Chapter 31 Valentino
I spend the whole night fuming in righteous anger. Those fuckers dragged me to a police station in a backseat of nowhere village in the county. We were in Scarsdale—why the hell would they go to another station?
Something feels so amiss in this whole thing. They’ve also taken Naomi, and I don’t know if they’ve brought her here. Women are usually kept separate from men when taken by law enforcement, so she’d be in another room. I hope with all I’ve got she’s fine. Yes, one of those bastards slapped her. He hasn’t got long to live. Once I lay my hands on him, he’s a dead man, cop or not.
The cops who took me leave me alone for hours in this windowless space. It’s an interrogation room; I don’t need to have been in one to recognize the table and chairs, the mirror on the wall. We all watch TV, don’t we?
What you don’t reckon with on TV? The caged feeling after being in this tight space that starts to close in on you after a while. Pacing doesn’t alleviate it, nor does sitting down and letting my mind go blank. A tough thing to do, with all the questions going around in my head.
What the fuck happened?
Is Naomi okay?
How did these guys get the drop on us?
Tangents from these three main concerns suffuse my head until I’m ready to burst, yet I know grabbing a chair and flinging it at the wall will only aggravate my position. They can add vandalism to the charges against me. Charges I still don’t know about.
I recall Naomi telling someone they were planting something in our room. The blow from the butt of a handgun had stunned me, and it’s a bit hazy. So, the cops are trying to frame me? Why? Because I’m the newest Mafia Don in this region?
None of this is making sense.
The door opens, and I jump up.
A bland-looking man in a well-tailored suit nods at me. “Mr. Andretti, I’m Fletcher Boyle, Esquire. Let’s get you out of here.”
I don’t know this lawyer, but I won’t look a gift horse in the mouth.
“Where’s my wife?”
He hands me a shopping bag when I pass him. “Rest room’s this way. I assume you’ll want to change first.”
The cops hauled me out of the hotel in my boxers. They handed me a pair of sweatpants and its corresponding sweater, as well as a pair of slippers, at the station—it would be considered abuse to leave me unclothed and without shoes in their care. I can’t wait to get these rags off of me.
“Mr. Boyle. Where’s my wife?”
His voice drops as he accompanies me down the hallway. “I don’t know, Mr. Andretti. I do know she’s not here, though. I checked. I’ve been hired to get you out, and that’s what I’m doing.”
He isn’t curt or short, which makes me cut him some slack. His wing-tip brogues alone scream he’s paid handsomely—someone very wealthy is pulling the strings to get me out. Best go to the source and not through an underling to get the right information.
It kills me not to know where Naomi is, but part of me suspected she wasn’t here. I can see the other cells as I pass through the only corridor in this boxy station, and they’re empty, the doors to the interrogation rooms open and revealing no one inside. They separated us on purpose, bringing me to this hellhole to put distance between us.
Why, though?
A picture’s starting to form, but I refuse to contemplate it. Not right now. Doom thinking won’t get us anywhere, won’t help Naomi.
I go into the restroom and change into the brand-new chinos and slim-fit shirt which fit perfectly. There’s also a pair of Loro Piana summer loafers in my size.
I feel more like myself when I come out and follow Fletcher Boyle out. No one in the station stops us, most of them with their head lowered. The only one who glares at us is the guy I recognize from the hotel room.
He’s now got a target on his back, whoever he is. I’m not stopping to find out, not when getting out and getting to Naomi is the priority. I have men who can handle this for me, plus I know Reeves will be gunning for this fucker, too.
A Cadillac SUV is ambling in front of the station. The lawyer and I both slide into the back seat.
“How did you get me out?”
He chuckles. “Amateurs, the lot of them. Bodycam footage shows they failed to knock and failed to announce themselves before barging into your room.”
“I’m getting out on a technicality?”
“They also had a warrant for possession of a controlled substance. The bag they supposedly found in your room? Couldn’t even get that right. It held point-four-five ounces of heroin. Criminal possession in the fifth degree starts at half an ounce.”
Hence them being amateurs.
“You are in the clear, Don Andretti.” He reaches into his pocket. “Sorry, was supposed to give you this earlier.”
It’s my phone. Someone must’ve gotten it from my room and handed it over to this man who came to free me. I also don’t miss the switch in title to address me.
I put in a call to Antonio. My consigliere must’ve been apprised of what’s going on.
