Chapter 33
CHAPTER
THIRTY-THREE
CINDEL
Eamon texted me this morning to ask how I am doing. I was a nervous wreck when I first arrived home. With my overactive imagination playing out scenarios where Dax didn’t rescue me, I wind up making myself sick. I brushed my teeth multiple times to get the taste of my stomach acid off my tongue.
I barely slept, tossing and turning most of the night. Fortunately, Andrea never left her room. If she saw me… if she knew what happened, she would have packed my bags and had me on my way to my parents that very night.
Eamon told me to take the next day off. I didn’t object. I’m certain Dax told Eamon every uncomfortable detail of what transpired. I’ve seen some pretty crazy shit as a bartender, but I've never been attacked before. Obviously, I was upset… I mean, who wouldn’t be?!
Yet, I couldn't discern if I was angrier with the guy who was supposed to keep watch, the abhorrent man in blue, or myself. Reflecting on what happened, I feel like it’s my fault I didn’t fight harder.
Even if Connor was there, I still would feel the same.
I made a promise to myself that very day…
when I’m facing the impossible, I will fight.
No matter how bleak the situation may seem.
I can’t allow my fears to paralyze me because next time, there might not be someone to come to my rescue.
It’s ironic how I can make this badass vow while I still couldn’t get the image of contorted limbs tucked inside a trunk out of my head.
The way Dax handled the circumstance was unnerving.
Previously, Eamon informed me how Garron and Dax were sent to handle collecting a debt.
Was this just a regular thing for these guys?
Killing people?! Who the fuck are these men? Andrea did try to warn me.
Opening up the tab on my phone with the recently conducted job search.
I made a point to apply to at least five vacant positions this morning.
Although, nothing I choose is in line with what I went to school for.
Keeping my options ‘open’ seems like a wise choice.
I need safe options right now. I mean… what if the FBI came in one day and shut the whole bar down over these men’s crimes?
Jiminy Cricket, I witnessed a murder. It was merited, though…wasn't it?
Holy shit balls… am I justifying that some people deserve to be killed?
It was self-defense. Although it wasn’t me doing the defending.
An unsettling chill skates through my body as I consider all of these moral dilemmas.
If I actually reach out to my therapist to work through all this, I’m confident they would book me an extended stay at the white-walled, no sharp things inn… or jail.
Aside from the breathing techniques, they couldn’t help me right now.
Despite last night, I have been sleeping better lately.
Which is wild considering all the fuckery that’s been going on over the last month.
Having the day off, I am ready to tackle the Lombardi topic as well as finish going through the remaining boxes from my family.
I wonder if my parents had anything else squirreled away at their place?
They quite literally liquidated everything and moved to the Catskills shortly after my brother’s funeral.
They’re not known for their nostalgic nature.
Dusting off my dinosaur of a laptop from college, I found the charger and went through a series of overdue updates.
Being in the service industry didn’t exactly entail computer work, so this relic was struggling, after I summoned it awake for the first time in ages.
It takes well over an hour of me shouting vulgarities at the screen, that I did not in fact want to purchase any kind of anti-virus and I could care less that my PDF reader was out of date.
Once the computer boots up and the background screen is displayed, it is like a punch to the gut.
A picture of me in a maroon cap and gown, on the front steps of my high school, with my brother beside me.
He’s yucking it up for the photo, by pinching my cheeks and making an exasperated awww face.
He took every opportunity to point out that I was the younger one, but he never made me feel incomplete or unwanted.
I remember my parents being too busy with work on this day.
As soon as I walked across the stage, they took this photo and were back to their oh so important obligations.
My brother’s the one that took me out to celebrate that evening. I had my first martini. I said, “it tasted like pickled dog water,” in turn earning me the name “Sparky,” the rest of the night.
Clicking on the internet icon, I type in the word Lombardi and hit search.
The first hit was for a news article, well over fifty years old.
“The Mafia wars made for difficult times in the 1960s. While smuggling was a lucrative business, crime families spread to the states where they could control distributing networks. Historical records are not kept on such secretive organizations; however, it’s believed that such crime families are present today. ”
The next website I scroll through covers Mafia origins, dating back to the mid-19th in Sicily. I need to narrow down the information to just the Lombardi family.
Unreliable resources had news from twenty years ago about the Lombardi family, referring to them as mobsters still at large in the Boston area.
The journalist goes on to say, they were likely not the only crime family in the area.
Right…? So, some guy like Tony Soprano, was running around Boston knocking off people when I was little?
I love The Sopranos, but this shit is far-fetched!
I fall headfirst into the rabbit hole, clicking on site after site, skimming through dubious reports about real-estate inflation thanks to illicit activity from the Mafia.
Current articles highlight how the average Joe is unable to afford property in the Boston area, due to fraudulent schemes still taking place.
I guess it’s possible the Mafia is still present today.
It feels as though I blinked and it’s lunchtime. Now I know way too much about the Mafia, however, the last name ‘Lombardi’ just seemed to vanish about twenty years ago. Eamon has been extremely kind and helpful, but I still hadn’t the foggiest idea what all this had to do with my brother.
When I finally stand from my bed, my legs have pins and needles from sitting in one position for too long. I manage to shuffle into the living room as the blood flow slowly returns to my feet.
Spinning the whiteboard toward me, I consider all the evidence that Andrea and I have on display so far. I uncap a dry-erase marker and write the name Lombardi, along the top. Not sure how it ties in, but there it was in loopy cursive.
I stand back looking over everything we’ve theorized, feeling like today’s hyper fixation was a huge waste of time. Still, we’re no closer to figuring out what happened to my brother. We don’t even have a person of interest.
The front door swings open to reveal my silver-haired roommate carrying in so much stuff; she can barely see in front of her. I rush to help, relieving her of multiple bags.
“What is all this?” I inquire, lugging the heavy packages to the counter.
“This and that,” she replies.
I peek into the bags to find not just groceries but brand-new home security items, including glass break detectors, doorbell cam, and motion sensors. “What is all this for?”
She quirks an eyebrow as if I should know, while proceeding to unload her monstrous number of purchases.
“How’d you pay for all this stuff?” She proceeds to quietly put the few groceries away.
On the counter remains; spaghetti, two Roma tomatoes, a bulb of garlic, and olive oil.
“Are you making pasta? Who are you and what have you done with my culinary challenged roommate?!” I defend myself by holding up one of the security monitors to my chest and playfully point my finger in her direction.
She cracks and a smile breaks through. I miss our games, jokes, and just laughing with her.
Andrea grabs the box from me and sets it back down with the others.
“I should have you know that I am an excellent cook. Just not the best with frozen waffles.” Her grin fades as her tone switches.
“All of this is to make you feel safe. No more cops showing up without you knowing. Also, no more surprise visits from you know who.”
I wasn’t sure how I felt about that. He really wouldn’t ever surprise me again?
“I should have done this years ago,” she adds.
Pulling out a large sauce pot, she stops suddenly as her gaze catches on the board in the sitting room. “Did you write that?” She walks over to the board and points to the word Lombardi.
“Yeah. Eamon told me to look it up.” I joined her, staring at the way the lines connect to names.
“And?” She looks at me with rapid blinks.
“Nothing much online. Just that it’s some kind of Mafia family that had a heavy presence in Southie, from the sixties to early nineties. Apparently, the real estate market is still suffering despite the family name all but disappearing when I was small.”
Andrea sucks her teeth, then saunters back to the kitchen to continue preparing to cook. She seems off… lost in thought or bothered, so I spin the whiteboard toward the wall and tuck it away for later.