175

Daniel is waiting on the porch of my bungalow when I get home this morning. I’d been pulling a safecracking job with my crew in the pre-dawn hours.

We made out like bandits! A little over four-hundred-grand in cash, gold and jewels. What makes it even better is that we didn’t steal it from a citizen.

The guy was an Armenian gangster and started bringing his action to our side of town. We had to teach him a lesson and show him whose turf he’d been operating on.

There’s more than one way to send a message. Things don’t always have to end in violence.

The message we sent was—We own this town. If you want to operate, you’ve got to kick up twenty-percent just like everybody else.

I was riding high from the victory and thinking that I’d buy something pretty for Chelsea to celebrate…maybe even take her out to a dinner that Carlo hadn’t made…

…and then I find Dany who quickly spills his guts and tells me what he and Chelsea did yesterday.

The first thing I do is shit all over him. The second thing I do is impress upon him the importance of keeping his mouth shut and not tell our father.

The third thing I do is make an important phone call, to see what the fallout was.

Now, you can’t exactly call up a guy you haven’t seen in a month and say, “Hey, did one of your guys get clipped last night? Do you know who did it?”

I mean, if you’ve got the news before they do—You’re obviously the one who did it.

I have to play things extra smooth. It would have been better to wait till later in the day, but I don’t want to talk to Chelsea without knowing the full extent of the damage she and Dany may or may not have caused.

Luckily, we do share some projects with the Cassaduchi family. We have a man in the mayor’s office who helpslubricatecertain construction projects for us—Thomas Wheeler.

A few years ago, the Cassian reached out to us for a favor. They wanted to dip in to construction on a housing project and they needed Wheeler to do it.

We now take ten percent of everything Wheeler helps them out with. It’s a finder’s fee in perpetuity.

At the moment, there happens to a big project on the esplanade. That’s been my excuse to call a capo on their side—Leo Abruzzi.He’s the one running point.

The problem is thatanyphone call after someone gets clipped, when it’s not public knowledge yet, is basically an admission of guilt.

I have to pretend to be about calling about one thing, when I’m really calling about something else, and both of those things will have to be lies that he’ll believe…andnot believe at the same time.

After pacing from my living room to my kitchen about twenty times with Daniel nervously watching me, I make the call.

Leo answers on the eighth ring, “Yeah?

“Hey, how’s that thing on the Esplanade going?”

“7am in the morning and that’s what you’re calling to ask about? Yeah right. What do you know?”

I act confused. “What doIknow? What do you mean—What do I know?”

“I mean you wouldn’t be calling me at the frigging crack of ass unless you knew something.”

“Knew something about what?”

He huffs out a breath, “Look, I’ve got a situation here. I don’t have time to fuck around. If you know something, start talking. Otherwise…”

I pause to make it sound like I’m hesitant, then say, “I might have a situation myself. I was wondering if you’d heard anything?”

“Heard anything about what?”

“You know…anything…anything going on?”

“Aboutwhat?”

I add another long pause before saying, “Armenians.”

“Armenians?”

“Yeah, Armenians.”

“Armenians, huh?” He says it like it makes sense.

“Yeah. Heard anything?”

“Maybe…” I can practically see him nodding through the phone…like he’s thinking.This is working.“Our friend with the stomach?”He’s talking about another capo named, Bennie Lupo.When we say ‘our friend’ that means he’s a ‘made guy’.

“Yeah?”

“There was a thing yesterday with one of his guys. Armenians maybe. I don’t know.”

“A thing?”

“Was doing his collections. He won’t be coming back.”

“Listen,” I try to sound worried, “this might be a problem. If you hear anything, I’d consider it a favor to me personally, if you’d let me know.”

“Same with you?”

“Of course.”

“Alright, I’ll talk to you.”

*Click*

“Whew,” I look at Daniel, “that was fucking close.”

“Did he buy it?”

