Chapter 5
JOAQUIN
“Are you just going to stand there, staring at the elevator doors?” Rocco questions, snapping me out of my trance.
I turn to him abruptly and narrow my eyes.
“If you had paid attention to anything but your dick, you’d know her leaving me was a pivotal moment.”
“Leaving you?” he scoffs, walking further into my penthouse.
Instead of heading to the kitchen for a cup of coffee like a normal person, he heads for the rolling bar and pours himself a glass of bourbon.
“It’s Pilar, that girl hangs on you like a fungus.
I give it twenty-four hours before she’s at the club, looking for your dick. ”
The urge to punch him in his face and break all his teeth tugs at me, but before I can lay a finger on him or tell him what a worthless fuck he is, he spins around and raises his glass.
“Now, put some fucking clothes on, motherfucker. I’m about to flip your world upside down and I prefer to do it without your junk staring me in the face.”
I don’t move, mainly to prove I don’t take orders from him, but then I realize the man I do take my orders from, showed his face unexpectedly last night and no good ever comes from that.
Making my way into my bedroom, I ignore the scent of Pilar that still lingers in the room and quickly pull on a pair of lounge pants.
The open drawer once filled with her clothes catches my eye and I silently wonder if I can stay away from her.
Shaking the thought from my head, I kick the drawer closed and go back to the living room where Rocco waits for me.
“You should probably pour yourself a drink,” he advises.
“It’s eight o’clock in the morning,” I growl.
“It’s five o’clock somewhere,” he argues, pausing. “On second thought, don’t drink. One of us should have a clear head and seeing as I haven’t slept in, oh, forty-eight hours, I’m going to elect you to be that person.”
I guess he needs to be reminded that out of the two of us, I’ve been the one with the clear and level head for the last six years.
“Look, I’m not in the mood— ”
“Uncle Vic is dying,” he reveals, cutting me off.
Sure I heard him wrong, I narrow my eyes and wait for him to elaborate.
“Stage four cancer,” he continues, diverting his eyes to the amber liquid sloshing around in his glass.
I try to picture the man I’ve looked up to for nearly half my life, frail and sickly, but I can’t.
Yesterday, he appeared to be a picture of perfect health, dressed immaculately as usual.
His color was good and there was no fault in his demeanor.
I suppose it’s like that for everyone, though.
You look good until you don’t.
Here today, gone tomorrow.
“No one knows and apparently, he has no intention of telling anyone,” Rocco continues.
“What about Grace?” He shakes his head. “Adrianna and Nikki?”
“What part of no one don’t you understand,” he says before knocking back the contents of his glass. Cringing slightly, he sets it on the coffee table and looks back at me. “No one in the organization knows either.”
That doesn’t surprise me. If word got around that he was so sick, his enemies and the other families would see it as a sign of weakness and likely put a bid out for his territory.
But him not telling his wife and daughters, now that’s a shock.
Victor might be one of the most notorious mobsters to ever walk the streets of New York, but he’s a family guy first and foremost.
While other bosses may have wives, they also got a side piece— the Italians call it a Goomah.
They keep them shacked up in fancy apartments just like this one and shower them with designer handbags and stolen furs.
Monday through Friday they’re with their families, but Saturday nights are reserved for their mistresses.
Not Victor.
Every day is family day for him, and so long as that man is on this planet, he only has eyes for his Gracie.
It’s always been the thing I respect most and if I’m being honest, it’s the thing I envy the most too.
But it’s because of men like Rocco and me, that he gets to live that life.
We’re the guys on the front lines, the men who drudge through the shit and take the bullets and do the federal bids so he can remain hunkered down with the woman he loves, watching his daughters live their cushy lives.
“So that’s why he’s here,” I say, taking a seat in the armchair across from him.
“I suppose that has something to do with it,” he says, drawing out a sigh. “He wants to have dinner with the both of us tonight.”
