Silence. An absolute pin drop silence.

Some of the men had their food hanging in the air while some kept pouring water in a full glass and I actually saw a man choking on his food, his face had turned into an ugly shade of red then he passed out on his chair.

I rolled my eyes. "I was expecting you guys to shout 'yes!' but never mind. I guess that was a one time thing."

It was like an eye opening moment for the men and they quickly started arranging the plates, glasses, their chairs and themselves by straightening up their ties and posture like a pure gentlemen they were. I kept playing with a strand of my hair with a toothy smile on my face and watched them making things in order and presentable.

"Where should I sit?" I thought out loud, tapping my chin and believe it or not over twenty men got up and offered me their seats.

So gentlemanly!

Confidently, I took long strides towards the Agostini brothers and stood beside one.

"Get up." I ordered.

Adrian gawked at me. "Are you out of your mind? This is my usual seat. I have been sitting here ever since I was a child."

"And I'm a guest at your usual dinner," I leaned towards his ear and whispered, "daddy."

Pink stains tainted on his cheeks. "Amelia... don't." He warned but it came out more like a beg.

"Daddy, please?" I batted my eyelashes innocently and tickled a spot behind his ear.

"Eek!" He squirmed and got up from his chair. "That's it! It's all yours. I'll grab another chair."

I grinned devilishly and made myself comfortable on the chair.

"Just so you know..." Adrian pulled out another chair and sat beside me, his eyes filled with mischievousness. "I farted in that seat minutes ago."

"I picked my nose and didn't wash my hand." I flashed him my hand, the same hand which I touched him only a mere seconds. The colour of his face drained in a very strange manner and he refrained himself from touching his ear.

My eyes went to the men who were watching me as if I was sent from Heaven itself. All dreamy eyed and shocked.

"God! I'm so hungry." I groaned loudly and picked up a new plate. The men watched me taking two full portions of lasagna and I rolled my eyes again. "What? Can't a girl eat to her heart's desire? Go on, carry on with your meals."

A man whom I recognised in the party was sitting in front of me, slightly leaned forward. "You can, signorina. We like women who love to eat, but... we haven't had a woman dining with us in ages."

I could easily guess who was the last woman who had dinner with these men.

I smiled at the man. "Do tell me, signore, what is your name? I haven't had the chance to learn the names last time we met."

"It's Piero, signorina." He smiled back.

"Pie."

"No, Piero."

"Piero the Pie." I cooed.

His smile didn't reach his eyes anymore. It had become forced and I realised that this man had a strong attachment to his name. "Si, signorina. It's Pie."

I kept my elbows on the table and sighed dreamily. "Well, Piero, do you mind if I join you guys tonight?"

He laughed nervously. "I don't think I have a saying in this, but you should ask capo who is sitting right beside you."

I didn't even bother to glance at the man beside me. "No, Piero. I don't need his permission anymore. I just want to know if you guys mind my presence."

He exchanged a quick look with the man beside me then looked around the table. "I...I don't think so, signorina. You're welcome to join us."

"Perfect!" I exclaimed. "Let's eat."

The silent tensed atmosphere around us eased by low murmurs and clinking of plates and glasses as we began our dinner. I was having the time of my life but then I dropped my spoon on the floor when I felt a warm hand moving up and drawing imaginary circles on my inner thigh.

My breathing became erratic and my hand trembled as I took another spoon. I looked around the table and saw that the men were engaged in their food and talking to each other in low murmurs. Even Adrian who was sitting right beside me was engrossed with his food.

I shuddered slightly when I felt his breath fanning on my ear. Jesus, what is wrong with me? I am strong, not so independent yet and ambitious. I will not be affected by a simple touch of this man!

"You're late!" He hissed in my ear. "Why are you late?"

"I...um..." I bit my lower lip and tried to calm my overwhelming senses. "I-I was just searching for some college courses. Didn't realise that time would pass so soon."

"And what the fuck are you wearing?" He hissed again, his hands smoothly running down to my knee and slowly trailing up to my inner thighs. "Didn't I tell you to change?"

I gulped. "Y-Yes. I forgot."

He squeezed my thigh slightly and damn it felt so good. "So you decided to flash your legs to every man present in this room?"

"I-It's not like that. Th-They have seen me in shorts before." I sucked in a sharp breath when his hand slipped into my night shorts for a mere second then pulled out and rested on my inner thigh, but he was close, so damn close into slipping his hand again.

"Oh really?" Oh sweet mother of Jesus, who is this person? He sounds like capo, but he is neither the man I talked with only an hour or two ago nor the monster I had known for months.

