Luca (The Boston Syndicate #2)

1. Luca

Luca

Chapter one

Eighteen Years Old

“Dad, I’m home,” I call out, walking into the quiet house. Usually around this time, the old man is standing at the stove cooking a huge dinner and the smell of whatever he’s frying up permeates the air, but not tonight. My dad likes to tell me he’s going to start working overtime just to pay the grocery bill that’s doubled since I turned fifteen. But it’s not like it’s my fault that sophomore year I hit a growth spurt and the football coach took notice of my size and asked me to try out. Two-a-days take it out of me, and when I get home, I’m hungry enough to eat a horse.

“Old man,” I call again. “You home?”

We live in a small neighborhood on the Central coast in California. Apparently my dad is from Boston, but he’s never taken me back there to visit family. Said without my mom, there was no reason for us to visit the East Coast. She didn’t have any living relatives and he didn’t have any ties there. Not that it ever mattered much to me. I’m perfectly happy staying on the warmer coast.

Walking into the living room, I see my father sitting on our old plaid couch with a weathered box in front of him and photographs scattered all over the oval coffee table. I’ve seen the box before but never its contents. It’s one he’s kept hidden in the back of his closet. One day, when I was about twelve or thirteen, I went into my dad’s closet to look for a shirt for picture day. I was already growing like a weed and didn’t have a nice shirt that fit, so Dad told me to grab one of his, then gave me a hard time about having to go clothes shopping again. The box was hidden in the corner, and just as I was about to open it—I was a curious little brat—he came in and saw what I was doing.

“Son, there are things in a man’s life he’d prefer to keep private,” he told me. “I’d like to think I raised you to respect that.”

I never tried to look in the box after that, assuming whatever was inside was something he didn’t want to discuss. He was right, he did raise me to respect personal boundaries. Seeing it lying out in our living room all these years later is a little startling, to say the least, especially with the open bottle of whiskey sitting next to him.

“Little early in the day to be hitting the bottle, Pops.”

My dad looks up at me as though he’s just now realized he isn’t alone. Frank Bennetti is many things, but a man who is drunk before six p.m. on a work night is not one of them.

He doesn’t say anything about my appearance, doesn’t smile, doesn’t do anything but stare at me.

“What’s going on, Dad?”

His silence is unnerving. In fact, his entire demeanor has alarm bells ringing in my head.

“Sit down, Luca,” he says, pointing to the dark-brown recliner across from him.

That’s the last thing I want to do. His tone and the devastated look in his eyes have me wanting to run the opposite direction and not face whatever he’s about to tell me because I know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, it’s going to drastically change my life. It’s not a feeling I’m familiar with; more like an instinctual part of a person’s mind. I’m scared, but I also know this isn’t going to be something I can hide from, whatever this is.

So, I sit.

My father holds out an old picture of my mother. We don’t have many. Actually, this is the only one. When I asked why we didn’t have any more photos of her, he said it was because when she died suddenly in a car accident, he lost his mind for a minute and burned them all. He told me it was one of his biggest regrets because I deserved to have photos of her. I never held it against him, though. I’d never lost the one person I thought I was going to spend the rest of my life with and had a baby to care for all alone, so who the hell was I to judge?

“Ciara was beautiful,” he says as I hold the yellowing photograph between my shaking fingers.

I nod and glance at the picture of the woman who shares the same blue eyes with me, then back to him. “She was. What’s all this about?”

Other photos are strewn about the low table. All of them are filled with faces I don’t recognize. They’re old and obviously from when he was younger. Dad’s in a few, and I pick one up. My dad and the other two men in the photo are wearing suits. One holds a cigar in his hand, and his head is tipped back in laughter. I recognize my father standing to the right of him, his hand clasped on the man’s shoulder, a wide smile stretching across his face. The other man is laughing with my dad and the stranger in the picture. They all look comfortable together, as though they’ve known each other for years.

“Old friends of yours?” I ask.

“You could say that. They were part of the life I lived before you. Before I left Boston.”

“Before Mom died?”

He blows out a long breath. “I went to the doctor last week. I haven’t been feeling well. Short of breath, tired, had a couple dizzy spells.”

