Chapter 9
Matt
“Do you know what that was about, Don Matteo?”
Not a fucking clue. I can’t let Marco know that, though. “Of course.”
“And it doesn’t bother you that he’s giving orders alone, without you present?” Marco shakes his head. “That’s dangerous, my don.”
“Only if I don’t know what he’s doing.” I shrug it off and stand. “Thank you for your time today, Marco. I’ll send for you again when next I have need of you. Until then, keep up the good work.”
Marco takes that for the dismissal it is, and finally I’m alone in my office.
It concerns me that Aron left before we really planned the next attack on the Empire. I know it’s a sore subject for him, but he’s got to try to be present for things like this. If I didn’t trust that he had something important to do, I might arrange for someone to follow him.
No, I can’t do that. He’d notice a tail in seconds. I have to let him do his thing. For whatever reason, he didn’t want me involved, and I have to accept that.
With Percy on a mission for me, I open the door and wave over our other guard for this shift, Alaric.
He’s young, recently recruited, with pretty, golden boy looks that could easily earn him more money than we’re paying him.
Alaric doesn’t want fame, though. He’d rather risk those looks in this line of work than sell himself on a runway.
“Alaric, gather the enforcers. Officers. Anyone who knows their way around a gun. Have them meet with me individually. Ranked officers first, then down the line. Can you do that?”
He nods and exits, tapping another guard to take over.
By the time Aron returns, dozens of men stand in the hallway, awaiting orders. His face betrays nothing when he walks past the crowd and enters the office. If I’ve surprised him, there’s no outward indication.
The door closes behind him, and he takes his place next to me at our desk.
“It’s time?”
“Yep.”
Aron sighs. “This is going to be a bloodbath.”
“Yep.”
“Any ideas on how to mitigate so-called civilian casualties?” When I shoot him a confused glance, he clarifies.
“Look, Matt, I want the Empire gone as much as the next guy out there. But people on the street? That’s a bit much.
We’ll start hating ourselves before it’s over.
Maybe we should consider smaller, more surgical strikes versus huge shootouts. ”
I scrub my face with my hands, sighing. “We tried that, Aron. Remember? When Javier was ordering drive-by shootings and little one- or two-person hits, it was ridiculous. We can’t keep that up forever.”
“We don’t have to keep it up forever. We just have to time them right. Hit as many Empire targets as possible at once. Not only will they not have time to coordinate any kind of retaliation, but they’ll be caught off guard.”
Sounds like a logistical nightmare. Where’s Aron going with this? “Synchronize watches, is that it? It’s not that simple.”
He stands and begins pacing. “Hear me out, Matt. If we wait a little while … oh, say, a few days … we can hit them in unison. They’ll be confused, disoriented, scattered. They won’t know their heads from their asses.”
Aha. That explains a little about his earlier disappearance. “A few days, huh? That’s oddly specific.”
Aron grins. “I may have borrowed an enforcer.”
“What’s mine is yours, Aron. No borrowing necessary.” Although I find it charming that he thinks he needs to explain himself like that. “All right. Three days should be enough time for this side quest of yours?”
“Two days for the quest, one for chaos.”
“Do I want to know what you’re planning?”
Someone knocks on the door, and Aron returns to his seat. “Maybe later. For now, just expect to be short one associate.”
Most of the afternoon passes before I figure out which enforcer he “borrowed.” Enzo’s one of our elite; Aron must have quite the task for him.
Meanwhile, we give the rest of our officers and hired guns their own specific targets, with one universal time to strike.
Much like Javier’s attacks on my dad’s penthouse and other apartment properties, these will ideally happen almost simultaneously.
Our most dangerous men are assigned to their Empire counterparts, saving the weaker targets for less experienced Royal Syndicate associates. I note, however, that Aron keeps redirecting me away from assigning the most dangerous targets of all:
Mom and Emily.
That’s when I realize not only who Aron used for his task, but what the task is. I wait for a break in the steady stream of hitmen before confronting him with it.
“Yes, Enzo’s going after Lucinda and my wife, but not to kill them.”
“What?”
His raised hand quiets me. “Do you trust me?”
“You know I do.”
“Then trust this. We’re going to capture them first. Eventually, they’ll die. The in between time will be a bit messy, but those two are certainties.”
“Messy” isn’t always a good thing. “Messy” leaves room for error, and I say as much.
“They’re not escaping, Matt.”
“You escaped. I escaped. I think maybe you’re placing too much faith in … fuck, I don’t know what. Our capabilities? The fact that they’re women?”
Aron deflects the question by calling in the next associate, and he doesn’t give me time to retort until the last man has a mission. By then, it’s well into the night, and we’re both beyond exhausted.
“You never answered me, Aron.”
He arches his brows, but the bemused expression doesn’t quite reach his tired eyes. “I didn’t, did I?”
Grabbing his arm, I stop him from getting up. “Aron, please. This isn’t a joke. If either Emily or Mom escape, we’ll both be dead. I doubt they’ll be sentimental enough to go easy on us because you’re Emily’s husband or because I’m Lucinda’s son.”
“And we won’t go easy on them, either.” He pulls his arm out of my grasp. “Matt, I’m tired. Let’s just go to bed and deal with this when Enzo reports back.”
“This is not a ‘when Enzo reports back’ situation!”
Aron’s gaze breaks from mine, and he turns his back on me. “You said you trusted me.”
“I do, but—”
“Enzo will bring Lucinda and Emily to a location of my choosing. He’ll secure them. He’ll call us, and we’ll go take care of things. By the time we’re done with our fucked-up family, the Empire will be in shambles.”
“What constitutes ‘done’ with our family?”
He barks out a bitter laugh. “W.W.T.D., Matt. What would Tito do?”
With that, he leaves. I follow him out, thinking about his last words in the office.
There isn’t much Dad wouldn’t have done to an enemy.
But to Mom? To Aron’s wife? I can’t answer those.
Dad adored Lucinda, but he had no clue what was going on behind the scenes.
He didn’t know she survived the car bomb, didn’t know she married Javier, didn’t know about Emily.
What might Dad have done if he’d known about all that treachery and betrayal?
Since Aron’s not being forthcoming, I revisit Dad’s old business practices, lessons he taught me from an early age.
Dad was big on making the punishment fit the crime.
For a man who hated any task that involved art or design, he was very creative in that aspect of his life.
He followed the spirit of “an eye for an eye,” if not the exact passage.
Thieves might not have to endure the Biblical punishment of amputation, for example, but he made damn sure they’d never use their hands again to slight him.
I have no qualms about enforcing the Royal Syndicate’s rules through violence, and Emily and Mom definitely broke more than a few rules. Hell, Emily’s very existence breaks the rules. Maybe that’s Aron’s point: We’ve got to follow Don Tito’s rules if we’re going to survive this.
By the time we get to our bedroom, I’ve got the beginnings of a migraine to add to my throbbing jaw and aching ribs. As soon as Aron shuts the door, I make a beeline for the medicine cabinet—then the liquor cabinet. Come Hell or high water, I’ll stop this pounding in my skull.