Chapter 16
DAMIANO
I hope the little prince enjoys his self-imposed prison for the rest of the day. I do stop by the kitchen and tell Rosa to send down meals to the basement, and get myself a furious, tight-lipped glare for my trouble.
“It was his idea to go down there!” I snap. “Just do what you’re told, woman. Unless you want him to starve.”
She mutters something in Italian that I choose not to hear, and then I go back out to Vito and the car.
But Shuffles has appeared across the road, shifting from foot to foot in the shuffle that gave him his name. He gives a jerky up-nod as I appear, and I head over, curious to hear what he has to say.
“Someone’s been driving around here, offering money to kill that boy who’s staying in there with you.” He jerks his chin toward the house.
“He’s not a boy,” I say automatically, even as my gut tightens. “When, where, and who?”
“Couple of hours ago, a few blocks down. Older guy, getting driven around in one of them European cars. No plates. Didn’t get a good look at him, either. Windows were dark and he only cracked it an inch, plus he had sunglasses on.”
That could describe anyone from the Bratva to the Morellis. “How much was he offering?”
“Couple of hundred. But it wouldn’t have mattered if it was a million. I got my integrity.”
I put my hand on his shoulder and give it a squeeze of thanks, then pull out my money clip and count out five hundreds. “Here.”
He shakes his head. “I wasn’t looking for that.”
“I know you weren’t. Take it anyway. And tell anyone else who gets an offer like yours that I’ll double it for them, too. Understood?”
He takes the money, folds it carefully, tucks it deep. “You sure about that? You gonna get a run on folks looking for free money.”
“I’m sure.” Paid loyalty is still better than nothing at all. “Now go tell Rosa that I said to send you out some lunch, and then you find a new place to hang around for a while.”
He nods and shuffles over toward the house, while I get into the car.
A couple of hundred dollars. That’s what the Clemenza heir’s life is worth to this motherfucker?
That’s an insult, is what it is.
I pull up the camera feeds for the basement, just to see what that cunning little snake is up to. But he’s covered over the cameras somehow, so that all I see is black.
He never would have dared to do that before Luca fucking D’Amato stepped in.
My thumb hovers over the control for the lights. One tap and I could plunge him into darkness, let him panic-breathe his way through the next eight hours while stuffed into that cage. But it’s too petty to be satisfying, and I don’t want him running to Finch D’Amato.
I put the phone away and think about how it felt to have my dick in his throat, his hair twisted up in my hand. “Don Clemenza” took my load and swallowed it all down.
What would Strike Ferraro and the rest of those losers say if they knew?
Nothing today requires much of a workout. At the third stop out in Astoria to check in on a crew running numbers out of a barbershop, a low-level soldier actually asks me if it’s true I bought the Clemenza heir at auction.
His senior cuffs him before I can, but I guess it means that what happened at the Obelisk is common knowledge now.
Then that same kid, rubbing the back of his head, pipes up again. “Hey, you think Seb Conti is gonna make a move? My cousin over in Brooklyn says—”
“Your cousin in Brooklyn needs to shut his fucking mouth,” I say, stepping close enough that the kid flinches.
“And so do you. Big Gee is the Boss. Anyone who says different is going to lose their tongue, just like Vito, here.” I thumb at Vito, who immediately opens his mouth and waggles his tongue-stump at the guy. “We clear?”
“C-clear,” he stammers, going ghost-white.
“The fuck is wrong with you?” the senior soldier snaps at the kid. Then, to me: “Sorry, Orsini. I don’t usually let my people run their mouths. You know I shut that kind of talk down.”
“I know you do, Pep.” Pete “Pep” Pardini is actually a good friend of Seb’s. Solid guy, keeps his crew tight, and he knows that Seb likes to keep eyes focused on Big Gee.
“Kid’s new,” Pep says with a shrug, walking Vito and me back out to the car. “He’ll learn, or he’ll lose teeth. Either way.”