I nod as I think about the last few months. Sure, he’s been a little more tired than normal lately, but the man isn’t getting any younger.

“He called me today to go over some test results.” He’s holding my stare with anxious eyes.

Fear drops to the pit of my stomach.

“There’s no easy way to say this. Fuck, I wish there was.”

His eyes squeeze shut and when he opens them, the pain behind his dark-brown gaze tells me what he’s so afraid to say—what I’m terrified to hear. “My heart is giving out, son. The doctor explained I’ve had what’s called a silent heart attack. Probably more than one. With my age, he said a heart transplant is unlikely, and that’s about all they can do in cases like this.”

I jump to my feet. “Bullshit. With all the technology and…”

My dad shakes his head. “There’s nothing they can do except medications to reduce the risk of further damage, but this is it, son. I’m being called to the mat for all the shit I did. All the people I hurt.” He leans back and takes a swig from the whiskey bottle.

“What do you mean about the people you hurt?” My brows draw close together, confusion and fear battling for dominance in my head.

I’ve never known the man to hurt a fly. Sure, he’s a big guy who may look and sound intimidating with his deep voice and a thick Boston accent, but he’s a caring single father who works for the power company and comes home every night to have dinner with me. He’s the man who throws the ball around with me on the weekends, who takes me camping and fishing. He’s not violent or a bad guy.

He leans forward and picks up the picture of him and the two other guys that I was looking at moments ago. “I have to tell you some things. Things I swore I would take to my grave, but seeing as that day is coming sooner rather than later, I need to get this off my chest. It’s been just you and me since you were a baby, and when I leave this world, I need you to know you aren’t alone. That you have family out there.” He waves his hand toward the front door before he tilts his head, indicating for me to sit back down.

“This is really fucking cryptic, Dad.”

Usually the old man would have my head for dropping the swear words that are flowing freely from my mouth, but he doesn’t comment. He rummages through the stack of pictures and finds the one he’s looking for. Taking the photo in his hand, he stares at it for several silent moments, then hands it to me.

I stare at a picture with my mother holding me standing next to the man that was in the other picture with my dad.

“So this guy knew my mom and you?”

My dad purses his lips and stares me in the eye. “That’s your father.”

Looking back at the picture then to the man sitting across from me—the man who raised me—I shake my head slowly back and forth. “No, you’re my father.”

His eyes squeeze shut and a tear escapes. Never in all my life have I seen this man cry.

“I knew your father, but I never met your mother.” He picks up the picture of the three men and hands it to me. “The man in the middle is Francesco Cataldi. He’s head of a Mafia family back in Boston. Your father, the other man next to him, was Elio Romano. He was Francesco’s consigliere.”

I look at him in confusion. My father knew people in the Mafia?

“What’s a consigliere?” That is seriously the least important part of this conversation.

“It’s a sort of advisor to the boss. I was a capo in the organization, and when Francesco needed things handled quietly, he’d send me in.”

“You were in the Mafia?” I stare at my dad. I’m surely misunderstanding what he’s saying or this is going to be some horrible joke. This entire conversation has to be some horrible joke. He’s not my father? He didn’t even know my mother?

“I was in the Mafia until the night I met you. The night I killed your parents.”

I sit stock-still, too stunned to speak, to breathe, just staring at my father, who seems to be holding his own breath, waiting for my reaction.

“This is crazy,” I whisper, looking at the picture then back to the man in front of me. “This is fucking crazy!” The volume of my voice doesn’t faze my dad. Or maybe I should start calling him Frank because, apparently, he isn’t my dad at all. In fact, he killed him.

“You killed my parents, then stole me? For what? Were you jealous of my real father and wanted what was his?”

None of this makes sense. The last ten minutes have turned my world upside down, and I can’t begin to make sense of anything he’s telling me.

“I can’t believe you’re saying this. Fuck. I can’t believe any of this is real.”

I jump from my chair and pace the room, looking from Frank to the pictures and shaking out my hands. My entire body is vibrating with wave after wave of barely contained anger crashing into me. A sickness washes through me, and I clutch my stomach as though I’m going to throw up from the force of the rage slamming into me. My head is spinning out of control, just like my life in this moment.

