Where?
That was the question Nico started with. His mind ringing, barely able string a coherent thought together. His eyes not believing the facts in front of him. His heart lodged somewhere in his throat, every beat feeling like it was making it harder and harder to breathe. His vision blurring at the edges, feeling like he was losing track of his thoughts the longer he tried to focus on them.
Where?
That was the question that helped to keep him grounded. The question that helped him grab his wayward thoughts and arrange them into something he could work with.
Where was she?
The very first thing he had done after receiving the call, was go to the upscale boutique she and Lorenzo had been shopping at. Charging in like a rhino on a rampage. All of his usual finesse nowhere in sight. Leaving nothing but ice and jagged edges in its wake. People had scattered in his wake. His people taking the liberty of closing the store doors before the work day was done. The manager, after a few choice words from Lorenzo (Nico had not trusted that he would not attack the quivering man), had been more than willing to let them carry on.
Questioning the attendants had yielded no results.
"We serve many clients on a daily basis. It is easier to help them while they are here and then forget about them once they leave," Had been the reply when he had questioned how none of them seemed to recall a customer who had been there less than an hour before.
At first it had seemed that the CCTV footage was also a bust. Only showing the moment Gianna entered the store, and not when she had left. They had checked the back door and the cameras from other neighbouring establishments, but upon seeing nothing they had gone back to the boutique.
Out of ideas and terrified he might start torturing innocent people, Nico had watched the footage from the store again. And that was when he had finally spotted her.
Her disguise was so good it was on the third repeat that Nico had seen her. He had stopped looking for her face in the crowd, focusing instead on movements and body shape. Mentally kicking himself for having forgotten such a simple thing.
With that, she had been easy enough to spot. He would know her walk and the shape of her anywhere. Even with her face hidden beneath a large hat and glasses, a silk scarf around her neck. Clothes that she had no doubt hidden beneath the bulky coat she had worn to the store. She had entered through the changing rooms, switched outfits and gotten out through the restrooms at the on the other side of the store. Walking right past Lorenzo who had still been staring at the changing room doors.
By that point the how, was clear as day for anyone to see. What was important was catching up with her as soon as possible, but by then it was too late. No one had seen a woman matching her description. Nor had they seen anyone in the clothes she had worn out of the boutique.
The mafia being given the slip by a pregnant tailor. Would wonders ever cease?
An hour of searching turned into two, then three, until night came and they were still searching. Nico had eyes and ears everywhere, but no one had seen anything.
He was using so much manpower on the search that Andre had come to see him personally. Entering Nico's home office, where he was spearheading the search from, without knocking.
"I will admit, Gianna in the brief time we met, seemed like a lovely woman. But it is not a good look for the don to be burning resources over one woman,"
"Give me one good reason why this is so important or we are going to have to stop," Nico had looked at his consigliere, not knowing where to start, but his mouth had decided for him.
"She is pregnant," He reached into his pocket, pulling out the picture from the doctor's appointment and handing it over. Andre was quiet for a long while, staring at the unidentifiable blob that was Nico's baby, his eyes soft. When he spoke, it was to ask a question Nico had been wilfully ignoring.
"Why did she leave then?" The words were merely curious, but Nico still felt them like an accusation.
His mind going back to a part of the day he wanted to forget. Taking him to the first few minutes when he had finally returned home and had gone upstairs, going into the guest bedroom Gianna was using. He had gone there hoping Gianna had at least left a note explaining her actions, there had been none. To his surprise, while there had been nothing in Gianna's room, there had been something in his. What she had left that had cancelled out his belief that his behaviour towards her had made her run away. His treatment of her might have played a part, but the evidence on his bed had shown what had finally driven her over the edge.
The straw that broke the camel's back had been a piece of paper. The custody agreement.
He had gotten careless, left his drawer unlocked, and she had gotten into his room while he was away and seen it. Most likely when she had gone for the notebook with his suit measurements in it. The one he had placed in the same drawer as the agreement back when things were still good between them.
She had not tried to hide the fact that she had been through his stuff. The notebook had been thrown on the floor. The custody agreement left on the bed, torn to pieces. If she could have, Nico got the feeling she would have burned it and left the ashes on the sheets.
Looking over at his advisor, it was tempting to tell him of Gianna's deception. Of how she had kept sleeping with him for months, all the while knowing that he was most likely wasting his time. But Nico held his tongue, Andre did not know Gianna, they had only talked for less than a minute. If his first true impression of her was that of a deceitful person, she would be forever tainted. No matter what happened after, Andre would always be giving her side eyes, distrustful.
So rather than go into that, he looked his consigliere in the eye and only told him the catalyst of the current crisis.
"I was going to take the child after it was born. She found out and took off,"
At the explanation, Andre stood, walking around the desk and crouching next to Nico.
"This is a mess, you know that right," Nico nodded, not shrugging off the older man's hand as it came to rest on his shoulder.
"I know Andre, I know. But I have no idea how to fix it," His voice wobbled at the end, the tight control he'd had over his emotions the whole day slipping.
"First, we are going to call off the search. Tell everyone she has been found. After that have only Lorenzo on the job, too many people means too many mouths talking," Nico nodded, Andre was right, he had behaved irrationally. If so many of his people were out and about, the other families would get antsy. Antsy crime families were never a good thing. Especially with Sergei still testing out his claws. It would be foolish to give him an excuse to attack.
"Do it," He said, and Andre left with a kiss to his cheek and a firm squeeze to his shoulder.
"Hang in there, Nico, we will get them back, it is just a matter of time,"
Once Andre was gone, Nico took a bottle of wine and left the office. He would allow himself one night and one night only to fall apart. Afterwards he would put his emotional baggage away keep moving forward.
He never made it to his bedroom. Instead he ended up in the guest bedroom. Curled up in sheets that smelled like Gianna, holding one of her dresses close, taking long sniffs from it as he cried. The first bottle of wine long gone, the second one almost half way there.
She had left with the clothes on her back. Was she warm enough? Was she safe? Had she eaten? Did she have a place to sleep, to rest?
The questions plagued him until he fell asleep. And they were still there in the morning. Going unanswered like the phone Gianna had left at the boutique.
It was a form of pain Nico had never felt before and he wished to never feel it again. But the longer Gianna remained missing, the more his heart hurt.
He was mourning a living woman. Crying for his unborn child. An unborn child he would never meet if Gianna remained missing. A terrifying thought, he did not like it one bit. But the longer the hours dragged on, the more it was becoming a reality.