I shake his hand and get back in the car, where I compliment Vito on his back-up show. I’m debating bringing up the cameras in the basement again when I get a text from the man in question: Sebastiano Conti, asking me to meet him later for dinner.
I go as summoned. Seb has already been served his sixteen-ounce ribeye when I arrive at the Family-backed steakhouse on Mulberry Street that’s been feeding wise guys since before either of us was born. Dark wood paneling, white tablecloths, heavy silverware, and generous portions.
I order the veal parm and a glass of red and wait for him to stop chewing long enough to talk. “What the fuck’s going on?” are his first words.
“Meaning?”
“Big Gee’s pissed.”
“He always is.”
“At you. Specifically. For dragging him into some meeting with D’Amato.”
I can’t stop the tcha of irritation. “That wasn’t me. It was the fucking Clemenza.”
Seb stops eating at that and raises his eyebrows. “That needs an explanation, Orsini. What do you mean it was the Clemenza?”
“He…” There’s no way I’m going to go into everything that’s happened over the last few days, so I abandon that sentence. “Long story short, D’Amato grabbed the Clemenza off the street.”
“He what?”
“I guess he heard some story the Bratva fucks were putting around, rumors that I wasn’t treating the Clemenza right.” I watch Seb closely as I mention the Bratva, but I see nothing in his face to suggest he’s heard about the potential war I accidentally started there.
But Seb is watching me just as closely. “So what happened?” he asks.
“D’Amato pulled me and the Boss into a meeting. He had the Clemenza there, who, you know, told him the truth.”
“Which is?”
My food arrives, giving me a chance to choose my words.
I thought Seb was on my side after the opera attack.
“He told D’Amato everything was fine,” I say once the server is gone.
“That he owed his fuckin’ life to me, and that he wanted to…
” I shrug, not knowing how to finish that, because “be with me” sounds way too intimate, and even “be under my protection” isn’t much better.
“And did he mean it?” Seb asks. He’s stopped eating to focus on me, which isn’t a great sign. I don’t want him focused on me, and especially not me in connection to the Clemenza.
“Well, he convinced D’Amato,” I tell him, which is true enough. “And D’Amato let him come home with me.”
I don’t like the way I said that. Come home with me, as though we’re in some cozy fucking relationship.
And Seb picks up on it, too. “What the hell is going on between you two, Orsini? I don’t understand it.”
“Yeah? Well, me neither.”
“You still want to kill him?”
I reach for my wine and take a long drink to cover the involuntary jerk that goes through me at the question. I use my glass as cover so I can arrange my face into the right expression.
Want to kill him? Of course I want to kill him. I plan to torture him until he begs for death, and then I’ll wait a while longer. He deserves an undignified end.
But the script feels old. The words sound rehearsed, even in my own head.
“I’m protecting him,” I tell Seb. “Like you saw yourself at the opera.”
“Where is he now?”
“At home.”
Seb still looks troubled, but the next words out of his mouth aren’t what I expected. “Keep him there. It’s not safe on the streets for him, not right now. There’s a price on his head.”
“So I heard. You know who put it there?”
“Isn’t that what I told you to find out?” he growls, but there’s no heat behind it. “I don’t know. And Big Gee isn’t feeling any warmer toward him after that meeting, which”—he squints at me—“you still haven’t told me everything about. What got my brother’s panties all twisted up?”
I want to deflect again, but what’s the point? If Seb doesn’t hear it from me, he’ll hear it from one of those dozy bodyguards of Big Gee’s. They’re gossips as well as useless. “He kissed me. The Clemenza,” I add, as Seb looks confused. “He kissed me in front of…well, everyone.”
“Oh.” Understanding comes into Seb’s face. “So it’s not just about protection, huh? You and him.”
“He was fucking around. That’s all.” I shove veal into my word-hole and chew. For a day or two there, I was dumb enough to fall for the Clemenza’s arts. Dumb enough to think that maybe we did have something under all that mess of history and blood.