“Let me explain, Luca.”

Facing the small fireplace in our living room, I keep my back to my dad, shaking my head violently back and forth. I want to cover my ears so I don't have to hear anything else that comes out of his mouth. It’s too much. This is all too much.

“I don’t know how you’re going to explain any of this to make it make sense. What? Do you expect some sort of forgiveness? You expect me to tell you that it’s okay you murdered my family since you took me in and raised me? Now that you’re dying I have no choice but to hear you out and forgive you for killing my real parents?” I place both hands on the fireplace and claw my fingertips into the rough brick, taking several deep breaths in an attempt to calm the nausea swirling in my gut. It doesn’t work.

“I can’t expect your forgiveness, Luca. That’s not why I’m telling you this. The Cataldis have no idea you’re still alive, and neither does your mother’s family. You can keep it that way if that’s what you decide, but I couldn’t leave you and not tell you that you have family back in Boston. I couldn’t leave you alone in the world, son.”

I whirl around and face the devastated man on the couch. “Don’t call me that. I’m not your son.”

“You’re right. You aren’t mine by blood, but the first moment I saw you—” Frank’s jaw tightens for a moment before he continues, his voice rough with emotion. “I knew I was sent there to protect you. If he had sent anyone else to do the job, you would have been dead.”

“Who?”

“Francesco.” He leans forward and rests his elbows on his knees with his head hanging low. His fingers link together as though he’s praying, asking for absolution.

He won’t find any with me.

“Francesco Cataldi was not a good man. He demanded absolute loyalty from his men and anyone in his organization. If he thought anyone was lying or would possibly betray him, he’d send me in to take care of them. He would blame it on a rival organization, usually the Irish, so he wouldn’t have to face any backlash from the other families or alert his capos. It was a way to foster the hate between our two organizations. Of course, there was never any proof it was the Irish, but he whispered it in every man’s ear. We were always on the brink of war because of his lies, but he never gave the go-ahead to go after them. Obviously, I knew the truth, but I was loyal to the man. And so was your father.”

“Then why the hell did he have him murdered?” The yell bursts from my mouth before I can contain it. Not that I care to try.

Frank looks up from his hands. “He met your mother and things changed. He had to keep her a secret, but he was so fucking in love with her.”

“How would you know that? You said you’d never met her.”

“When Francesco came to me and told me Elio had betrayed the family and I needed to take care of him and his side piece, I did some digging. I followed him around for about a week until he led me to her. To you.” He closes his eyes again. When he opens them, he grabs the bottle and takes a long pull. “I went back to Francesco and told him Elio had a baby with the woman. He didn’t care. He convinced me that Elio was funneling information to the Irish. That he was a rat. That was the worst thing to be accused of in our life.”

“What do the Irish have to do with anything?”

“Your mother was the sister of Maeve Monaghan, wife of the head of the Monaghan family. They were our enemies. Having anything to do with anyone associated with that family meant death, in Francesco’s mind at least.”

“So my family are nothing but killers and criminals on both sides. That’s just fucking great,” I say with a caustic laugh as I run my hands through my hair, yanking on the strands. God, what I wouldn’t give to go back in time and believe my dad was a normal working-class single father who missed my dead mom.

“I couldn’t argue with Francesco. I knew if I did, he’d have me killed without question. He wanted it to look like a home invasion since he knew the Irish would be out for blood. That night, I knocked on the door—”

“Excuse me, Frank, if I don’t want the details of how you murdered my parents.”

He inhales a sharp breath. I’m not sure if it’s a result of me calling him Frank or calling him a murderer.

“When I saw you alone after…what I’d done, I couldn’t do it. Fuck Francesco and his bullshit reason for wanting your parents dead. I wasn’t going to hurt a child. I never had, and I wasn’t going to start then. You were crying so hard, but the second I picked you up, you looked me in the eye with those big blue ones of yours and just stared at me.” He smiles and it does nothing but make me angrier that he’s thinking about it as some twisted bonding moment instead of the bloodiest night of my life by his hand.