“Val,” he says when he picks up.
“Where’s Naomi?”
He sighs. “We’re still finding out. You got separated at the hotel.”
I curse aloud. The lawyer flinches next to me.
“Don Vitale has generously offered us the use of one of his homes. We figure she must be near. We’re waiting for you to decide the next steps.”
So, we’re heading back to the same region where it all started. My heartrate’s not coming down. Taking me, it’s starting to sound like a set up. What was all this about? And how does taking Naomi fit in?
We reach a gated property in a well-off area. When the car gets waved in without a blink, I realize the car and the lawyer must also come from Don Giorgio. He’s still the head of his Borgata—his grandson Matteo is supposed to take over the reins next year—and all the other Dons from the Northeastern coast region pledged their support to me, as I did them, last night during my initiation.
Merda, was it just last night? It feels like a lifetime ago.
I jump out of the car as soon as it stops. The front door of the two-story manor home set amid lush gardens opens, Antonio standing on the threshold.
I storm in, finding Luciano, Victor, Marco, and Pesci all in the open-plan kitchen to the side of the house.
“What the fuck happened?” I ask my capo.
Pesci lowers his head. “We didn’t see them coming, boss. They tasered us all. By the time I recovered enough to call Marco, they’d already taken off.”
“Fuck!” I kick an armchair, allowing some of my rage out. “They got me on trumped charges.”
The lawyer, who followed me in, apparently, lays it out for my men like he did in the car.
“Diversion,” Victor says when Boyle is done explaining, and we all freeze.
“What?” Luciano asks, recovering first.
“Target was Naomi,” Victor adds, his face hardening like granite.
It had indeed seemed too easy, me getting out of the station earlier. The stakes had been set up to crumble like pieces of straw at the first gust blown by a big bad wolf, aka a lawyer.
But what this also did was make time pass. The first hours after any abduction are crucial. We’re almost half a day late.
Frustration is boiling over inside me, and I want to crawl out of my skin. Hit something. Kill something. Preferably the ones who got their hands on Naomi. My fists pound away at the same armchair I kicked, a roar of pure rage pouring out of me.
What the hell do they want?
A hand settles on my shoulder. I throw my arm back, in a move designed to chuck right into the person’s chin and destabilize them. Instead, my elbow hits something solid, and I’m left smarting with pain.
“Damn it, Victor! What did they feed you at that monastery? Rocks?”
“Focus,” my baby brother tells me.
I glare at him; he remains unfazed.
He’s right, though. I need to think, not turn into a raving cockhead driven by his base instincts to maim and kill.
Forcing a deep breath, I turn to the men in the room.
“Okay, what do we know so far?”
“They knew where you’d be,” Luciano says.
“And what your protection detail would be like,” Marco adds.
Pesci lifts his hand to speak. “It looked like a police raid, but there was no damage inside aside from your room. They knew exactly where to look.”
“They could have someone inside who sold them information,” Antonio concurs. “I’ll get a crew on it.”
“Get the CCTV footage while you’re at it,” I say. “Actually, wait.”
That might take hours. I know someone who can get us in much faster. He’ll need to be apprised, too. I pull out my phone and send a text. Less than a minute later, he calls.
“Reeves.” We’ve ditched the secure server and all the roundabout way of getting in touch once the Joel Smith operation was over.
“Someone took Naomi?”
My nostrils flare. “Looks like it.”
“How can I help?”
“Your guy who knows the systems…” We’re not on a secure line, so I leave this vague. He’ll know I’m referring to the hacker who got us in and out of Pineridge.
“Yes?”
“We need the camera footage from the hotel we were staying at yesterday when we both got taken.”
“And yet, you’re out,” he says, tone suddenly cold.
He’s only protecting his own, I remind myself. Declan Reeves is not someone to cross, same as me. You don’t get on our bad books willingly.
“It was a diversion. Lawyer got me out on a technicality, and the charge they used didn’t even compute.”
“One of these instances is a fluke. Two is not a coincidence.”
“Exactly.” I proceed to give him the name of the hotel.
“He’ll get you what you need. Do you have a computer with you?”
I turn to my men. “Laptop?” I mouth.
Marco lifts up a device.
“Yes,” I tell Reeves.
He cuts the call, and silence blankets the room.
Luciano’s the first to speak. “Val. Coffee.”