That isn’t anything unusual, whenever he visits, we usually hit one of the steakhouses on the strip, but I can tell I’m missing something by the way Rocco pauses and leans his elbows on his knees. He lifts his eyes to mine and fixes me with a hard stare.
“I need you to tell me what happened with Pablo Rodriguez. You don’t just off a fucking guy like that and not tell me about it.”
I raise an eyebrow at his tone. The balls on this motherfucker.
If he wasn’t too busy getting his dick sucked, he would know about the situation with Pablo and the countless other problems I’ve dealt with since we took over Temptations.
But his lack of appreciation is my own fault, in my quest to be part of Victor’s world, I fucking spoiled Rocco.
“All you said was there was a problem and the next thing I knew, you were changing your clothes, but I don’t remember seeing any blood, so what kind of fucking problem was there?”
Clucking my tongue against the roof of my mouth, I meet his gaze.
“First off, don’t fucking talk to me like I’m beneath you. I don’t give a fuck about bloodlines— we both know I do a fuck of a lot more around here than you do and if it weren’t for me, you’d be fucking dead.”
“Should I tell you where you’d be if it weren’t for me?” he counters, cocking his head to the side.
Oh, I know where I’d be and suddenly, it’s a lot more appealing. Grinding my teeth, I lean forward and match his stance.
“I didn’t know Pablo was even in the club until Miguel came to me and told me Pilar was unresponsive in one of the VIP booths.
I immediately took her off the floor and brought her downstairs, he gave her a shot of Narcan, and I played back the surveillance tapes.
Luckily, Rodriguez is a greedy motherfucker and stuck around after he sold to her.
I knocked his two guys out and grabbed him when he was taking a piss, his dick was still in his hand when I dragged him to the basement. You want to know his last words too?”
Swiping a hand over his face, he mutters a curse. I lift an eyebrow at his response and laugh bitterly.
“I’m sorry, should we grieve the motherfucker who was dealing drugs in our club and nearly killed my girlfriend? Wait, maybe I should’ve paused before I pulled the trigger and asked your permission.”
“For fuck’s sake, Joaquin, I’m not fucking busting your balls for taking him out. You should’ve seen Uncle Vic’s face— he lit up like a Christmas tree. He was so proud and thanks to you, I’m nephew of the year and— ”
“What are you talking about? How did Vic know?” I ask, fearing the guys fucked up when dumping Pablo’s body.
He sighs, leaning against the leather cushions of the couch as he spreads his arms across the back.
“Did you stop to ask yourself how Pablo was allowed into the club?”
Recalling the conversation, I had with Omar before I made my way up to Rocco’s office, I nod.
“Omar said he was on the guest list, which is crazy because I checked the list earlier in the afternoon. I didn’t have a chance to dig deeper into it because Victor suddenly appeared, and I had to get back to Pilar.”
“Victor put Pablo on the list.”
“What? That makes no sense.”
“It was a fucking test, one I apparently passed thanks to you.”
“A test,” I repeat. “Why the fuck would he test us?”
The only logical explanation would be that someone reported some bullshit to him— my guess, that weasel Jimmy Gold. He might be Victor’s right hand, but there’s something not right with that motherfucker and it isn’t just his gold teeth.
“Bro,” he calls, demanding my eyes. He swipes a hand over his face and his bloodshot eyes go wide as he blows out a shaky breath. “I don’t know, and I don’t want to get ahead of myself, but what if he was testing me because he’s finally decided to make me a made guy.”
The tension that was escalating between us only moments ago suddenly dissipates, and I stare at him, trying to find the words.
If that’s the case, that’s a huge deal. It’s huge for me too seeing as I can never be made.
Having Rocco play with the big dogs is good for our crew.
It gives us the power we lack in the organization.
You see, him being a made guy means he can essentially do whatever the fuck he wants.
He can take out anyone so long as he isn’t a made too and use his weight with the family to make a score.
