Happy Friday babies 🖤

Isaac's POV

"You're up early," I say as I walk into our home gym.

My dads already down here, running on one of the many treadmills..

"Couldn't sleep," he says, not bothering to slow down his pace.

I peek over at his timer once I've climbed onto the treadmill to his right to see that he's been running for almost an hour now. It's only 6 am.

I don't engage him in any more conversation after that. I turn my machine on increasing the speed and begin to run along beside him.

About fifteen minutes pass by when I'm breaking our tedious silence, remembering to keep my promise to my wife, that I'll attempt to try and talk with him. "Mom talk to you yet?"

He shakes his head silently.

"Hailey and I are moving out by the end of the week."

Pops smacks his hand on the emergency stop button, bringing his treadmill to an immediate stop.

He puts both of his hands on either side of his torso, attempting to catch his breath, "now why the hell would you say some shit like that?"

I look away from him, continuing to run, "because we have a life of our own, dad."

"As if I just didn't tell you that this family is in danger, Isaac."

Now I'm the one slamming my hand on the emergency stop button, "if there really are moles in this family then we're no safer here than we are in our own home."

He drops his voice to an almost whisper, "this is your home.. I just- I just got my family back, please don't leave son, I'll never get you back if you walk out of these doors."

I inhale a deep breath bitting the urge to say some snarky, petty, shit.

"That's exactly why I need to leave.."

He frowns.

"If I stay under the same roof as you then you definitely won't get me back. I need to leave in order to forgive you, Pops. I need mom to forgive you and let you back in because she wants to. She's only giving you the cold shoulder because I'm here, because I'm around."

"Isaac-"

"You weren't here!" I quickly talked over him. "I saw the instant relief in her eyes the second she saw you. You weren't here to see just how bad it was, how bad she was. I know for a fact that she's probably dying for you to hold her, dad.. I need to leave in order to save the family you left behind. I need my son to have both of his grandparents in his life. I'll be damned if we have to split holidays and birthdays because I couldn't learn to forgive you. I need to save my marriage while I still can, I need to put my wife and son first."

Pops nods his head quietly and is switching the subject, "I saw the log sheet for the cells last night.. You have Nathaniel down there?"

"Why the hell are you checking my log sheets?"

"Paper work," he shrugs. "Working on documents, they always brought the edge down when I had a shitty day. I didn't expect the login to work to be honest."

"I didn't have the need to change it, the only other person that knew them was dead."

"What's going on with your cousin? Why is he down there?"

"He won't stay in rehab so I created his own personal rehabilitation facility."

He snorts softly, "that's only gonna aggravate him even more, son. The second you let him out, the second he gets his freedom he's gonna go back down that same road. He needs to want to change for himself."

"So you didn't hold Emiliano down there against his will? Elias?"

Pops inhales a deep breath, "I want you to learn from my mistakes, Isaac. I want you to be more humane than I ever was. He's your family, your blood, don't treat him like an animal, don't treat those men the way I used to."

I stare quietly in his direction and he's instantly frowning a second later.

"What?"

I shake my head, "you're different is all."

He inhales a deep breath, slowly nodding his head in agreement as he gets off of the exercise machine, "I've had a lot of time with myself, a lot of time to get into my head, think about things."

I follow right behind him, walking over to where he has a couple water bottles sitting on a bench. "Why wouldn't you just say something? Why didn't you tell anyone, dad?"

"Because I intended on having her back in a few weeks," he hands me a bottle. "A month max when I first got the threat. Then everything started going downhill and I lost my priority in her. You became my priority, Hailey became my priority, it's why I wanted you to leave so bad after she got hurt. I couldn't worry about you guys while trying to worry about Veronica at the same time. Things just kept getting in the way and more threats kept piling on, I couldn't manage everything."

"Not alone you couldn't."

"I was afraid, Isaac," he admits, his voice growing softer. "It's been a very long time since someone's made me feel uncomfortable, like I didn't have hold of a situation, like I couldn't protect my family. I was scared and being the man I am, I didn't know how to ask for help, I was afraid of letting people in and making it so much worse."

"Pops-"

"I have a bounty on my head on the dark web," he blurts out and chills are instantly running up my back.

"Memo had it all set up. He'd been planning it. If he didn't come out alive I wouldn't either. I basically signed my own death certificate putting those bullets in his chest."