He nods at the kitchen island, and as much as I bristle and itch to run out and do something, anything, I know I’ll be no good without fuel. The only thing we can do right now is wait.
So, I sit on a stool and nurse a mug of coffee.
Fifteen minutes later, Reeves calls.
“Sent you a secure link. Check it out.”
I reach for the laptop. The link takes us to a video file—footage from the hotel. We see the crew of five men in tactical gear hot-footing it to our door, bursting it open.
My hands tighten to fists when I see one of them pulling Naomi out of the room violently, her small feet dragging on the carpet. Victor’s massive palm lands on my shoulder, staying me down, though I can hear the sharp inhale as he watches his sister-in-law being clocked in the back of the head with the butt of a gun. She’d gone just enough past the lens so her face isn’t visible, but we can all see her body crumple, unconscious, the man hitching his arm across her waist to continue dragging her.
My fist lands on the marble surface with a thud.
What have they done to her? After everything she’s been through already…
“He’s a dead man, Val.”
It’s Marco. Or Luciano. I don’t know, and I don’t care.
They’re right, though. I let this notion steal my focus. If I think about Naomi too hard right now, I’ll lose it, and then I’ll be of no help to anyone, much less her.
“Valentino?” It’s Reeves—he’s still on the phone.
“Who are these motherfuckers?” I ask him.
“I don’t know. Yet. But I do know that’s not police tac-team gear. The masks are wrong, and the chest plate? Not Kevlar or any of the new materials for law enforcement or even the military.”
“So they might not be police at all? The plainclothes cazzo who came into the room? He’s definitely police. I saw him at the station when I was leaving.”
“He’s working with these people, at least.” Reeves stays silent for a moment. “Let me see what I can find about him.”
He cuts the call, and I tell the men what just transpired.
“You know, it’s a long shot, but…” Marco frowns.
“Go on.”
“Billings was found in a former safe house for the cops.”
Which suggests…
“You think they have anything to do with this? Retaliation?” Horror fills me as some threads start to connect. “Smith?”
“He’s not done with her,” Luciano says softly.
I shake my head. “But why now? He’s all but dropped off the face of the Earth. None of his friends or associates want to touch him with a ten-foot pole.”
“Let’s think this through,” Antonio states. “What did he want with her all along?”
I think through the past months, sift through the information we had about Joel Smith and what he did to Naomi.
Then the lightbulb comes on.
“The money,” I say. “The trust fund she’d unlock when she got married.”
“When did you get married?”
I frown at Fletcher Boyle. But if he’s still here, it means Antonio vetted him. Plus, Don Giorgio sent him in the first place, an associate of his, if not a friend outright.
“In April,” I reply.
“Most trust funds require a moratorium of three months from the date of marriage to unlock if it were dependent on that clause. Yours hasn’t been three months yet.”
“So, the trust can’t be accessed yet?” Luciano asks.
“Unless it doesn’t have such a clause.”
Reeves should know about this. I text him and ask.
All this for money?
But then again, this has been the driver of Joel Smith’s life all along. He seduced a na?ve young heiress when she was fifteen and turned her head, so she’d end up married to him, giving him access to her fortune. He has no respect for human life, only seeing a bottom line.
Here’s the thing which disgusted my father even more than Smith’s treatment of his wife so far—Smith all but offered her up to my dad if the latter wanted to sleep with her after the birth of Naomi. Aoife Reeves-Smith faced massive complications during the birth of her first child, which resulted in her needing a hysterectomy. With her unable to give him more children, and especially a son, a true heir, she was of no use to him.
Who says he didn’t graduate to selling her body for money?
And now, he’s doing something similar with his daughter. She’s just dollar signs to him.
How can he be pulling this off, though?
“Who could be helping him?” I ask.
“Not any of the families,” the lawyer says. “You are Don Andretti now, one of them. Not unless they want an all-out war.”
No one wants a war between the families. That would be suicide.
“It won’t be the Irish mob, either,” Antonio says. “Don Vitale all but wiped them out once. They won’t attempt anything again, much less on his territory.”
The Irish mob killed Don Vitale’s only son, Matteo’s father, over a decade ago. They learned their lesson when the old man all but scorched them into the ground in legitimate retaliation.
“I don’t see the Bratva getting involved in this,” Luciano says.
“No.” They stick to their thing, don’t get their hands dirty on other territories.