"Yes." I tried to push his hand in vain as I looked around to check if anybody was watching us and thankfully the men as well as Adrian here loved food very much. "Ca-capo... your hand..."

"Tell me Amy," He whispered huskily in my ear. My body turned rigid and goosebumps arose on my skin. "The men might have seen you in those shorts before, but has anybody touched you like this?" His hand slipped inside my shorts again and it stopped right there. My breath hitched and it made me writhe into the seat. "Has anybody made you feel all hot and desirable?"

Unable to speak any words, I ended up shaking my head. What happened to the part where I thought these shorts won't be a bother to me? I have no idea.

"Don't wear those shorts in front of my men again, Amy. I do not like it." He growled like a man who was possessed by some demon and pulled out his hand from my shorts, but it rested on my thigh again.

From my other side, I felt somebody lean to my ear and whisper, "I am totally ignoring you guys."

My eyes widened in surprise. I pushed away the hand from my thigh and shot the brothers a glare.

"You..." I pointed an accusing finger at an innocent looking Adrian, "Stop eavesdropping and you..." I turned to capo who was casually drinking his water, acting oblivious to what he was doing right now, "Don't you ever do that again unless you want me to stab you with a fork!"

"Do what?" He asked curiously. "Do tell me, what was I doing?"

My cheeks turned red. I was the center of attention again and every man in this room was waiting to know what his boss was doing with me. I didn't had the courage to tell them nor the courage to face the embarrassment. My purpose here was different than this.

"N-Nothing." I stammered, "Absolutely nothing. Carry on with your dinner."

The table went back to its usual atmosphere and I tried to join in the conversations the men were having.

Tried.

I have absolutely no idea what they are talking about! I don't know who Cocaina and Droghe are. They do sound like pretty important people but for the love of God, talk some sensible English shit with me! I also learnt that capo doesn't like speaking much during his meals because he was silent all the freaking time. Adrian tried to entertain me but how long would that poor guy would keep up with his acts? It clearly looked like he wanted nothing but to devour his food.

The situation was getting awkward and out of hand. This is not what I was expecting.

"Boys, can I ask you a question?" I leaned on my chair with a glass of water in my hand.

Their attention was on me again.

"Do you guys be all fun and party loving only when you are drunk?" I asked quizzically.

I got some low responses of 'no', 'fuck no' and 'of course not'.

I banged my hand on the table. "Then why the hell are guys acting so boring here? I was expecting you guys to be rocking, you know, and I'm getting this old grandpa attitude from you instead."

"Are you insulting us, signorina?" One of the men asked.

"Si." I answered, smirking. "I am insulting you for being boring so what are you going to do about it?"

The men remained silent.

"That's what I was expecting." I muttered and thought of ways to get them talking and laughing with me.

Throw another party right now, right here like last time? I can't do that if the Agostini brothers are with them-of course! Why didn't I think of this before?!

"Yo capo?" I grinned mischievously.

He looked at me as if I had grown two heads. "What?"

"Get out."

His jaw clenched. "Mi scusi?"

"You heard me. Get. Out. Shoo." The whole table went deadly silent and exact one hundred and two pairs of eyes, including mine were on the boss.

His eyes were blazing in anger. "Do. Not. Shoo. At. Me."

Oh shit, I pissed him off. Not with this Do-not-do-anything-at-me again!

"Please?" I asked politely. "Please get out of here."

"No."

"How do you say this?" I muttered.

"What?"

"Um, pretty please?" I can't have a proper chat with the men if he is here! They all respect and fear him unlike me who insults him whenever I feel like it.

His eyes had a knowing glint yet he refused to move. I turned to Adrian, mentally begging him to help me.

He gave me a look of disapproval. I showed him my puppy dog eyes and he face palmed himself.

"Um, fratello?" The capo hummed in response and next four minutes fifteen seconds were nonstop rambling and shouting in Italian between the two brothers and my poor ears went numb because my stupid self was sitting in between them.

Then the capo got up from his chair and stormed out of the room. Adrian followed him but stopped at the door.

"One hour." He looked over his shoulder. "You better make good use of that." Then he left the room, leaving me alone with a hundred stunned men.

And I was making a huge smiley face.

"So boys," I folded my arms and wiggled my eyebrows. "What was I saying about you being boring?"

****

"Awww, she is so cute! How old is she?"

"Four months." Piero replied and took away the small photo from my grasp then put it in his wallet.

"Do you visit your family very often?" I asked curiously.

"Si, every weekend. But this weekend capo wanted me to stay for some work." He explained.

"Ooh. And your wife?"