I remain quiet not knowing what to say, my chest suddenly feeling heavy.

"I found Cris months before the wedding. I had to get to him before the other families went after him, before they turned him against me. I had to come clean about his father in order to get him on our side. The sit down was just a play in the book to get me to his house so the other families could attack. They needed to think they won, that they had Roxwell on their end still, they needed to trust him.. I would end up dead, but on my terms. I dethrone myself rather than letting myself fall and end up six feet under, permanently."

"But Veronica-"

"Would eventually get rescued by Cris's team, he has guys inside, I had a plan, you were gonna get her back in one piece."

I inhale a deep breath, taking in everything my dad has just said and quickly take a step back when he takes one forward.

He sighs heavily, "this the heavy I was trying to save you from, this is the ugly I didn't want you anywhere near, the bullshit I wanted to protect you from. Me being back doesn't just put our lives at jeopardy, Isaac, it also puts Roxwell in danger. The family's are gonna put two and two together when word gets out that I'm alive and breathing, that he betrayed them and it's only gonna get worse."

I nod my head, "meaning we need to move fast."

He nods, "I don't want your mother or Hailey around when you decide to do the E&R."

Extract and Rescue.

"I don't want them at arm's reach."

"Hailey won't leave willingly without me and I don't want to lie to her, she already feels like she's losing me."

He nods, "then you do what you need to do to protect your family, son, you tell her everything if you need to. She will be in that safe house at the time of the extraction, even if that means I have to chain her down to a chair myself."

I snort softly and he's quickly frowning .

"What?"

"You're starting to sound like you're still the boss," I smile.

He forces air out through his nose, shaking his head, "this me being me, this is me protecting my family, me putting my foot down as her father in law, regardless of whether she likes it or not."

"Speaking of still being the boss, I need you to take over this weekend."

He immediately frowns, "take over? What do you mean?"

"Hailey wants one single day with me so I wanna go away for the weekend before everything starts going to shit. I need these next few days to try and fix the shit show of a husband I've been, I want her to truly enjoy herself before confining her to the house."

"Then ask Ricci, this is why you have a second in command, Isaac."

"Dion has a daughter, I don't want to strip him from the father daughter time they'll barely have already."

"And I have a wife," he grumbles. "At least I still think I do. Your marriage isn't the only one that needs fixing, son."

"I'm asking you for two fucking days, Pops, you can't give me two fucking days?!" I exclaim.

"Dominic-"

"Are you kidding me right now?!" I scoffed." I'm not asking Dominic, I'm fucking asking you!" I place my hands on my dads chest, shoving him back. "I don't trust him, I can't trust anyone right now, I barely trust you but you're all I have right now! Maybe if you hadn't kept me in the dark I could've had other people to lean on!"

"Fine!" He shouts. "Fucking aye man.."

"Get rid of the confirmed moles while we're gone and get confirmations and proof on any one else you have suspicions on. You obviously have a plan in mind since you had a stack of charts in my office."

He smirks, crossing his arms along his chest, "anything else boss man?"

I place my hand on the side of his arm, "start working on your apology, the second I get Nathaniel coherent enough we're telling him and Sal about Veronica. I'd want them in the E&R."

The blood from my father's face instantly drains making him a couple shades lighter and I'm leaning him alone with his thoughts as I head out of the home gym.

It's a little after 8 am once I'm out of the shower and dressed, ready for the day.

I kiss my half sleeping wife on the forehead before heading out the door, reminding her that she needs to get up and have breakfast, that she can't lie around in bed all day without eating.

She practically bolts out of bed when I tell her she should also probably start packing our bags because I have a surprise for her tomorrow, but I wasn't gonna tell her anything if she didn't show me proof of her breakfast.

Hailey would constantly make me send her pictures of food to prove to her that I had eaten throughout the day when we first started dating. Big mafia man has to eat, were her exact words.

It's nearly 8:30 in the morning by the time I'm pulling up to the warehouse and climbing out of my car.

A loud motorcycle engine behind me instantly grabs my attention. I turn to look back to find Ric parking a few parking spots away from my car.

He hops off of his bike and is quickly running in my direction, a backpack strapped to his back as he pulls his helmet off of his head.

I glance down at the watch on my wrist checking the time, "you're late," I say out loud.

He rushes over to me, smiling, "I know, I know, I'm sorry."

