Chapter 25
DAMIANO
I close the door behind me and stand there listening. After a minute or so, the shower finally starts up in the bathroom.
I should go make those calls. Find out what the cops are saying, find out if there’s any fresh intel.
I should’ve seen today coming; didn’t Shuffles tell me already that he’d been approached?
It makes sense that the same fucker would be hedging his bets, approaching people anywhere Caligula might turn up.
Yeah, I should go make those calls. Instead, I buzz Rosa on the intercom to bring up something light to eat, and then I sit on the edge of the bed and put my head in my hands.
I know you hate me, he said. I know I deserve it.
The old Caligula Clemenza would never admit in a million years that he deserved what I did to him.
And in the car, his brain couldn’t finish a thought. His mind is the most dangerous weapon he has and it was grinding like a seized engine. He couldn’t connect the dots. Couldn’t get from A to B.
Worse, he stood on the stoop with a gun aimed at his head and didn’t move. The guy who told me he’d do whatever it takes to survive, who even crawled back to me because he figured that the devil he knew was better than the one he didn’t.
That guy just stood there and waited for death.
I think…
I think I broke him.
The thought lands hard and the ripples of it just keep spreading out, making it worse.
Not bruised him. Not rattled him. Not pissed him off the way I’ve pissed him off a hundred times and watched him come back sharper.
But broke him.
Months living on the street couldn’t do it. The Bratva selling him at auction couldn’t do it. And whoever’s tracking down the Clemenzas, they couldn’t do it.
But I’ve done it.
I found a hairline fracture in that armor of his, and then I twisted and twisted until…
Until he broke.
He lied to me about my people. He used Rosa and Sammy and Vito as pawns. So I broke him for it.
That’s fair.
That’s justice.
That’s what I wanted from the start.
So why do I feel bad about it?
Rosa comes up with a tray of sandwiches, and a few minutes later, the shower shuts off. He comes out of the bathroom a few minutes later, hair damp, wearing a towel, and he stops at the sight of me, like he wasn’t sure I’d still be here.
He drops the towel and gets into the bed, still looking at me.
“Eat,” I say, handing him one of the sandwiches. He takes a bite, and then another and another, but only when I watch him. “Here,” I say, handing him another. I take one of my own, and we eat in silence.
“You should go to sleep,” I tell him after. My voice comes out rough.
“Will you stay?” he asks.
“Yeah,” I say. “Just till you fall asleep, though.” I take off my shoes and sit up on the bed, back against the headboard.
“When you go,” he says, “can you leave the lamp on?”
I made a twenty-one-year-old man afraid of the dark.
I’m not proud of it.
“Yeah,” I say again. “I’ll leave it on.”
His breathing evens out after a few minutes, and I sit there watching the shape of him under the covers and trying to figure out what the fuck I’m supposed to do now.
I need him back.
Not for—not because I—
I need his brain back. His strategy. Without the Clemenza running at full capacity, I’m flying blind while everyone under my roof is at risk.
I need to find a way to un-break what I broke.
But I’m so much better at breaking things than fixing them. Always have been.
I meant to leave, to go back to the guest room, but the next thing I know, I’m waking up with a crick in my neck from sitting up against the headboard all night.
Caligula is awake. Lying on his side, looking up at me. The lamp is still on, and I don’t know what the hell time it is. The security shutters are still down all over the place, but my phone tells me it’s coming up on eight in the morning.
Caligula looks rested, which is more than I can say for me. But still pale. “You stayed,” he says.
“Didn’t mean to.” I rub the back of my neck, grimacing.
He’s quiet for a moment. Then: “Dami. I’m sorry.”
I look down at him. “For what?”
“For using your household against you. For threatening Rosa, Vito, Sammy.” He says it simply, looking at the bedspread rather than at me. “I was sure you were going to kill me, so I used the only leverage I could find. But it was wrong. They’re good people, and I’m sorry I used them like that.”
I wait for the angle. The pivot. The moment where the apology turns into a negotiation, where I’m sorry becomes so here’s what you owe me now.
