The Introduction

Ken rang the doorbell of the DiBiancci palazzo with one hand, the other hand settled deep into his pocket. Beside him, Joanette shifted in her Guiseppe's, looking at herself in the two way glass on the giant doors and fluffing up her bangs.

"Do I look okay?" She asked for the umpteenth time, causing Ken to roll his eyes for the equal measure.

"You look fine, Joan."

"No, I mean do I look like a nanny? I'm trying to look like a nanny but I don't know what nannies look like. Wait a minute, let me google what nannies look like." Joanette quickly balanced her layered cake in one hand and began to fumble with her purse flap with the other hand. This was the first time she'd been set to play an empathetic character and for a child, no less.

While it was true that Joanette was more sentimental than her sister, she still had a long way to go before she could be unleashed on children. She didn't like the small creatures and never wished to have any of her own. Alistair's idea was already crashing and burning.

"My my, I never thought I'd see the day. Is the great Joanette Ilsabeth Bordeaux, nervous, perhaps?" Ken smirked down at his partner, who immediately snapped her cold eyes up at him and glared. He wasn't intimidated at all, Joanette could hurt him badly if she wanted to, but he knew she wouldn't.

"Shut the fuck up, Ken." She snarled viciously, which only served to widen his smirk. He was about to say something else to make her lose her cool when the door opened, and the pair came face to face with the Spanish mob queen herself, Katarina Montenegro. She was a gorgeous woman in her thirties who was obviously so high maintenance it was ridiculous. She was dressed to the nines and Joanette had heard from her father that she just always dressed like that, probably due to her close friendship with the supermodels in her life.

"Can I help you?" Katarina questioned, eyeing the two up and down suspiciously for a moment before her face brightened significantly. "Oh wait, you're that nanny Marco hired, right? From The Agency?"

"You know who I am?" Joanette blinked, not quite sure what to do with herself. She didn't know whether to act as herself or play the nanny role, not that she knew how to do that either.

"Your Agency's nanny services came highly recommended from Amaria Greene. Come in." The woman stepped back and opened the door further for her, allowing the model to walk into the house with her bodyguard in tow. "You're the bodyguard for Cressida, I assume?"

"Yes, I'm her partner." Kenton gave Katarina a ridiculously coquettish smile as he said this. "Pleasure to meet you, miss Montenegro."

"Partner? Like romantically or professionally?" Katarina looked at Joanette, who was bursting at the seams with the urge to clarify the situation, lest some other horror of a misconception come about, but when she tried, she was interrupted yet again by Ken.

"Romantic," the shithead said sweetly. "It's kind of a secret, given our occupation. We're professional partners as well."

Katarina's lips quirked up at the corners into a smirk of amusement at the two of them, the look widening into a wicked grin when she saw Joanette's glare at Ken. "Ah, I see."

"Pardon me but where is the child?" Joanette asked as she looked about tentatively.

"Somewhere with her dad and brother probably breaking shit." Katarina rolled her eyes, typing something into the screen of her phone. "Marco's been teaching them how to use guns."

A thudding sequence coming down the stairs diverted the small group's attention to the grand staircase which was in the middle of the expansive foyer. Shortly after, three figures appeared.

"Dad said I can aim almost as good as he can, didn't you, dad?" The little girl whom Joanette assumed was Cressida looked up fondly at her father, almost as if he were her entire world.

Ah, the untainted innocence of childhood.

<i>Can't relate.</i> The model thought bitterly. She had never had a conventional relationship with her father, and always thought of him as a business partner rather than a parental figure. Alistair never bothered to correct her.

<i>"Si, piccola</i>. She shot two bullets right beside each other and Sal hit four bullseyes." Marco high fived his children and gave them all a bright smile. Joanette took notice that his smile was literally perfect.

<i>Sacre bleu</i>, the man was attractive. It made her blink blankly for a moment in admiration.

"<i>Papà's</i> a great teacher," the little boy, Sal, added proudly.

"He's also a sadist," Katarina jumped in, sending her baby daddy a warning look that only made him smile. "Don't go around shooting anybody in the house."

Joanette observed them carefully, confused as to the nature of their relationship. Were they together? Were they ever together in the first place? Did they hate each other?

Marco finally tore his eyes away from looking at Katarina like a lovestruck puppy to take notice of the addition in his foyer and blinked. "You've finally made it." He stuck out his hand for Ken to shake, which gave way to a very manly handshake.

"Mr. DiBiancci, hello." Joanette held out her hand gracefully for the mafia king to shake. "I hope we are not late."

"Please, call me Marco."

"Marco." She smiled comfortably and held out the dish in her hands. "I've brought a nine layered cake to celebrate this lovely new venture."

"Oh! Cake!" Little Sal bounded up beside his sister, who looked barely bigger than he did, and took a peek at the glass dish in the model's hands. "Is that caramel?"

"Yes it is. There's pineapple in there too." Joanette smiled at the curious eyes that looked up at her.