I roll my eyes, playfully shoving him away from me, "I'll get you off of the hook this once. I won't always be around to save you from Dominic's wrath."

"I know," he smiles. "Time genuinely slipped away from me, I was up late and kept snoozing my alarm."

"I'm assuming you had a good evening if you were up late?" I asked, walking beside each other now.

Ric immediately tries to hide the smirk on his face as he shrugs his shoulders. "It was decent, yours?"

"Ric.. you know damn well that I know where you spent most the night."

His smirk turns into a wide smile, a hint of a fucking blush on his cheeks.

"How's she doing?" I asked, referring to Paola, his sandbox crush.

I got multiple messages from the tech team last night that Ric was near hitting bounty lines and his location hadn't moved in over an hour, while Ian's and Aj's locations were back at home.

Dom immediately sent out a team to investigate the address and found Ric hanging out in a gated apartment complex; it didn't take them long to figure out who's name was under the lease, instantly sending me a file over on P.

I was happy for him, I knew how much the little girl we knew back then meant to him, and I'm assuming she still means a lot to him since he spent half the night at her place.

I was also wary of her though.

Brielle and Paola coming back into town around the same time back to back didn't sit right with me, too big of a coincidence if you ask me.

I didn't think it was possible but Ric's smile grows even more as he begins to talk about Paola.

"God, she's so beautiful, KP, and so independent now!" He exclaims. "She works three fucking jobs, three!"

I chuckle softly, "alright man, calm down, you're getting overly excited."

"She saw you and Red at the airport."

"Yeah?"

He nods as he reaches for one of the double doors in front of us, "she works in the Starbucks."

"I'm assuming she has no ties to daddy's money anymore if she's working three jobs?"

He shakes his head no.

"I'm happy for you, Ric, it's good seeing the old you again."

"Thanks, KP, I'm finally starting to feel like myself a little bit."

"I wanna talk to her,"I say as I walk into the warehouse and my men are instantly looking in my direction as we walk deeper into the building.

Ric immediately frowns.

"It's just a funny coincidence that two women in my men's life are suddenly back don't you think? I just wanna touch base with her I promise."

He nods his head, "I'll talk to her."

"Alright get away from me, I can't have the guys thinking you're getting special one on one with the boss," I joke, pushing Ric away.

He smiles and begins to walk away from me and I'm calling after him, "Ric!" He turns back to look at me. "ASAP, bring her to me, don't make me go looking for her."

He nods, "I gotchu," and turns to walk towards the back to the locker room.

"He's late," Dominic mumbles as I walk over to my office.

"You'll live, Dom."

He inhales a deep breath, no doubt probably mentally rolling his eyes as I walk into the office, walking around my desk.

"You need anything before I take off?"

"Yeah, get me a line set up for the weekend, please. Hailey and I are going out of town. Make sure to put Ric and Beans on it for sure, per my wife's request."

He nods, "you want Aj with Ric?"

I nod waving him off as I take a seat, "take Val off, I don't want any tension between him and Beanie. Put Metcalf with Beans so I can have all three dumb dumbs together."

He smiles, "what about the second truck?"

"I don't care, send me a list of who you pick."

"I'll send it over in an email in a few minutes."

"Have a good sleep," I say as I reach for the laptop in front of me.

Dominic takes off leaving me alone in the office and I instantly reach for the USB in my slacks, plugging it back into the MacBook.

The security screen pops up just like the last time and I'm typing in the same date from yesterday, a bunch of files quickly opening up on the screen.

I click on the file that I opened yesterday, my aunt's file and continue going through the whole thing, a nasty feeling already sitting in the lower pit of my stomach.

I continue to click through the images on the screen, my heart sinking deeper and deeper as I click onto a new picture.

There's a handful of pictures on this damn USB of my mom, of my mom and Jessica, of Nathaniel, Sal, of Hailey, of myself, even my dad.

We're out in the open, not having a single care in the world during our honeymoon and that instantly begins to make me sick. I hate how vulnerable we looked, how vulnerable we were, how I had no idea that my wife had predatory eyes on her.

I stay scrolling through the files, images, notes, for a good fifteen minutes, up until I decide that I need a break, a breath of fresh air.

I can't begin to imagine how my father felt holding something like this in for so long, I've only known bits and pieces for a couple days now and I'm already at my ends with it.