It doesn’t come. He just lies there, looking at the bedspread.
I get off the bed and stretch. “I’m gonna get coffee. You want some?”
He nods.
I go downstairs, and Rosa is already pouring out two coffees like she’s psychic. She gives me a look when I come into the kitchen, but just tells me breakfast will be ready in fifteen minutes, and where do I want it?
“I’ll let you know,” I tell her. And then I carry those mugs all the way back up to my bedroom, relieved at least that Rosa is still here, even if both Caligula and I have been relegated to drip coffee for now.
Caligula is sitting up against the pillows. He takes the mug with both hands and drinks like it’s the first warm thing he’s had in days. Which…I guess it might be.
“We need to talk about what’s next,” I tell him.
He looks at me over the rim of the mug and waits.
“Whoever’s sending these guys after you, they’re not gonna stop. Yesterday was sloppy, but sooner or later someone less sloppy is gonna show up, and I need to know who I’m up against before that happens.”
He nods slowly.
“Your brain ain’t—” I stop myself. Start again. “You said you couldn’t figure it out yesterday. In the car. The stuff about the hit men not being professionals.”
Something flickers across his face. Not anger. More like shame. “I know,” he says quietly. “I couldn’t…think.”
“Yeah. And I need you thinking.” I take a sip of my own coffee to avoid looking at him. “So here’s what I’m gonna do. I’m gonna call that asshole Strike Ferraro. Set up a meeting with your Loyalists.”
His head comes up.
“Don’t look at me like that,” I mutter. “This ain’t a gift. You got people out there who might have heard something about who’s targeting you. Ferraro claims he knows nothing, but the others might. Could be intel I can’t get from my own network. And maybe being around your own people will—”
I don’t finish that sentence. Will fix whatever I broke isn’t something I’m saying out loud.
“Maybe it’ll jog something loose,” I say instead. “Get you back to being useful.”
He’s staring at me. For the first time since the basement, there’s something behind those golden eyes that isn’t flat or empty. It’s not the old fire; more like an ember glowing brighter under a careful breath.
“Okay,” he says.
“No one comes armed,” I tell him. “Anyone pulls a weapon, I put them down. You don’t go anywhere without me. And if I say we leave, we leave. No arguments.”
“Alright.”
“And Caligula.” I wait till he looks at me. “If any of them try to collect that bounty, I will kill every last one of them. You’ll be the last Clemenza standing. The very last.”
“A collector’s item,” he says, and there’s a ghost of something in his voice. Not quite the old acid. But a shadow of it. A memory.
I call Ferraro. The old man picks up on the first ring, like he’s been waiting with the phone on his chest.
“Shut up and listen,” I tell him. “I’m calling on behalf of—” I glance at Caligula.
“—of Don Clemenza,” I say, just to see how it lands.
It gets no reaction out of Caligula, but Ferraro catches his breath.
“He wants a meeting with his people,” I go on.
“Tonight. No one armed, or I deal with them myself. Where?”
There’s a long silence on the other end. Then Ferraro’s voice comes back thick and unsteady, and I realize the old bastard is crying. Crying with relief or joy or whatever it is these Clemenza Loyalists feel when they hear their prince is still alive and asking for them.
I hold the phone away from my ear and wait for him to pull himself together. When I finally get an address and a time out of him, I end the call and look at Caligula.
He’s holding the coffee mug with both hands, and his eyes are…
Alive.
Not with the dazzling Clemenza prince brightness. But something that might be a cautious hope.
“Thank you,” he says.
I get up. “Don’t thank me yet,” I tell him. “I’ll bring up some breakfast, and then you’ll get some more rest. Tonight’s gonna be a long one.”
I leave him there with the lamp still on and I pull the door mostly closed behind me.
On the landing, I stop and think about what just happened. Because I just handed Caligula Clemenza access to his own army. They’re an army of has-beens and wannabes, but if he gets back to full strength, if his brain comes back online, if those Loyalists give him what he needs…
He could turn all of it against me.
I knew that.
And I called Ferraro anyway.