RYAN'S POV
We heard the footsteps as our expected guests walked into the house.
I feel Rico from beside me bump his shoulder against mine to get my attention. When I look over at him, he whispers, "so that was your idea of a show, huh?"
I grin at him and whisper back, "Yeah. I have to show them how strong I am."
"We should probably go down, huh?" Rico whispers the question to me and I see him grow nervous.
I smile softly at him before I take his hand in mine, which garnered his attention, and whispered to him, "It will be okay. I know it will. And if it's not, then all you have to do is tell me and I will get us all out of there and make sure they don't find us, okay?"
I see him grin up at me while he shakes his head. "You always have to be the overprotective sister, don't you? Do you ever wanna take a break?"
"No, I'm good!" I say with a cheeky smile.
I then stand up and pull Rico up with me. "Alright let's go."
As we were walking through the hall, the lack of conversation downstairs did not go unnoticed. To break the tension that was obviously there, Rico decides to speak as we are walking down the stairs. "I can't believe you made me hit my head on the wall."
I scoff and roll my eyes. "Shut up. I didn't mean to."
We finally walk into the living room where the two sofas that are facing each other are being occupied. One with two men I suppose are my father and older brother, the other with an annoyed looking Rudy. I walk over to the couch that Rudy is sitting on and ruffle his hair, which causes him to scowl at me, before I sit down next to him, while Rico sits on my other side, kind of leaning into my touch.
Everyone is silent for a couple of moments, nobody knowing how to break the silence.
Finally, I decided to speak which seems to break the other two men in the room out of their trance. "Alright. I guess we will start with introductions. I am Ryan, the eldest out of the three of us. This," I gesture to Rudy, "is Rudy. He is the middle child and also the grumpy one." This earns me a whack with the back of his hand onto my shoulder. Which hurts more than it should because he is wearing rings. "Ow bitch. Your rings fucking hurt." I complain to which my efforts for sympathy are rewarded with a shrug. "And this," I gesture to Rico, "is Rico. He is the youngest and the most energetic person I have ever met in my life." I finish and Rico looks at me with a fake offended face to which I smile and ruffle his hair. Which earns me a glare as he tries to fix his hair back to the way he had styled it.
I turn to look at my supposed family to see them looking at us with fond smiles. I quickly wipe any emotion from my face and look down.
Someone clearing their throat draws me back to the two men in front of us. It was the younger one of the two, my brother. "This is our father," He gestures to the man beside him, "Alessio. I am your oldest brother, Alessandro. I am 26." I nod my head, pretending that I didn't know anything that they were telling me.
Then, Rudy deciding to also play oblivious, speaks in a monotone and deep voice which seems to take the other two men by surprise. "You said oldest brother. How many more do we have?"
We obviously have six more, as I said before, we already know everything.
"You have six other brothers, beside me. All of which are older than you. Oldest from youngest, Lorenzo, 25. Christopher, 24. Marco, 20. Xander and Xavier which are twins, they are 18. And then Matteo, he is 17." I nod my head along to what he is saying.
Suddenly, our father speaks up for the first time since Rico and I had walked into the room. And from Rudy's slightly shocked expression, since he had opened the door. "Why did you run? Why did you try and hide?"
Okay then. Straight to business I suppose.
I turn to my twins to see them already looking me. First, I look to Rico, silently asking him if I can tell them that we weren't really hiding. He instantly nods his head. Then, I look to Rudy and do the same. He shakes his head no. I raise my eyebrow telling him to think again. He seems to contemplate it for a few seconds before slowly nodding his head.
I turn to look at our new 'family' to see them watching and studying the interaction.
"To answer your first question, we ran because we didn't know what to do. We thought that given that when they told us that we had family, we knew we had an hour head start, so why not use it? Your second question, we didn't hide from you." I don't elaborate on my answer because I don't know how much I want them to know.
But of course, it didn't work out like that for me.
"Elaborate. Because it sure did look like you were hiding." He says a bit more sternly.
I lean back in my chair and relax a bit. "Simple, really. It is in the basic necessities of finding someone. The police had our license plates, so you tracked them to Los Angeles. Then you found the bikes were ditched in the ally-way, so you decided to check the city cameras. There, you saw that every single street we walked down had cameras who showed you where we were." I end with a little shrug. "It did take you a lot longer to find us than I thought it would take you. I got bored just sitting here."
Both of the men look completely baffled by my response to their question.
"How did you know we would go looking for you?" This time, Alessandro asked the question. He seems to just want to know how my brain works, maybe he is just simply testing my intelligence level.
"I didn't. It was kind of a test. If you went through the lengths of trying to find us yourselves, then we would go with you. No gripe and no problems. However, if you would have hired someone to find us than I would have made sure you couldn't find us." I pause wondering if I truly want to scare them at all. "Plus, we know who you are." I mention nonchalantly, but that sentence causes both of the men to stiffen up.
Alessandro now talks calmly and cautiously. "And who, do tell, are we?"
I smirk on the inside because my plan worked wonderfully, and it was hilarious. "Famous businessmen...?" I question like it is obvious, but also confused that he was even asking the question. I immediately see both of them take sighs of relief.
They don't want us to know...
Interesting...
"Alright since you guys seem to have a lot of questions, let's do rapid fire. You ask questions, I answer quickly. But I also have the chance to skip them. Deal?" I propose as I play with a now sleeping Rico's hair because he laid his head in my lap.
