12/28/07, Ocean Beach…
"You okay there, mister?" Niko heard as he was helped up to his feet, looked and saw a small brunette, who he guessed from her small height to be in her early 20s.
"Yes... I'm alright." Niko says.
"Well, you look like you've been in a fight… and jumped off a ship." The woman says, Niko noticing a lightweight coat over what he guessed to be a stripper outfit, given they weren't too far from the Pole Position Club.
Niko truly wondered just how old she was but then another brunette ran up to them, a tall one with dreadlocks and deep blue eyes. "I was on my way home and then I found him... he nearly drowned, Midnight." The first brunette says.
"Thankfully, you did find him then." The second one says.
"Coast guard busted me and my boss… I had to swim for my life." Niko says, Midnight looking him up and down.
"Now what to do with you?" Midnight asks.
"Safe place to hide, maybe?" Niko asks, the smaller of the three taking her red stiletto heels off of her sore feet and Midnight looking at her.
"Gionna-" Midnight starts to say.
"We can't just leave him here." Gionna says.
"And we don't know anything about him. No offense mister." Midnight says looking down at Niko as she says the last part.
"None taken… but I have a feeling she's gotta get home soon." Niko says, pointing to Gionna.
"Yeah. 8pm-2am ain't the nicest shift at the Pole Position club." Gionna says before all three leave.
"Alright, try anything and I kill you." Midnight says before they enter the apartment.
Gionna closed the door before she and Claude hug and kiss, Niko now just noticing the ruby marquise cut engagement ring on Gionna's ring finger.
"So… you're not natives to here?" Niko asks.
"No... I'm from Canada." Midnight says.
"I grew up in Liberty City." Gionna says.
"And I'm from San Fierro. Where are you from?" Claude says.
"Serbia… that's where I spent most of my life." Niko says.
The next morning, Gionna had woken up and despite less than six hours of sleep, she set up her webcam and Johnny answered it.
"Hey, old friend. How's it going? Billy ain't run the chapter into the ground yet?" Gionna says.
"Not yet… where's- oh, there you are." Johnny says, seeing Midnight in the background.
"Hey Johnny." Midnight says.
"So what's going on?" Johnny asks.
"Well, first…" Gionna says, lifting her left hand up and Johnny turning shocked when he saw the ring.
"M, has Packie thought of proposing to you yet?" Johnny asks.
"I don't know, Johnny... we haven't talked that much about it." Midnight says.
"Packie doesn't strike me as the marrying kind." Gionna says jokingly, Midnight lightly shoving her.
"Everything in its time, you two." Midnight says.
"Yeah- hey, get down from that thing, you wiseass!" Johnny says, the last part directed at Fredric, who was swinging on a ceiling fan.
"Fredric, stop acting like a child!" Gionna says, Fredric jumping onto the ground and walking over to Johnny.
"Honestly Fredric, you are a dumbass some days." Midnight says.
"Hey, I was bored. Someone decided to trip the fuse box at my apartment." Fredric says.
"Hm I wonder who that could have been?" Midnight asks.
"Probably Malc or DeSean." Gionna says.
"Yeah maybe." Midnight says.
After the video call, Gionna had gotten ready for her day and walked outside… only to see a black limo out near Washington Beach. The three men in it were fixated on her, one she didn't recognise and two that when she did, it sent chills down her spine.
Joey Leone and Luigi Goretelli... two of her former friends from Liberty City.
Thinking quickly, Gionna used her sleeveless dark red hoodie to hide the scar on her neck and black oversized sunglasses to hide her hazel eyes as she walked towards the Malibu Club, where she was going to meet up with friend and father figure Tommy Vercetti.
"Six years, I've been looking for her… she's gotten too comfortable, relaxed, thinking she wouldn't pay for what happened to my dad." Joey says. Now 39 years old, he had changed. He was slimmer and more muscular, stopped working at his garage and helped more with the Leone family as Toni was now the head of it.
"I knew there was something twisted about that woman… ever since that kid she found walked into our lives, his eyes locked onto her and he had his hand wrapped around her heart. She always liked the violent types." Luigi says.
"You two are boring me with this Bonnie and Clyde love story that they have! I have no patience for this!" The third man says in a thick Russian accent, Joey and Luigi looking at him.
"We have a deal, remember? You trap Gionna and that snake with no tongue, we'll get this Niko Bellic for you! Unless you have other ideas, Mr. Bulgarin!" Joey says, the man looking at him after removing his sunglasses.
Ray Bulgarin had once ran into Gionna when she was only 9 years old and had incidentally witnessed him unlocking a container that had, to her shock and horror, contained girls barely older than her in it and dressed in too little clothing. It was disturbing to the point where Gionna had found a nearby payphone that night in 1989 and dialed 911, despite Ray's threats and him trying to kidnap her.
"I'll do it." Ray says, him and Joey shaking hands.
Joey felt like he was making a deal with the devil… he had found Gionna on that cold December night, her clothes ripped and her shaken so badly that she was terrified of leaving her home for weeks afterwards.
But Joey reminded himself that Gionna was no longer that little girl or the feisty teenager she was in LC. All the sides of her that he knew over the years, all the fun he did have with her, loving her like a little sister at one point… it had all disappeared the night Salvatore died.
It didn't take Joey long to figure out that two people were involved in that assassination… it did take him six years to find out who they were and where they were hiding though.
And he wasn't gonna wait another day up there in Liberty City, surrounded by old memories.
He wanted his revenge… and he wanted it no matter what it took.