Timur grinned at her. “I’ve got news for you, mladshaya sestra, you don’t have a mean bone in your body. Your threats are empty.”

She rolled her eyes at him and gripped the two carriers she’d brought with her, desserts for the women she was meeting for the first time. “Maybe I shouldn’t have brought anythin’. They might think I’m tryin’ to show off.”

“Anytime you bake, Evangeline, you’re showing off,” Timur said. “You’re that good. They don’t like it, they don’t deserve your friendship.”

She wanted to wrap herself in that compliment. More, in the genuine fact that she’d somehow gotten past his reserve and wariness that she might be out to harm his brother. “Thanks, Timur.”

Alonzo pressed the doorbell firmly, not giving her any more time to rethink her decision to come. Elijah’s home was a very large, sprawling house. Like the Arnotto estate, the Lospostos property had been landscaped and the mansion constructed with leopards in mind. Lots of secluded acreage for the cats to run, hidden passageways in the house as well as groves of trees for an arboreal highway. The property backed up to Jake Bannaconni’s.

Alonzo had told her Jake and his wife, Emma, would be there. Also, Eli and Catarina Perez would be present. She would be meeting Siena for the first time. Siena was pregnant with triplets and, although it was early in the pregnancy, they were taking precautions, so everyone thought it best to meet at the Lospostos home.

She glanced back at the men surrounding them—the men she thought of as her “boys.” Timur, Gorya, Sevastyan and Mitya. Mitya had no business being there, but for some reason Alonzo had insisted he come. He hadn’t been out of the hospital that long, or for that matter, up. He was pale and still walked as though something hurt, but he would never admit it, at least not in front of her. He’d told her to quit fussing over him, but she ignored his order and just did it anyway. Timur, Gorya and Sevastyan laughed at him and told him he’d just have to live with it. They’d called her little sister in Russian and she hugged that to her as she stood there on the wide verandah wanting to run.

Alonzo bent down toward her, shifting his body slightly to put himself between her and the bodyguards. “You don’t have to do this, Evangeline. If you’re doing it for me, don’t. You don’t ever have to do anything you prefer not to.”