"Pregnant again." I both burst out laughing. That would be his baby number five. Piero is a family man.

"Okay, okay! I got one!" Gerald, one of the men shouted and gained our attention. "Three years ago. Paris. In the Eiffel tower."

"No way!" I screamed in shock. "You stole from the tower?! What did you steal? A mini tower?"

Then we all burst out laughing and Gerald went in shock because I was correct.

Just like I expected, we all clicked right away as soon as the brothers left. It was common knowledge that you don't joke around in front of your superiors and I didn't realise it sooner. Our food was half eaten and long forgotten and we were simply chatting along, laughing and talking about times where they did something bad...in a fun way and I had to guess what it is.

"I got one!" Antonio, another man here shouted. "Four days ago. Rome. In a coffee shop."

I gasped dramatically, covering my mouth and pointed an accusing finger at him. "You stole a cup of coffee?!"

He grinned. "No, signorina. I stole the cream out of a cupcake."

"Why would you do that?! The cream is the most amazing part of a cupcake!" I whined.

The men here have done some very crazy things. Stealing a battery out of a brand new cell phone instead of the phone itself, a lock from a bridge full of locks instead of buying one because they broke their own lock and didn't wanted to spend any money and needles without any thread because they had lost their patience in putting the thread in the needle and ended up breaking the poor needle.

My jaws were paining by laughing too much as Harry, the oldest man present in the room with a thriving age of fifty talked about how he stole a bottle of milk from a baby, drank it and later found that it was mother's milk.

"How much time do we have left?" I asked, panting heavily.

The men checked their watches. "Ten more minutes."

"I really had fun with you guys tonight. Even though the first half was boring, I really enjoyed this hour." I raised my glass of water and the men raised their glasses of low content alcohol and water. "Thank you, for letting me join you guys for dinner tonight."

"Cheers." We clinked our glasses with each other.

"Speaking of dinner," I kept my glass on the table. "I actually wanted to talk to you boys about some issue."

"Sure, go ahead." Piero said.

I crossed my arms. "Is it true that you guys burnt a man over an argument of chicken?"

The room went silent again.

"Then it's true." I flung my arms up in the air in exasperation. "What is wrong with you guys?! You can't harm an innocent over an argument of chicken! He was our chef."

"But he did try to put up a fight with us." I heard somebody grunt in annoyance.

"That doesn't mean that you'll kill the person." I voiced out. "Try to talk like adults because that's what you guys are. You have no control over your anger and you have very less patience. The women working here are suffering because of that. I have seen people disappearing forever and there's nothing we can do. Just try to notch it down guys. I would really appreciate that."

"Okay." Antonio shrugged and I saw a few men nodding their heads in understanding. "We can do that."

"That's it?" I gasped in surprise.

"Si, signorina Jones. If you say that our behaviour is too much for the women, we'll try our best to keep it down." Antonio said. "And we do apologise for our harsh behaviour, but there's nothing we can do about it. This has been going on for years and we do not know how it began. We have been simply following it because that's what we do."

"What do you mean?" I asked, confused about this new piece of information.

"Tony is right, signorina!" Harry coughed and drank his glass of water. "This has been going on even before I joined the famiglia and that was almost twenty years ago. We do respect the women working here very much. They are the ones who keep this mansion up to its original glory, isn't that right gentlemen?"

The rest of the men raised their glasses saying 'yes', 'absolutely right!' and some had even started complimenting the good work the housekeepers had done in cleaning and arranging their rooms.

"We might be good with you, signorina Jones." Piero said with a genuine smile on his face. "But we are also bad and nobody can change that. In the end, we are all humans with a heart."

The door of the dining room opened and the Agostini brothers came back. Capo was having a scowl on his face as he took a seat beside me and Adrian did the same.

"All done with your chit chat?" He asked in a low voice, keeping his eyes straight to the men who were now back to eating and talking to each other in murmurs, pretending as if they had never had a good time.

"Yes." My voice sounded distant to me.

"Are you all right, Amy?" Adrian whispered from the other side and tapped my shoulders.

I blinked rapidly and gave him one of my brightest smile. "Yes, Adrian. I am fine."

I had lost my appetite after that. I kept nibbling and tearing the food into bits and pieces. The recent conversation I had with the men kept replaying in my mind.

The men genuinely care about the housekeepers of this mansion and we were told that they were dangerous and aggressive.

Lies. Everything was a lie.

The housekeepers in the house of Agostini had been living in a goddamn lie for years because there was something or rather someone who wanted them to live in fear and stay away from the men.

And I was going to find out who and why.

Author's note:

One guess, who?

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