“I didn’t know what to do,” he continues. “I knew Francesco was out of town, but his wife, Rosa, stayed behind. I called the house, and thankfully, she picked up instead of one of the guards. I told her what was going on, what I’d done, and what I couldn’t do. She was a devout Catholic and told me to meet her at the church and to bring you.”

“You put an awful lot of faith in the wife of the man who ordered my parents’ murder.”

Frank nods his head in agreement. “I did. I don’t know, maybe I thought she knew a family who would take you in. I thought she could help me figure out a way to disappear. Rosa had a goodness in her that wasn’t tainted by the life we were in. I knew in my heart of hearts she would help me. I’d done something I never thought I’d do. I was betraying my boss, and I knew what the consequences would mean. I wasn’t exactly in my right mind that night.”

I look back at the picture of my real father with Frank and Francesco. They looked like friends. How the hell could one friend order the murder of another?

“She showed up at the church but made her guard wait outside. She was beyond distraught at discovering her husband ordered the murder of an innocent child, especially since she had a child at home. She told me Francesco was well on his way to turning her sweet boy into the ruthless man he wanted to take over for him someday. Honestly, I think if she could have run with me, she would have, but there was no way Francesco wouldn’t have hunted us down and made both of us regret ever having attempted it. She brought me all the baby supplies she had on hand and a wad of cash. Told me to get as far away as I could. She said God must have put me in your path and this was my chance to make amends for all the heartbreak I caused. That getting you away from that violent and bloody life was my chance at redemption.”

“I’d say taking off to the other side of the country was a good plan then.”

He nods. “I was so fucking scared those first few days. Hell, the first few years. I knew there was no way Francesco wouldn’t be looking for me. I kept checking online for reports of what happened to your parents. But there was nothing. No news reports or anything. Between the cash Rosa gave me and the money I had in my safe, I set us up out here with new identities.”

“Why didn’t you go to the authorities? If you really regretted what that guy was going to make you do, why didn’t you call the FBI or something? Turn him in.”

“There was nothing witness protection would have done for me that I wouldn’t be able to do for myself. And I sure as hell wasn’t going to incriminate myself to get them to cut me a deal. Disappearing in the wind was the best option as far as I could see at the time. And I believed Rosa when she said I was meant to raise you to be an honorable man with no ties to our life. That wouldn’t have happened if we hadn’t disappeared.”

“Why didn’t you take me to my mother’s family then? You could have disappeared on your own and been done with the whole thing.” The only thing I keep thinking over and over is how fucking crazy this all sounds.

How is this my life?

“I thought about it so many times. There were days I was sure you should be with your mother’s family, but then I’d think about another kid being raised to live a violent life. I couldn’t imagine putting you there. I didn’t know the Monaghan’s that well, but everything I knew, everything I’d been fed about them, told me they weren’t any better than the life I took you from. I don’t know; I just couldn’t imagine you growing up to be a killer like me. I wanted to protect you from that life. Something intrinsic changed in me the first time I held you, Luca. It was impossible to ignore and even more impossible to explain. I never gave much thought to God or a higher purpose, but between the way you looked at me that night and what Rosa said in that church, I just couldn’t hand you over to another criminal family.”

“Why tell me now then?” I yell, the numbness I was feeling moments ago morphing back into anger.

“Because I’m dying. Because I feel guilty for leaving you with no one. Because I’ve raised you to be a good man, and I believe you’ll make the right choices with your future. Choices you wouldn’t have had if I’d left you on the Monaghan’s doorstep. I don’t know, son. The reasons change minute to minute.”

I bristle at his use of the word son but don’t comment.

“I can’t be here right now,” I say, standing from the old recliner.

“Where are you going?” he asks, worry creasing his forehead.

“I don’t know. This is…this is all too much.”

My legs carry me to my room, but I don’t feel anything as I throw a few changes of clothes in my bag and head to the front door.

“Luca,” my father—no, Frank—calls from the living room. “I love you. You have every right to hate me, but I need you to know that.”

I don’t look at him.

I don’t respond.

I just walk out the door.