I shut the laptop close and pulled the USB out, sticking it back into my slacks. My dads made it very clear that it's to never leave my side and it hasn't not since the second I got my hands on it.

I look at the stack of folders that's sitting at the corner of my desk, the stack of folders my dad pulled out from the metal cabinet behind me, charts of men he believes could be our possible moles.

I've skimmed through the tabs here and there, looking at the names, to make sure that no one I'm close to is in that stack and thankfully there isn't, but I don't put it past me. I do get a little uncomfortable when I realize that a third of the names in the stick are men that are in my tech/security and immediately get my guard up.

I have half of mind grabbing the stack of folders and begin to work on them but decide not to, I don't wanna ruin my day anymore than I plan to already. I'll let pops start on it tomorrow and tackle it when I return from my trip, I have other priorities to attend to right now.

I have family I need to worry about right now.

I get up from the chair, slowly making my way around the desk and out of the office, heading towards the door that leads to the lower levels of the warehouse.

I need to check on Nathaniel and see how he's doing. I haven't seen him since I put the order in to bring him in and lock him up four days ago.

The watch on my wrist ping as I climb into the elevator and click the number three to see that Dominic has already sent me my list.

I pull my phone out of my slacks to see the list in more depth when I realize that I have four messages from Hailey, three of them pictures.

The first one consists of her food, French toast, egg whites, fruit, bacon, and oatmeal.

I laugh softly at the second one, it's a picture of her eating some of her French toast, a cheesy smile on her face.

The third one is a picture of her empty plate, with a thumbs down at the untouched oatmeal, a message right below it.

"B did me dirty with the oatmeal AGAIN."

I smile to myself as I haha react to her text message and heart react to the picture of her eating, sending her a gif that says, 'good job.'

Hailey's eating habits have definitely changed now that she's pregnant, she was the pickiest eater now. Her stomach can't handle certain things because she'll just end up throwing them back up, like egg yolks which is why she only eats whites now and oatmeal. She can eat oatmeal white no problem if it's the right consistency, but Beven's tends to make it a little too thick for her and I've told him multiple times to ease up on the milk, which explains how he did her dirty.

Hail opens my message and is reacting to my gif but doesn't reply so I get out of our message thread and go back into Dom's, like I was originally going too.

I instantly begin to smile when I see that he's put Yonny as the driver for the second truck, another one of the guys who's gotten really close to my wife.

I'm actually surprised to see him on the list, I would've thought Dom would've kept my dads OG men with him in the warehouse and make it feel like the old days.

The elevator doors open ping open and I'm quickly liking the list he sent me and shoving my phone back into my black slacks and stepping out of the metal box.

I walk up to the big bolted door and put the code in on the keypad and place my hand on the palm scanner as the door buzzes open.

I instantly see Beanie standing towards the end of the hall, near the room that I have Nate in and begin to walk towards him passing the other two guards at the entrance, both of them quickly greeting me.

Beans immediately smiles as I walk up to him, "morning boss."

"Morning," I greet back as I walk up to the door. "How's he doing?" I look through the small glass window to find my cousin passed out on the bed, one of his hands handcuffed to the bed.

I turn to look at Beans, "why the hell is he handcuffed?"

"He-" Beans pauses. "He wasn't exactly being nice to himself, I cuffed him for his own safety. Withdrawals at his point, the stage I was in, really ain't no joke, damn nearly makes you wanna kill yourself."

I look back through the small window, into the dim room, watching Nate stir in his sleep.

"I should've paid more attention to him, to Hailey, everyone," I mumble.

"Hey." I turn to face Elias. "How you really holding up, kid?"

"I don't feel like I'm suffocating anymore," I answered truthfully, tapping my chest. "The weight's still there though, something doesn't feel right, something feels off still."

He shakes his head, "that's fear."

I frown slightly and tilt my head to the side.

"Fear of not knowing if he'll overcome this," he points towards the room.

"Fear of me not being able to protect my family," I say. "Fear of not being able to forgive my father, fear of failing."

"And that's fine, it makes you human."

"My dad-"

"Had fears too," he said over me. "He may not have voiced them, but he had fears just like you, boss."

"I hate that you call me that.."

Beans chuckles softly as he walks forward unlocking the door, "you're just not used to it. How's your dad doing?"

I shrug, "when do you plan on talking to him?"

