The Mafia's Daughter

Chapter 2 The daughter grows up

Valentina grows up as a beautiful young woman, she gets good grades in school and her four brothers protect her from all the other boys at school. Christiano is her favorite brother and the two seek each other out a lot. He also always thinks about taking Valentina with him, taking care of her, and looking after her, more than Lorenzo. The two are not at all alike and differ like day and night and water and fire. Despite that, they love each other. Valentina tries, and Lorenzo tries too, but it’s hard.

After school all the boys go to business school, Valentina goes to the dance academy. Bianca and Roberto don't want Valentina to work as a businesswoman. They want her to be able to pursue her dreams and Valentina wants to dance. After her education, she asks her father if she can dance in the club. Valentina knows that her father has several strip clubs, the biggest one is half an hour's drive from her house.

Valentina, like her brothers, no longer lives at home, but in an apartment in the city. Just like Lorenzo and Marcello.

Just like their parents, Riccardo and Christiano live in a large villa in a luxuriously enclosed neighborhood in a better-located part of the city.

Valentina, like Lorenzo and Marcello, lives in a protected complex, where you can't just enter and which is secured by people who work for the Ferrante’s.

"Dad?" 21-year-old Valentina knocks on the door of her father's office. She's in the strip club and that annoys Riccardo immensely. "What are you doing here?" he asks when he sees her walking in the hallway.

"I want to discuss something with dad." She says softly, even though she knows that Riccardo never does anything to her, at work she finds him intimidating, he is so different than he is at home. At home, he is warm and loving, but when he is at work, he is cold and distant and above all very businesslike and surly. She's tried to joke about it in the past, but Riccardo can never laugh about it. He is then exactly like his father, seriously engaged in his work.

"Come in sweetheart." Calls her father and she goes inside.

"Was Ricco in the hallway?" her father asks, and Valentina nods.

"RICCO!!" her father shouts and not much later Riccardo appears in the doorway.

"Sit down too." He tells his son and Valentina feels more nervous. The chance that she will get her way with Riccardo here is considerably smaller. Valentina nervously sits across from her father and as always he folds his hands over each other with his elbows leaning on his desk.

"What's up?" he asks his daughter and sees how nervous she is. She fidgets with her fingers and she looks down, both Roberto and Riccardo know what this means; she's going to ask for something that she knows both men are going to lose their patience with. Riccardo sighs impatiently.

"I want to dance here." She starts. She tries to sound confident but fails and Riccardo starts laughing and shakes his head "Like that's ever going to happen." He looks at his father, who in turn observes his daughter.

"I think it makes you more confident." He tells his daughter, who dares to look up for the first time during the conversation.

"What?" she asks softly and Roberto raises his eyebrow at her.

"Sorry daddy, what did you say?" she asks again. She was raised better than that, you speak with two words 'yes daddy, what do you mean daddy..' She bites her lip and Riccardo jumps up.

"Surely you don't think about doing this, are you!!?" He shouts and Roberto frowns at him

"dad. I’m sorry I didn’t mean to yell at you." Says Riccardo quickly after it. Roberto nods.

"This is ridiculous!" Scold Riccardo and he walks to the door and throws the door open "CHRIS!!! COME HERE NOW!!" he shouts across the hallway and Christiano quickly comes running.

"wtf bro?" he asks, and Riccardo tells him to come in. He observes his father, his favorite sister Valentina, and his furious older brother Riccardo when he is in the office.

"What's wrong?" he asks, and his father leans back in his chair as he looks at his two sons and his daughter again.

"Valentina wants to dance here and dad is seriously thinking about it." Tells Riccardo annoyed and raises his voice. Christiano raised his eyebrow and looks at his father and then at Valentina, she looks at him and he sees the twinkle in her eyes, He thinks it could make her more confident.

"Why?" he asks her.

"I love to dance, I dance so often with Esmay, Sofia, and Nelly. Anna is a friend and also dances here. Kimberly is the daughter of Aunt Rosanna and can also dance here. Just ask Grace," Valentina pleads and she shrugs her shoulders. She knows Christiano has a soft spot for Grace and he seeks her out a lot and Grace is one of the girls who want Valentina to come and dance at the club.

"I'm the only one with a real dance education. I think it could be better than it is now." She starts explaining, her voice softly at the end and she lets her head hang, nervous as she is. Christiano steps forward and turns her in her chair towards her father.

"Chin up." He commands her in her ear and he grabs her shoulders and helps her upright in the chair. Valentina looks at her father. Who in turn looks uninterested in what his daughter is going to say. How is it possible that all his sons are so brutal and he has to reprimand them constantly? Is it because she is a Lamberti that his daughter can't do that, that she is so insecure or is that because we are all men and Bianca is like that too? He keeps wondering when he looks at the beautiful young woman.

"Tell dad what you want, without a doubt," Christiano whispers in her ear, and for the first time Valentina looks straight into her father's eyes and he can see the fire burning in her eyes.

"I want to dance here daddy, I think it can be better, I have a dance education, I'm good at this." She tells him and she already sounds more confident than before. Not yet what he wants most, but it's a start.

He nods to her "No stripping." He adds and Riccardo's mouth falls open and Christiano grins. Valentina's mouth also falls open. Roberto chuckled at his children's reaction and waved at the door.

"If you're fighting for what you believe in, you shouldn't be surprised if you get it, sweetheart." He says to his daughter and he picks up a stack of documents and starts going through them as he waves again to the door of his office. It's time for his children to go, Roberto still has plenty to do. Valentina jumps up and kisses her dad on his cheek.

“Thanks, Daddy! No stripping!” She sang when she walks out of the office past a fuming Riccardo and a laughing Christiano.