THE REALM OF boredom was a dangerous place.

At least it was for Cory.

“Joe.”

“Mmm.”

“Hey,” Cory said, once more attempting to get Joe to as much as look at him.

It didn’t work.

Fuckhead.

“Joe, I’m serious.”

“Yep.”

He was going to punch his brother.

Hard.

“Joe.”

He didn’t even glance up over the newspaper in his hands. Joe did, however, smile and voice his thanks when his wife came around to the head of the table to set a mug with rolling steam coming off the rim down in front of him. Liliana headed back across the kitchen but now rhythmically patted the back of her two-month-old son sleeping against her chest. A task that was made easier after she delivered her husband’s coffee.

He smiled at the sight of his nephew.

Babies weren’t so hard to understand even if they were foreign creatures in a lot of ways. Who wouldn’t want to be constantly warm, fed, comfortable, and happy if one was new to a big world and nothing seemed to make sense?

Shit, yeah.

Babies knew what was up.

Damian Joe “DJ” Rossi.

The first of his generation.

Cory loved that kid to death already, and he didn’t even do anything at this point but cry, sleep, and eat. It was only the love he had for his nephew that stopped him from reaching across the table to punch Joe in the shoulder when he deliberately ignored his younger brother.

A few years ago, that wouldn’t have surprised anybody. Hell, a few months ago Cory still could have been provoked into doing something crazy to Joe just to make his brother pay attention to him at any given moment that he felt the need. His ma, Lily, liked to say he had a bad case of middle child syndrome. The one-year age gap between Cory and his older brother made them closer than most siblings; they did everything together growing up and when they moved into adulthood. The nine- and ten-year gap between Joe and Cory and their younger sister, Monica, fostered an older brother complex that the world would just have to get used to.

But the brothers …

Joe always looked out for Cory.

Not that he had to.

Or fuck, maybe he did.

Except—

Cory glanced his sleeping nephew’s way once more—the baby was starting to blink awake as his mother wiped down a counter. He would hate to make the little guy cry when Joe cursed Cory out for being a shit. So, he kept his fists and annoyance to himself.

Later, though … He could always get his brother back later.

“Have you listened to anything I’ve said to you in the last five minutes?” Cory asked, his hand faster than Joe’s when he snatched the newspaper out of his brother’s grasp before he held it out of reach entirely. “Because I know you’re not that fucking checked out, bro.”

Joe glared.

He didn’t get the chance to speak, though.

“Language,” came a quiet, feminine call from across the kitchen. Just as quickly, Liliana cooed to the baby, “How was that nap, bambino?”

Goddammit. He considered rolling his eyes. Except he liked his brother’s wife.

Cory grinned at Joe instead while saying to Liliana, “Sorry, Lil.”

“Mmhmm.”

“Give me the newspaper,” Joe muttered while holding out a hand, waiting.

He answered that with a shake of the newspaper, taunting his brother. “Talk to me first. I’ve got plans.”

“You always have some kind of fuc—”

Joe’s gaze cut to the side where Liliana watched them from behind the kitchen island like she was daring one of them to start up with their usual nonsense. Cory was being good; Scout’s fucking honor and all that shit. It was just Joe who seemed to forget where he was. Liliana’s new thing about correcting bad language in her house—although she’d never liked them swearing in the kitchen to begin with—made her seem more like Joe and Cory’s mother than she already did.

And that said something. Considering their mother’s name was Lily and all.

Cory had learned it was better to not point those things out to his brother. Despite what people liked to think and say about him, he wasn’t dumb. Foolish at times because often, that’s when he had the most fun. Not stupid, though. He didn’t like to wake up with aching bones, so he kept his mouth shut to his brother about how he’d basically married a woman who was a lot like their mother.

See?

Smart.

“You always have a plan, Cory. The problem is you rarely follow said plans because apparently why bother and then you cause a bunch of shi—problems.” Joe let out a hard sigh with his gaze blazing when Cory laughed at his almost slip-up again. “Knock it off—Damian barely slept last night. He’s teething. I’m tired.”

“That’s a little early, yeah?”

Joe’s brow crinkled. “What?”

“Isn’t he young for teeth?”

“Apparently not,” Liliana answered for her husband.