“So, who, then?” Victor asks.
I have no idea, and the frustration inside me is burning up again, ready to blow out.
Fuck!
We all retreat in silence around the room. The lawyer receives a call and excuses himself. I thank him for his help, then fall into the same armchair I was punching earlier and heave a sigh.
“We’ll find her.”
The low voice and calm tone of Victor is soothing in the moment. It reeks of certainty and strength.
I nod at my brother. “We will.”
Reeves calls. The trust fund does have the moratorium period included in it. But better yet, he’s found who our bent cop is. He sends me his home address, as well as that of his partner who remained outside the room the entire time, and I assure him we’ll take care of it.
“We have our man. Connor Gatling,” I tell the room.
“Boss?” Pesci asks, standing up. “Can I?”
His eyes are lowered, and he’s asking for a second chance here. Another capo might already be dead in his shoes, but I have to own up. I’d wanted to please my wife by booking that hotel. Not that I shouldn’t have, yet our security should’ve been tighter, too. It’s not entirely Pesci’s fault.
“Go,” I tell him. “And take him to our regular spot when you’re done.”
“Thank you, Don Valentino.”
It’s strange to hear my men calling me by this title; guess I’ll have to get used to it.
We sit down and wait. Marco rustles up lunch. I don’t have much of an appetite, but I force myself to eat to keep my energy up.
Pesci’s call comes in—he texted earlier to confirm getting the package; now, he’s telling us they’ve reached their destination. He took Connor Gatling to Newark. He’s our only link to find out who the fake tac-team with him were and hopefully where they’ve taken Naomi. No way will I conduct this interrogation outside of my territory.
Marco, Victor, Luciano, and I are getting into a car—Antonio will be staying in case we need to reconvene here—when my phone rings.
I frown seeing the caller ID.
“Yevgeny Mikhailovich,” I say in greeting.
“Tovarisch Valentino,” the d’yavol of Little Odessa says in a sad tone. “I heard what happened to your wife.”
News travels fast.
“Tovarisch brother of Yevgeny. Yevgeny help Tovarisch,” he continues.
He sounds half-drunk already, but I appreciate the sentiment.
“Thank you, my friend.”
“Boy Tovarisch give Yevgeny, he very good, but talk lot, too. Might help Tovarisch.”
My senses flare up to full alert. Marco just spoke of Billings in there—could Thad have information for us?
“I’m listening.”
“Boy says papa need money. To pay Albanians.” It sounds like he’s spitting fiercely after saying this. “Svo lach’.”
No wonder he spat—he’d just called them the worst form of low-life trash.
“Spasiba, Yevgeny Mikhailovich.”
“Da, Tovarisch. Find wife. Bring wife home.”
I cut the call and stand there in wonder. Who’d have thought getting revenge on a figlio di puttana and wanting him to suffer would open up a vein of help from the most unlikely of places?
“Change of plans,” I tell my brothers and Marco and start back toward the house. “What do we know about the Albanians?” I ask Antonio inside.
He frowns. “Not much. Why?”
“Because they could be the ones who have Naomi.”
Billings needed money for his father to pay back his debts. Billings Senior approached Joel Smith first to have a Governor in his pocket, second to marry off his son to Naomi and get her trust fund money. Thad was protected by crooked cops in New York, and just now, a crew of low-lives worked with two Westchester County police officers to kidnap Naomi.
It’s all too much of a coincidence. And the missing link we couldn’t find before? It seems to be the Albanians.
Rumor has it that a while ago, they were starting to encroach on the Eastern Europeans’ territories, probably seeing them as the easiest to get a foothold in. Nobody messes with the Bratva, not even the most established families of New York.
Guess these fuckers are looking for a new stronghold?
What they don’t know? They’ve messed with the wrong person.
“Marco, you and Victor head to Newark. Find whatever you can about the Albanians from Gatling.”
Marco is a master interrogator. I can count on him. And the very sight of gigantic Victor can be enough to make a man shit his pants.
“Luciano, you’re with me. Let’s go see what Don Giorgio can tell us about these cazzos. I know they’re mainly located in the Bronx, which borders his territory.”
Fucking Albanians. I’m going to find Naomi first, then I’m going to bring them down.
But there’s still a more important loose end to tuck away. I place a call to Reeves on the way to the car.
“Joel Smith is behind all this. I need you to find him for me.”