“Who the fuck knows? I think so. Time will tell. You need evidence before you accuse somebody. At least now he’s looking in the wrong direction. Word will spread. He trusts me.”

“Okay, I gotta go. I’m late. I’m sorry Antonio.”

“Yeah,” I pat my brother on the back as I push him out the door.

Now, with that fire potentially on the backburner, I’m going to have a shower, then go see Chelsea.

Mom!

Momma please!

The blood…so much. It’s everywhere! Mikey! Joey! Daddy? Momma? Joey? GET UP!

GET UP! YOU HAVE TO GET UP! GET UP NOW!

My dress…this isn’t mine. These aren’t my clothes. Who am I?

Daddy?

The man with the flashing lights is here. I’M HERE!

I’M HERE!

WAKE UP, MIKEY! THE MAN IS HERE!

WAKE UP!

WAKE UP!

I speak to Carlo in the kitchen and ask him for two breakfasts, then take the steps up to the third floor.

When I get to Chelsea’s room and let myself in, I find her twisting and turning…mumbling in her sleep.

I open the curtains and the balcony doors before sitting down on the bed. I try to wake her with a hand on her thigh, “Chelsea? You’re dreaming.”

She throws a backhand andwhacksme across the face as she darts to a sitting position.

“Ow,” I laugh at her.

She holds her hand like it hurts, presumably from hitting my jaw. She looks at me in confusion.

“You alright?” I caress the side of her face. She looks like she’s seen a ghost.

“Nightmare,” she explains quietly.

“But it’s daytime,” I point outside, “shouldn’t it be adaymare?”

“Nope, technically a daymare is a trance or hallucination experienced while awake.”

“Hmm…funny how they name things like that.”

She gives a little laugh, “I could explain, but it’s a really boring story.”

I pull her to me and give her a kiss. “Listen, we need to talk. I’ve ordered up some breakfast for us. Should be about ten minutes.”

“Okay,” she gives me a peck on the lips and massages my cock through my jeans, “do you think that’s enough time?”

I laugh because I’m hard instantly! “That’s not what I meant.”

She straddles my thigh and rocks back and forth on it, kissing me. “What did you mean then?”

“I meant if you wanted to freshen up.”

“Do I not look fresh?” She kisses me again. I groan from the strain in my pants. Chelsea has an effect on me like no one else. She starts biting my neck and the feeling is about to drive me insane.

“Daniel told me everything,” I say the words quickly so she’ll stop. If I don’t get business out of the way, I’ll end up locking myself in her bedroom, fucking her all day.

She gets off me instantly, “What did he tell you?”

“That guy you killed wasn’t a nobody. He wasn’t a captain but he was a soldier.”

“Damn it! I told Dany not to tell anyone!”

“He’s my brother, of course he’s going to tell me. And it was the right thing to do. If you were going to do something like that, you should have come to me first.”

She glares at me with a mixture of doubt and sarcasm. “And you would’ve helped me?”

“Believe it or not—Yes.I would’ve helped you. I think my father handled things the wrong way too.”

Knock, knock.

I yell, “It’s open.”

Carlo comes in, wheeling a cart. Chelsea squeezes his shoulder on the way to the bathroom.

He glances my way, “The patio, sir?”

“Please. Thank you, Carlo.”

He lays everything out and I take a seat at the table. I’d skipped dinner so I dig in to my fettuccini alfredo while I wait for Chelsea.

She joins me a few minutes later, barefoot, wearing a t-shirt and…I think…underwear. “What did you get for me?”

“English breakfast.” I pull off the dome, feeling my cock twitch again, “Eggs, toast, sausage, bacon, grilled mushrooms and half a grilled tomato.”

“Hearty,” she raises her right eyebrow and sits, “you know, Antonio, you might not agree with what I did yesterday but you don’t know what my life has been like.”

“So, tell me.” I’m not just saying that, I really do want to know.

She starts picking at her food nervously, “For starters, I have the same nightmare every night.” She shrugs like she’s telling me about a visit to the mall.