Beans has yet to talk to my father ever since he returned, he tends to leave the room whenever the three of us are all together. According to Dom, he's a lot more hurt that he wasn't included in his scheme, that he didn't trust him enough, that he hasn't gotten a personal apology like Dom and I have, and I didn't blame him.

"When do you plan on forgiving him?" He fires back.

I smile about to say something when Nate begins to cough in the room, catching my attention as Beans opens the door.

"Try not to take anything he says personally, Isaac, he's hurting right now so he's pretty hostile."

I nod, "thanks, will you go get Leo for me? I want vitals done before I leave."

"Of course, just promise me you won't uncuff him until I get back, it nearly took three of us to get him down."

"Three?!"

Bean's lips tug to the side as he nods his head, "adrenaline mixed drugs ain't no joke, makes you incredibly strong for some fucking reason."

I smile and nod my head, "don't worry, I got it, hurry back, I gotta talk to you after this."

He nods his head one last time before he's taking off and I'm stepping into the dimly lit room. I grab an empty chair from the side of the room, pulling it up to Nathaniel's bed, taking a seat on it.

I want to wake him up, I want to talk to him, check up on him and how he's doing, but decide not to, I decided to let him sleep instead and just keep him company in case he wakes up while Beans is gone.

About five minutes have gone by when Nate begins to stir in his sleep and I'm pulling my attention off of my phone, paying attention to him.

He coughs softly and instantly begins to heave and I'm leaning forward in my chair in case he decides to throw up. He's currently laying on his back so I'll have to turn him on his side.

He heaves a couple more times when he's immediately bolting up and turning to the side to hang off of the bed and I'm quirky grabbing the trash bin and placing it under him as he begins to retch into it.

He doesn't throw up for very long when he's laying back in bed, on his back, his free hand laying on his chest.

He inhales a deep breath and grumbles, "the hell do you want?" Before turning his head to look at me, pure anger in his brown orbs.

I lean back in the chair and say, "my cousin back."

Nate quickly begins to snicker to himself as he looks away, "I could say the same thing."

"I didn't go anywhere, Nate, I'm still right here, dude, I'm here for you."

"Now," he snarls, instantly looking in my direction. "You're here now, where the hell were you when I actually needed you!?"

I quickly sit forward, "don't you dare fucking blame me for that shit, Nathaniel, you pushed me away, you pushed everyone away! I get you're in physical pain right now but don't fucking project that on me. Who's the only one who would go looking for you, who would jump at the sound of your fucking cries the second you called?!"

He stays quiet, angrily staring in my direction.

"Oh that's right, it was me!"

Nate's eyes immediately begin to glaze up.

"You're down here because of me!" I snarl. "Because I care about the only fucking family I just about have, Nate! Because I don't wanna get a phone call one day from the guys that they found you lifeless laying in a puddle of your own throw up!"

He stays completely silent still.

"I tried it your way, I tried being there for you, I tried being soft and gentle for you, threading around you but it's obviously not working out so now we're gonna do it my way. You're gonna get your shit together whether you like it or not even if that means I have to spend my entire nights, days, down here, instead of spending them with my pregnant wife!"

Tears begin to trail down his face as he turns to look away and I'm getting worked up all over again.

"Look at me when I'm talking to you!" I exclaimed.

He turns back to me, his chest heaving now.

"I need you, Nate, I need my older cousin right now, I need someone to lean on, I need that guy I used to look up too. I need the closest thing I had to a brother back."

He lets out a small sob as he frantically nods his yes and I feel my eyes instantly begin to burn as I watch the pain start to hit him all over again.

"There's so much I want to tell you dude, but I don't trust this version of you."

He nods his head, "I want to see Jessie."

"Then sober the fuck up." He nods again. "I'm leaving for the weekend with Hailey and my cousin better be back by the time I return. You got it?"

"H-he's here now."

"I want him back permanently, not momentarily. Prove to me that I can still trust you, Nate, and I'll be in here with Jessica Monday."

"I p-promise."

"You understand why I'm doing this right?"

He nods.

A soft knock on the door and it's quickly grabbing my attention. Beans is back with Leo standing right beside him.

I inhale a deep breath and get up from the chair, looking down at Nate and place my hand on his shoulder. "I believe in you dude, you can do this. Everything's gonna get better, you're gonna be okay."