That’s what makes me hate him all the harder. He had me so mixed up I even considered giving up justice for my father. That fog that he brought down over my eyes was so thick I lost sight of my vendetta.
“How does that…work?” Seb asks. He’s stopped eating altogether and is just staring at me.
“What?”
“I’ve known you most of your life, Orsini. All you ever cared about was killing—”
“It’s none of your damn business,” I snap, and then expect Seb to pull rank. He’s Underboss, after all. If he wants to make it his business, he will.
But all he says is, “Okay. You’re right. But if Big Gee thinks your loyalties have become divided—”
“If that motherfucker is questioning my loyalty—”
“Watch your tone,” Seb says immediately. “Anyway, it’s not just you. He’s been making noises about a whole bunch of people lately.” He sighs. “Between you and me, I think he could do with a fucking vacation.”
“I’ll leave it to you to suggest that,” I snort.
Seb is right, though. Recently my work has been focused more internally than externally, and Big Gee’s orders about some of the crews have been…odd. Some of them look genuinely surprised when I show up, and it’s hard for me to lean on them to do better in any particular area.
I always find something, because those are my orders. But it’s a stretch sometimes.
When dinner starts to wind down, I seize the chance. “Listen, I need to get some of my people into protection. We got anyone in Chicago who could help?”
“Depends what they did,” he says. “Chicago’s jumpy about things these days. You might be able to swing something with Sonny Vegas, though. He’s been taking in strays in Sin City. Long as you can pay, of course.”
“Money’s not a problem, and they didn’t do anything. I just need to get them away from the Morellis.”
“Then Sonny’s probably your best bet.” He pauses. “But if they didn’t do anything, why is D’Amato gunning for them?”
“Long story.”
“Make it short.” I hesitate again, and Seb sighs. “You know what’s wrong with this Family right now? Everyone’s being so fucking cagey. No wonder Big Gee’s so jumpy. You got a problem with D’Amato, Orsini, you need to tell me.”
“He’s not as convinced of my good motives toward the Clemenza as you are. So my people have become collateral.”
Seb stares at me. “Wait—your people, as in Rosa and Vito and Sammy?” He looks even more troubled now. “I can’t believe that. D’Amato wouldn’t be dragging innocents into something like this.”
“Or maybe D’Amato ain’t the fuckin’ messiah after all,” I snap, and Seb’s face darkens. “Look, I’m just telling you what I know.”
“Let me ask a few questions.”
He doesn’t believe me. But it begins to occur to me that I might be the one in the wrong, here. Because how do I know this about D’Amato?
I heard it from a fork-tongued serpent.
“You know what,” I say slowly, “I’d appreciate that. Maybe I got the wrong idea. But be quiet about it, eh?”
He nods. “And I’ll tell Big Gee to take that vacation,” he says with irony. “Maybe there’s hope for the Giulianos after all.”
“You ever wonder how things might’ve been different if you…” I break off at Seb’s look of outrage. “Forget it.”
“You’re fucking right I’ll forget it—and you better, too. If I ever hear you finish that sentence, I’ll put a bullet between your eyes. Big Gee is the Boss.”
“Yeah, I know. I didn’t mean—”
“No, you fucking didn’t,” he cuts me off heavily.
With Seb, some topics are just off the table completely.
Him being a better leader than his younger half-brother is one of them.
And any time he hears something that might suggest it, he’s the first one to squash it, hard.
But there are still whispers. I talk to a lot of crews, and today wasn’t the first time someone raised it.
They don’t usually ask so direct, but I know what they really mean when they ask after Seb Conti, want to know how he’s doing.
Seb would kill me where I sit if he thought I was suggesting he usurp his brother. But I’m not the only one thinking about it.
It doesn’t matter. Big Gee’s the Boss because he has the name, and Seb doesn’t. What I should be worried about isn’t the internal political bullshit, but the Morellis and the Bratva.
And the Clemenza.