It means he has a say in what the fuck goes on.
But more than any of that, it is his chance to finally step away from his deceased father’s shadow and rid himself of the tarnished reputation he inherited because they shared the same name.
Still, Victor setting us up like that, I don’t like it. Not only because I have another man’s blood on my hands, but because Pilar was a victim of his games.
“Wait a minute,” I start, pausing to swallow the lump in my throat. “When you say Victor set us up with Pablo, what does that mean?”
“He put his name on the list to see how I’d handle having a well-known drug dealer on my turf. You know how he feels about drugs.”
Pilar’s face flashes in my head as I rise to my feet and start to pace in front of the coffee table separating us.
“So because Victor wanted to test you, Pablo was allowed in the club with his drugs. Was Pilar part of the plan too or was she just a fucking coincidental casualty?”
“Uncle Vic has no idea who Pilar is,” he says, narrowing his eyes for a moment.
That’s not entirely true. During a few of his visits, he’s met her. She even came to dinner with us one night. I never introduced her as a girlfriend or anything like that, but that shouldn’t matter. She was with me and if . . .
“Man, get that shit out of your head. You’re looking for someone to blame when the truth is, Pilar’s a junkie.
She knows where to get her shit and if it wasn’t Pablo it would’ve been someone else.
You put a drug dealer in a room with people looking for an escape, the dealer is gonna score— all Uncle Vic did was set the stage for what he knew was inevitable. ”
He goes silent and my mind drifts back to Pablo’s last words.
I didn’t know she was yours.
Would it have made a difference if he knew she belonged to me?
“Fuck, you’re in love with her,” Rocco accuses.
I lift my gaze to his. For a fleeting moment, after Pablo uttered those words, I wanted everyone to know she was mine, including the guy I considered a brother. Then reality settled in and I remembered this life I’m living ain’t meant to be shared with a woman or . . . a child.
“She was pregnant,” I reveal, scrubbing both hands over my face. After a moment of silence passes between us, I brace myself and drop my hands to my sides.
“What do you mean, was?”
“She had an abortion.” The words sound just as foul as they did when I handed her the money and told her to get rid of it.
“Jesus, man,” he hisses. “And you said not to drink this early,” he mutters, pulling himself off the couch. I watch as he reaches for his empty glass and crosses the room, pouring himself a refill. He takes a gulp before turning back to me. “I’m guessing you wanted her to keep it?”
“I’m the one who gave her the money and told her to take care of it, but that doesn’t mean I didn’t want it. That part of me isn’t fucking dying inside.” I shake my head and look at him. “A baby doesn’t fit in this life.”
“Would it have really fit in hers either? She needs to get straight, man.”
“Maybe she would’ve,” I say. “She was clean from the minute she found out.” My voice trails and I sigh. “It doesn’t matter,” I tell him, clearing my throat. “We’re done.”
Finished before we began.
Rocco bites the inside of his cheek as he studies me for a beat. Before he can bestow any advice— which, let’s be real, he’s probably the last person who should be dishing out advice on relationships or anything for that matter— I clear my throat.
“We need to put a plan in place should any of Pablo’s men feel the need to retaliate,” I tell him. The worrisome look on his face dies and he shakes his head.
“According to Vic, that won’t be a problem.”
“And why is that?”
Before he can answer, a knock sounds on my door. Raising an eyebrow, I turn and stare at the door.
“You expecting any visitors?” Rocco questions from behind me.
Shaking my head, I start for the door. I peer out the peephole to see who it is but I can’t make out anything.
Glancing over my shoulder, I motion for Rocco to get my gun from the safe.
Instead, he reaches into his jacket and pulls out his own.
With a jerk of his head, he gives me the green light to open the door and aims his gun.
My hand closes over the knob as the mysterious person on the other side of the door knocks again. Rocco moves to stand behind me and as I pull open the door, he cocks his gun.
“Don’t shoot!”