"Caramel and pineapple? Well that's interesting," the girl said thoughtfully, coming up beside her brother. They really looked like twins with their similar size. It was hard for Joanette to believe she was actually four years older than the boy beside her.

"Allow us to take it from you." The boy held out his arms, causing the woman with the glass dish to narrow her eyes at him suspiciously. She could already tell that this one was a little devil with his innocent smile and evil intentions.

Still, she carefully placed the dish in his hands, his sister coming to help him when he gave a grunt from how heavy it was. Dutifully, the two children stalked off, carrying the dish between them and leaving behind four amused adults.

Katarina's arms were crossed over her chest, face blank but for the trace of a smirk across her lips. On the other side of the room, Marco was looking after his kids with the utmost adoration.

"If you would please brief us on your situation," Joanette said, cutting through the moment, "So that we may better understand what your troubles are?"

That seemed to snap the man out of his trance and he nodded, motioning toward the stairs. "Follow me to my office."

Joanette and Ken followed behind the pair up the stairs and down the hall until they were surrounded by rich varnished woods and the faint smell of tobacco. The two agents took their seats in the guest chairs, while Katarina leaned against the desk beside where Marco had taken his seat.

They had heard about her, and of course they had. The comeback of The Spanish Princess turned The Spanish Fox was probably the most rattling thing to have happened to the underworld. Katarina's progress onto the throne of the Spanish mob was nothing if not explosive.

That being said, the story behind the Mafia Emperor's takeover wasn't short of action, either. Marco had faced his fair share of troubles in his leadership, especially after the situation of his mixed offspring came to the light.

"How familiar are you with our story?"

Joanette blinked at the man, trying to remain impassive. "Well enough."

The answer was simple, yet loaded. Alistair had more than prepared them for what they were about to face, but she wasn't foolish enough to believe that there wasn't more to the background that even The Agency didn't know.

Maybe her cousin would.

"Saverio Alcunze." Marco slapped a manila folder onto the desk and Ken picked it up immediately. "He disappeared nine years ago during the massacre of The Letter M casino opening and hasn't shown up since, but he's been working from the shadows. Growing. Expanding his network."

"Again," Katarina added, a sour note to her words. "He's a pest I've been trying to neutralise for a long time, but there wasn't a trace of him anywhere."

"Until recently, that is." Marco glanced at the mother of his child, who was preoccupied with something on her phone. She sensed his attention and shifted her body toward him, a move that was completely subconscious, as Joanette could tell. "Cressida is my heir, and she's being targeted by him and his people."

"What about the boy?" Ken asked, not once looking up from the folder in his hands. "Isn't he being targeted as well?"

"Not actively." The Spanish woman finally put down her device. "Salvador is my heir, and Saverio wants what Marco has, though we wouldn't be surprised if he starts gunning for my son as well. He's tried killing me before."

"Why?" There was Joanette with her questions. She couldn't stop asking them and it's not like she ever tried.

"We're cousins and he's an entitled prick."

Joanette's eyes darted between the man and woman opposite them, and even though she wasn't looking at him, she knew Ken was in the same position. Katarina scowled.

"Marco and I aren't related. Saverio and I share a maternal grandmother. Marco and Saverio share a maternal grandfather."

The agent wasn't sure if that gave her relief. It was still kind of weird.

"He tried to recruit me as his ally years ago. I declined."

The look Marco shot at the back of her head made Joanette think that 'declined' was more of an honorific than anything.

"We're working to track him and we're getting close, so your services will only be required until all the threats are neutralised." Marco sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. "I think it goes without saying that you should protect the children with your lives."

It most definitely did and Joanette didn't want to be reminded that she was getting put on the spot over a tiny fraction of a human being.

She and Ken looked at each other, silently communicating. They'd worked together for long enough that they knew how to do that now.

"What are your real names?" Katarina was watching them intently. Joanette's lips turned to the side for a moment before she hooked a nail under the chin stick of her mask and peeled the thin material off her bare face, revealing her true identity.

Marco's eyebrows rose in surprise but he didn't say anything. Katarina, on the other hand started laughing.

"Fuck, I need to get one of those masks. Do you sell them?"

"No, but I can arrange for a gift."

The two women smirked at each other, leaving the men to blink at them in confusion.

"I met your father once," The Spanish woman informed. "He's fucking scary."

<i>"Scary."</i> Joanette snorted. Alistair was intimidating to everyone but her. In fact, she believed he was probably scared of her.

"The kids can't know your true identities yet. We'll ease them into it." Brown hair fell over a bare shoulder as Katarina's head tipped. "You can have the option of living in-house or out of it, but I'd prefer to have your presence constantly here."

"So would we." Joanette and Ken looked at each other as they answered in tandem, then three pairs of eyes turned toward Marco, who shrugged, reaching a hand out for the woman by his desk.

"Whatever's best for the kids."