“What nightmare?”

“Variations of it at least. I’m in that car when we were run off the road, it’s upside down and I’m on the roof, sitting in a pool of my family’s blood after they’ve all been executed. I’m all alone. I keep trying to wake them up. In the dream, I don’t understand what death is yet.”

“Yikes.” There’s not really much you can do to comfort a person when they tell you something like that.

“I spent my whole life since that day feeling like a third-class citizen. People treated me worse than a racist person treats an immigrant. I knew I wasn’t who people said I was and everyone thought I was crazy.”

“I understand, Chelsea but—”

She doesn’t let me finish, “You don’t understand, Antonio. I can’t think of anybody who would. This family, the one your father controls, wasmybirthright. As far as I’m concerned, he’s only a steward for now.”

She doesn’t know how right she is.Any other man in my father’s position would have killed Chelsea by now to protectwhat’s his. It’s a testament to how much he loved her father that he hasn’t.

According toour thing,Chelsea was to be next in line when she came of age. You don’tusuallyhave a woman boss, but in the absence of a son, it’s been known to happen—Even in the old country.

She goes on, “Nothing felt right my whole life because it wasn’t.Thisfeels right. And I’m going to take it all back.”

“And I’m going to help you.”

She shoots me another doubtful look again, “Are you? Isn’t your loyalty to your father?”

“It is, but his loyalty is to you as well. You wouldn’t be alive if it weren’t. He avoided war once, but it’s been coming ever since. I think that it’s time we took back what’s ours too. But…” I leave the word hanging.

“But?”

“But you can’t just go around killing whoever you feel like.”

Her fork lands on her plate with a clatter, “Why the fuck not?”

“Because they’re not all bad guys, Chelsea. The man you shot yesterday might’ve had a wife and kids. Soldiers just do what they’re told.”

“You’re telling me that fat asshole never killed anyone before?”

I shrug, “He probably did, but as of yesterday, so did you. All I’m saying is that you have to be more diplomatic about this whole thing.”

“And how do you propose we do that?”

“The man who gave the order to kill your family, was old man Cassaduchi. The guy who carried it out is a capo named Joshua de Soto.”

“Then I’m going to kill them.”

I almost want to laugh at how single minded she is, but I hold it back. “Sure them, they can go, but there are other guys who are friends of ours. They weren’t on board with taking out your father, butour thing,isn’t a democracy. Do you understand?”

“So, you want me to leave some of them alive?”

“We’ve got to be surgical about this is what I’m saying. I know the structure of their organization, so letmepick the targets. If we can get rid of the key guys who support the old man without question, then we might have a shot at a peaceful resolution.”

“How?”

“Well, I know these guys. If I were to tell them that we were going to make a move on old man Cassaduchi and when the dust settled, it’d be business as usual, they wouldn’t openly support us, but they wouldn’t stop us either. They’d say—Do what you gotta do.”

Chelsea seems lost in thought, then says, “Stand up for a second please,” as she comes over to me. She pulls down my zipper and sticks her hand in and pulls out my cock—I’m still hard from when she kissed me.

I laugh.

“Is this thing evernotready to go?”

“Not when it’s around you.”

She pushes me back down on my chair, moves her underwear to the side and sits her pussy down on my cock.

I grunt in satisfaction from the pleasure of it. She takes all of me, but doesn’t move.

She kisses me hard and I feel myself stiffen to the point where it hurts. “Your father isn’t going to allow this.”

I cup her breast and kiss her neck, “He doesn’t have to know right away.”

“You’ll keep it a secret?” She writhes and pushes my face to her tits.

“As long as we can.”

“We?”

“I’m going to bring Christina in on this.”

“Good,” she pushes my head back and sucks my tongue…it’s her signature move and makes me want to explode in her right now.

Suddenly she stands…leaving my cock slick with her juices…and goes back to her side of the table.

“Find me my second target. We’re doing it tonight.”

Such a tease…