49. Chapter Forty-Eight
Chapter Forty-Eight
Alessandrio
“ A nything?” It’s hard to keep the snarl from my voice as I peer over Jimmy’s shoulder.
“Do you want him to give you the same answer he gave you fifteen minutes ago?” Emilio asks from behind his desk.
To that I do actually snarl, the sound rumbling from my chest and Jimmy’s fingers slip on the keys in alarm.
“Drio!” Emilio snaps.
Our eyes collide, both narrowed with warning. He has been patient with me this past week, abnormally so, and I know it’s due in part to the guilt he feels over what his wife did. Good. Let him feel that guilt, let it wrack him the way it has me and keep him up at night. But even now I see his new found patience tested the way my grip on sanity has been.
“She’s been released from the hospital,” I bite out each word, not even trying to hide my venom.
“And she has headed off with the detective,” he replies with much more gentle restraint. “She’s safe.”
I want to toss the desk, to throw things, to rip this old money room apart with my teeth and claws. An avalanche of emotions has come down on my shoulders this week: guilt, rage, betrayal and emptiness. Riccardo shot Olivia in the fucking chest. Emilio seems to forget that. Every time I’m reminded of how close she came to death’s door, I fucking hyperventilate. I don’t like feeling powerless, refuse to feel this way, and accept it. So I have our tech guys searching New York for any sign of her, and at nights, when I feel the emptiness more acutely, I drive around the streets looking for her.
“You need rest,” Emilio continues with a sigh, standing.
“What I need is to find her.”
With every step he takes, I see something I despise in his eyes. My claws punch into my palms, the urge to lash out at him coiling tight.
“What if she doesn’t want to be found?” Pity laces his voice and features.
Something warm slips from my fists, drawing my brother’s gaze down to where my blood drips on his carpet. Emilio shakes his hideous head, horns glinting in the afternoon light.
“I am taking you home,” he says, holding up a hand as I open my mouth to spit something incoherent. “Not a fucking word. You are going home to sleep. I will come wake you myself if they find anything, and we can go after her then.” He grips my shirt, pulling me closer, making me shuffle forward on my paws. “I know you are fucking hurting right now. It kills me. She is safe and we know that much. Right now I have the Outfit breathing down my neck and meetings to organize after the shit fight Galdano and Riccardo left us in. I need you clear-headed and rested enough to protect me. I need you, Drio,” he pleads and that familiar heavy shroud falls around my shoulder.
It’s family first with us, has to be and I know it. It’s never mattered what I want or need. The reality of his question is a painful blow. What if she doesn’t want to be found? What if she doesn’t want me? I tried my best to get to her in the hospital, even had Lorenzo and some of our men pretend to be nurses, doctors and fucking cleaners to gain access. Olivia Dolmino however, was guarded heavier than the Crown Jewels. That Detective Mathers doesn’t like the Mafia very much, and I guess he thought someone would try to get to her to silence her.
“I need to know,” I spit. “Even if she isn’t coming back, I need to hear it from her fucking mouth.”
“And I promise you, we will find her if we can and get that answer. For now, I need you good.”
Pick your battles. That is what I have learnt as his second in command. Right now, I cannot fight him. He would kick my ass in my exhausted state and he’s right. I am not thinking level headed on so little sleep. So I allow him to take me home. The prick even rides with me in the elevator, up to his penthouse. He said it was a gift, but I know it was his guilt. I demolished my apartment, pulled an Emilio in her room, tearing apart her bed and wardrobe. The scent of her driving me to madness. I unlocked a new level of crazy those first few days. Emilio had me move up to the newly refurbished penthouse with promises that I wouldn’t take my rage out on his new plaster or furniture. And I complied. It doesn’t feel like home yet. Only my clothes and my binoculars made it up here. He says nothing about the couch pressed up to the window, the empty bottle laying on its side and those binoculars sitting on the arm.
Old habits die hard and now that I am alone again, I watch. It does nothing for the emptiness but to only solidify the reality of it. But at least up here I can’t smell her on everything, and I don’t know whether to rejoice in that fact or not. It still feels so raw.
“Get some sleep,” he says, surveying the space for any damage.
I only grunt and make my way up the stairs. It’s so fucking quiet. In my new bedroom I find another old habit, the white pills scattered across the bedside table. The ones I refused to take the way I refused the peace of sleep. Now I knock a few back, and fall on the massive king bed. When I close my eyes, I find what I feared. Grey eyes, full lips curved in a sweet smile and a head of golden hair. Even in my memory I can’t escape my awe, can’t avoid my hand that reaches out to nothingness as if to capture that beauty against my palm. She isn’t there though, not right now, and it’s dread I feel as I am dragged under by the lull of forced sleep. What if she doesn’t want to be found? Well, she can say it to my fucking face when I get my hands on her.
Me: I want you to look into something new for me.
Jimmy: What do you need?
Me: I want Detective Mathers’ roster for the next few nights, his locations and regular movements. And I don’t need to tell you that this is just between you and me.
Jimmy: You got it Drio.