Cory hadn’t taken his gaze off his brother. He decided to scale back his usual personality just a touch or two. At least for the moment. Sometimes, Joe was owed a break from his younger brother’s constant torment, regardless of how much personal enjoyment Cory gained from it.

Screw it, he thought.

Forget the new property he wanted to buy with his brother to add to their portfolio. They could get back to the legal side of their business on another day. Besides, they weren’t even supposed to be opening anything new for a while. He’d promised their mother to give Joe a break on any new real estate or other business ventures until they settled in with the new baby. It made sense, but this particular business that was up for sale had been too good to pass up. Except he would. He wanted to do something else for his brother instead. Joe could use some fun.

Right?

“You need a break,” he said to Joe, switching tactics and topics in his next breath. Now he had a better idea, and the follow-through to get it done would probably be a lot easier. “Let’s go to High Life tonight.”

“We opened that club months ago, and it’s still packed full every night.”

“Good business, right?” Cory pointed at his temple. “Told you that one would be a banger.”

And he was right, like with most of their business ventures.

“So, come and enjoy the place with me tonight,” Cory said. “You didn’t even open it with me.”

“My son was three days old.” Joe scoffed. “Are you serious? I’ve got a newborn here, man. I’m not going to party all night while my wife chills with a teething baby.”

“That would be a dick move.”

Something their father, also named Damian, would have his sons’ balls for. He liked to tell the brothers that good men were made at home serving their wives and not in the streets with people who often forgot their morals for the sake of business. For a simple reason, too. Another man might not trust someone based on the things they knew from the streets, but the way a man treated his wife—publicly and privately—would always say a lot about his character.

It was a poignant statement. Considering his father was one of the three highest seated men in the Chicago mob—the Outfit—it really said something coming from him.

Cory kept it in mind. Not that he had a wife to remember it for. He also wasn’t currently looking for one. Besides, one married Rossi brother was enough.

“Except you could use a break,” Liliana spoke up, “and all he really wants is me at night, anyway, Joe. Why not go out and get away from … everything?”

He pointed in his brother’s wife’s direction, saying, “See. What was it you told me last week? The Outfit is running you dead, man.”

Joe said nothing, but he didn’t have to when the two faced one another at the table. Nothing he told his brother was a lie. The Outfit had both men by the throats when it came to work. That happened when one looked to move up in the mob, and they came from a family like theirs.

They never said as much, sure. It wasn’t like they ever spoke about their intentions with the mob. Everything was always unsaid, but just understood. He blamed that on the fact this was all they ever knew.

Their uncles? In the mob. One, a boss. The other, sitting next to their father so that the two could act as the right and left hand of the man running the whole criminal organization.

Where else were they going but in? They didn’t need to say it.

His brother was already in. Joe just wanted … a seat at the table, now. Cory, on the other hand, kept busy with his Uncle Theo and the man’s arms and substance dealing he had going on in the city and elsewhere. All he ever did was work now, too.

Damn, he hadn’t even gotten a new tattoo to add to his collection of full sleeves, a throat and chest piece, and an almost finished back piece, too. That was unheard of for him—every six to eight weeks of healing, and Cory was back in for another round in an artist’s chair. His lack of new ink spoke to how busy he’d constantly been.

Joe was no better. Hadn’t they earned a break?

Cory gave Joe a grin. “So, are we going out tonight like old time’s sake, or …?”

“You know I’d feel better if I just got to have a damn nap, right?” Joe asked back.

That time, Liliana didn’t correct his language. She did laugh, though.

“I mean, yeah,” Cory returned, shrugging under his leather jacket, “but what’s the fun of being twenty-five—”

“You’re twenty-five.”

“Twenty-six,” Cory corrected, cursing himself internally because no doubt, Joe was onto his scheme.

“Really, you just want to go out tonight, but you want me to come with you, right?” Joe asked. “That’s what this whole thing was about, wasn’t it?”

Well …

Cory looked Liliana’s way for help.

She always did.

It’s why he liked her the most. Next to his brother marrying her and all.

“He does need a break, doesn’t he?” Cory asked. “You said it first, Lil.”

“He does.”

He went back to his brother. “The wife spoke. I’m really just trying to follow her wishes.” His brother still said nothing. “Come on, Joe, all I do is work … that’s all you ever do anymore, too. Take a night.”

Joe shook his head. “You’re something, man. I hope you know that.”

He did.

All too well.