"Alright." My 'father' said while Alessandro nods his head in agreement.
"Where did you get all the money for those bikes and the houses?"
"Skip." I say because I am not telling them about Arlo.
"How do you know so much about tracking people down?"
"Old job." I shrug. Not a lie.
"Where did you learn how to ride your motorcycles?"
I debate answering this in my head, apparently too long because Rudy speaks up before I can say anything. "We have some friends." Not a lie.
"Where is Maria?"
"Never met her." Not a lie, technically.
They both look at each other before my 'father' speaks in a softer voice. "What do you mean, tesoro?"
(Treasure)
I decide to ignore the nickname he gave me. "We grew up in the orphanage. We were abandoned there when we were a couple of days old. The only thing we were left with were who was born first, our names, and our birth certificates. After that it was in and out of foster homes. Some good, some not. I tried to find her, but I couldn't." I shrug my shoulders like it is no big deal, but it is. Mothers shouldn't abandon their children. Especially since I now know we have seven older brothers, which seems like they grew up with a mother.
They look at me with pity.
I hate pity.
"Where did you get the scar?" Alessio is talking about the scar that goes through my eyebrow.
I freeze in my place. Memories come flashing back.
No no no.
I shake out of it. "I am going to go put Rico to bed." I point to the hall on the bottom floor that has two guest rooms. "You can have those guest rooms. Rudy, you should go to bed too." He nods his head as I effortlessly pick up my younger brother and carry him upstairs, leaving Alessio and Alessandro downstairs to do whatever they want.
ALESSANDRO'S POV
We watch in shock as my little sister, my sorellina, effortlessly picks up her younger brother bridal style. Granted, he is a gangly kid, but he has at least four inches on her. She seems to be about 5'9 and Rico is at the very least 6'0. Rudy follows behind them, but not before taking one more wary glance at us.
(Little sister)
I look over to my father and he nods, understanding that I wanted to talk where the triplets could not hear us.
We both walk down the hallway that we were pointed towards and open our own doors which lead to some beautiful rooms, no matter how average they might be.
After a couple of minutes, of which I chose the time to look around the room for listening devices or cameras, sue me because of my habits, I hear a knock on my door, to which I open it and see my father, and I invite him in.
"I think we should call Lorenzo to have this conversation with him on the phone." I state and he nods his head while calling his second oldest son.
Ring.
Ring.
Ring.
"Hello?" A peppy sounding Enzo answers the phone.
"Hey Enzo." My dad says. "We just met the triplets and-"
"Oh my god! Tell me all about them!" Lorenzo interrupts before dad could say anything else.
"Enzo, listen." I say because I want to tell him about the fact that we have a little sister. "We had quite the shock when we met them. The oldest, Ryan, is not a boy like we thought. She is a girl." I say and the phone in met with complete silence. Suddenly, I hear the running of footsteps. I furrow my eyebrows in confusion. "Enzo?"
I hear a door on the other side of the phone open and hear the noise of the gaming room, where the younger boys typically hang out. "Matteo, Xavier, Xander. Listen to Sandro. He and dad are on the phone and have some wonderful news! Sandro tell them!"
"Well we met the triplets and the eldest, Ryan, is a girl, not a boy like we thought." I say with a smile because I can't wait for my brothers reactions.
I hear a chorus of 'what!?' over the phone and grin to my dad who is already smiling fondly.
"Yeah," I continue talking, "They gave us a run for our money though. All three of the triplets fled San Diego and went to Los Angeles as a type of test I suppose. She left breadcrumbs for us to follow and eventually find them on purpose. She said if we didn't go through the work ourselves then she would have hidden herself and her brothers from us. She is smart, there is definitely something they are hiding."
"Yo my sister is a genius!" I hear Matteo yell.
"Unlike you." I hear Xander grumble followed by a smacking sound and an 'ow!'.
"Where are Chris and Marco? We have to tell them too." Dad says while I nod my head in agreement even though I know the other brothers can't see me.
I hear a chorus of footsteps running and a door opening. "Marco!" I hear Xavier shout. "Marco! We have a little sister and two more little brothers! Ryan is a girl!" I can hear the excitement in his voice.
In the background, I hear a 'wait really?' and then a whole lot of 'yes'.
"Where is Chris? We need to tell him too." Dad says, yet again.
From the other side of the phone I hear Enzo say, "uhhhh. Oh! He said he had to perform immediate heart surgery I believe. So, he will be here in another couple hours, I think. I can tell him then."
With my brothers still on the phone, I look towards dad. "Did you notice they all have accents?" I see my dad nodding.
Suddenly, and overly enthusiastic Xavier is heard on the phone. "What accents do they have?"
"I honestly couldn't tell. It seems like they move around a bunch. All their accents are little bit different though." I speak as I recall our conversation. "Ryan seemed to have a decently heavy French accent. But it was soft, as if she grew up there and moved away for a couple of years. Rudy seems to have a heavier German accent. We didn't hear Rico speak. He is the baby of their little family, so they did all the speaking for him. He even fell asleep in Ryan's lap." I shake my head even though I know most people I am talking to can't see it. "It is weird how they both have different accents though."
I let my thoughts trail of and then for the rest of the night, we continued to talk about the triplets informing them about their mannerisms and how they interacted with one another. Lorenzo was less than pleased to hear about how often they seemed to cuss, but he said he would work on it with them.
It was then time for them to go to sleep, since it was like 2 a.m. in New York, so we hung up the phone and we all went to sleep.