Patience. I have to get this right. Emilio doesn’t need the cops coming down on him as well as the Outfit. So I wait for the perfect moment, trailing the detective for his evening shift. Watching him and his partner follow their usual habits of dinner and coffee. I pull out the trusty radio scanner to follow their pursuits and wait for them to return to this spot, where a silver sedan sits waiting for its owner to return to it.
Darkness has always been my greatest friend, heavy shadows and the drawn out nights of these colder months. My laser focus keeps my head in the game as I wait. The opening I need comes closer as headlights bounce off the car beside me. I hear men talking, a single bark of laughter and a door slamming closed. The jingle of keys is my cue, the moment I have been waiting for, and I take it with gusto. I know he feels it, see his shoulders tense as I step behind him—it’s a well-known feeling to those of us who have felt the sharp press of a barrel of a gun against one’s kidneys.
“Didn’t anyone ever tell you not to park beside vans?” I taunt, feeling for his holster and removing his piece, kicking it under his own car with a paw.
“It’s the problem with old age,” he says, raising his hands in the air. “You get cocky and forget the simple rules of the game.”
“Well, lucky for you, I will make this quick,” I whisper, checking our reflections in his car window. Neither his nor my features are clear on its liquid black surface—good. “Olivia Dolmino.” His shoulder tighten further. “Where is she?”
“Who are you?” I hear his own anger catching in his voice and press my gun into his side further as a reminder.
“None of your fucking business,” I snarl. “Where is she?”
“Well, my answer would depend on who you are.” I grip the back of his coat and shove him into his car, my patience finally tested.
“I am not playing games,” my voice drips with malice.
“Alessandrio Greco?”
My grip on his coat relaxes with my surprise. “She told you about me?” I ask incredulously.
“No,” he replies quickly. “No. She gave nothing away, it’s only that she showed up to the docks in Lorenzo’s car that we pieced together your family’s involvement. And when I mentioned you to her, it was hard to ignore the look of a girl in pain. I have daughters, you see. It’s a look I recognize well. That, and she said a Greco might come looking for her.”
“Where is she?” I repeat my question with very little control left.
“I can’t tell you that.” The growl that escapes my throat is purely predator. “However, she gave me a letter for you. It’s in my glove compartment. I can reach in and get it.”
“Nice fucking try.”
He tries to turn his head then, and I let him, the desire to show him exactly what it is he is dealing with, what he will face if he fucks with me right now. I lean closer and meet his eyes, watch them grow wider with understanding and shock.
“What are you?” he gasps and I shove him again, displaying just a taste of my power.
“Your worst fucking nightmare. Now where is she?” I snap my teeth for good measure.
He stares long and hard for a moment, as if contemplating his answer.
“I cannot tell you that, but I have a letter she gave me and if you want to reach in and take it, you can.” I glare at him and watch his throat work as he takes a large gulp.
“Move back,” I snarl and press him forward with the gun, “Further,” I snap as he backs up, hands high for me to see. “Throw me your keys.”
He complies and I catch them easily, and relish in the sight of him taking in my clawed and dreadful hands. I wonder if he’s questioning this moment, trying to piece together if she meant this monster when she wrote the letter—if there truly is a letter.
I keep my gun aimed and ready over the top of his car as I move around to his passenger door and open it. The internal light goes on instantly, and I smile at him as the warm glow puts my features into perspective. I lean in and open the glove box, not taking my eyes or the gun off him. I feel inside, my hand closing around paper and I remove a plain white envelope in utter disbelief. Shutting the door, I make my way back around the car to my van and to the detective, eyes boring into his.
“She told me it was for whoever came to look for her,” he says calmly. “I didn’t expect you,” he says honestly. “What happened to you, Alessandrio?”
“A new Mafia torture method,” I reply with a mocking grin as his eyes become rounder.
“There are more like you?”
“Oh, plenty more. An entire army of us.” I hold up the envelope. “Thanks for this,” I say and toss his keys over the other side of his vehicle.
I don’t wait for him to reply before climbing into my van. I gun the engine and reverse expertly, headlight illuminating a frozen Tony Mathers as he watches me depart the parking lot. He probably won’t sleep tonight. The idea of an army of monsters like me will unsettle him and keep him busy for a while about how to tell the others—if he can even make sense of it himself.
The contents of the letter burns a hole in my pocket all the way home. The awareness of it niggling with every step to the elevator and every breath up to the penthouse. There is too much space in this place for one person. I should have declined Emilio’s gift, but I couldn’t stay in my old apartment any longer with her scent everywhere, making her absence tangible. I take a seat on the couch, pulled up to the view that kept me sane on my loneliest days. Despite the touch of fall, the rooftop bar is lit like a Christmas tree in the night, still thrumming with life. Taking a deep breath, I use a claw to carve open the envelope and remove the note inside. My heart is kicking in my chest as I unfold it to reveal pretty scrawling letters. Three words that feel like the destruction of my soul, making my stomach fucking hurt along with my heart.
I’m sorry.
Liv x
The paper flutters to the ground as my head falls into my hands. I swallow around the lump in my throat, the penthouse that just moments before I felt was too big suddenly feels as though it's closing in on me.