Chapter 30
Chapter Thirty
Joaquin
“You’re sure it’s ready?”
“Stop whittling, hermanito. I tested the app four times on the burners. It’s untraceable. You worry worse than an old woman who can’t find her dentures.”
Jorge gives me an obscene hand gesture that our tíos pretend not to see.
We’re standing on his front lawn with Javier, our cousins, and our tíos.
It’s two in the morning, so pitch black outside.
We have a clear view of most of the houses owned by the syndicate families.
Some are out of sight because they’re in an adjacent neighborhood, but we’ll be able to pick them out soon enough.
I hold a burner phone with a single app and a single account—Genio Colombianos.
Colombian Genius. I may want our targets to guess who did this, but I don’t need any concrete evidence leading back to me.
While I usually don’t have a flair for the dramatic—that’s Javier with all his Wuthering Heights angsty, broodiness—I count down.
“Cinco, cuatro, tres, dos, uno.”
I hit send.
We wait.
Within three minutes, lights flip on in houses throughout the neighborhoods. It’s like watching a Christmas lights show. Within five minutes, our phones are blowing up. A Kutsenko or Andreyev is calling each of us. Only Tío Luis and Tío Matías have silent phones, but they’re laughing the hardest.
“If they’re dialing out, their call waiting won’t connect the incoming calls. That’s only pissing the rest of them off even more.” Javier breaks character for a moment and cackles like the witch out of Hansel and Gretel.
It’s like a round robin as the bratva take turns calling each of us, keeping our phones buzzing for nearly ten minutes. I bet if we put them on the sidewalk they’d bounce around like Mexican jumping beans.
Finally, Tío Enrique answers Maks’s call on speaker. Right on schedule.
“It’s rather late to be calling, Maks.”
“I’m going to fucking murder all of you.”
“And leave our wives widows? I’m sure that’ll impress Laura and the others even more. Happy wife, happy life. Wasn’t it nice while it lasted?”
“You piece of fucking shit. This is business among the men. You don’t involve the wives.”
“Ah, but all the evidence says otherwise. You haven’t had any problems involving the other women. You’re just pissed you got caught—and got outed. Find your huevos in whatever drawer Laura keeps them, and fucking own this like the man you pretend to be.”
Tío Enrique hangs up just as Tía Elle pokes her nose out. “It’s starting.”
All the men head inside and find our women waiting for us.
It’s their turn for their phones to be blowing up.
See, it wasn’t just the men’s phones I hacked and added the apps to.
I’m certain they all woke up to furious elbows and fingers poking them as their wives read what popped up on their screen.
Through a combination of hacking accounts across multiple devices, zero-day exploits to jailbreak their phones, and desktop tools that let me take over their devices, I sideloaded an app onto all of the phones.
My family and I paid an exorbitant amount for my Ivy League education, but it’s twenty-plus years of hacking that trained me to do some of the most highly sophisticated, state-sponsored-level shit out there.
The women in my family pass around their phones to each other, the men looking over their shoulders. It’s the same texts or some variation of them over and over.
I’ll kill him.
I’m sorry.
I’ll make this right.
The thing about this app is that you can’t send a message to just one person. It’s all or nothing. So, every text goes out to every woman in the Four Families.
Tía Elle’s phone rings twenty minutes into Showtime at Los Diaz. It’s Laura. I glance at Madeline. She knew what was coming, and since Laura’s calling, I’m guessing she didn’t warn her sister. My sister-in-law shrugs.
Once upon a time, Madeline and Laura were like Tío Enrique’s nieces.
He has a cross on his forearm with four initials.
P at the top—Pablo. J at the bottom—Juan.
L on the left—Laura. And M on the right—Madeline.
When shit went south, first with Juan then with some of the other women, Laura threatened to carve her sister’s and her initials out of my tío’s arm with a butter knife.
Tensions eased when Javier and Madeline finally got together.
But the damage was already done. Tía Margherita and Tío Luis stopped having Sunday dinners with Laura and Madeline’s parents.
The four of them together haven’t shared Christmas with us in eight years.
He doesn’t say it, but losing Laura and Madeline—temporarily—was one of the hardest things Tío Enrique’s had to bear.
With no children of his own, and a pack of nephews running every which way, I know he enjoyed having two girls around. He would’ve made an excellent girl dad much like Salvatore—as much as a shitbag as he is with everything else.
Tía Elle answers on speakerphone.
“Hello.”
“Hello, Elodie. Please hold on while I get the others on the phone.”
It’s only a moment later that we hear Sylvia Mancinelli and Mairghread O’Rourke join the call. Tía Elle and Sylvia are similar in age while Mairghread and Laura are close. They’re the four ruling women of the four ruling families.
This will either be war, or this will be peace.
There will be no middle ground.
Laura speaks first since she initiated the call. “Elodie, this was not how I planned to wake up. Certainly not at this hour.”
“The truth is rarely convenient, Laura.”
And we’re off to the races.
“Perhaps we can move past the lack of pleasantries and get to what matters.” That’s Sylvia’s voice.
She’s one of the most elegant and sophisticated women I’ve ever seen.
She’s today’s version of Sophia Loren meets Gina Lollobrigida meets Martha Stewart.
She’ll stab you through the throat with her designer stiletto while smiling and serving you espresso and biscotti.
She was also a renowned international attorney in her own right before marrying Salvatore.
Much like Laura does for the bratva, Sylvia handles the Mafia’s legal side of the family’s legit businesses.
She’s far smarter than foolish men in our world give her credit for.
“What matters is not only the information sent to us but how the hell it got onto our phones.”
Mairghread O’Rourke’s an investigative journalist. She’s not a hacker, but she can find anything she wants to know. It shouldn’t be too hard to figure out the answer. I guarantee she has some sources who’re hackers and programmers. She only needs to ask them.
“You should probably ask Nicolina that. She’s the one with the degree in national security. I believe she concentrated in something along the lines of cybersecurity.” Tía Elle isn’t exactly dismissive, but neither is she warm.
“Why?” It’s a simple question from Laura.
“Because your men deserved it.” That got a simple answer from Tía Elle.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Like Laura would’ve ever been satisfied with such a vague response.
“Sylvia can answer that as well as I can. I’m sure Salvatore’s given her a heads-up.” Tía Elle has no qualms naming names.
“Oh, no you don’t. Salva protected Tricia from the start.”
My tía lists their sins. “Because getting hit by a car, having her vehicle explode seconds after she got out, being chased and shot at, and being poisoned while pregnant shows what Salvatore’s protection is worth.
And don’t say the Diaz men should’ve done a better job.
That’s neither here nor there when the Mancinellis failed so spectacularly. ”
“She’s pregnant?”
The three women’s shocked voices blend together with that one question, then the call goes silent. The kind of silent when the phone’s muted. I guarantee Laura and Sylvia are ripping their husbands a new one, and Mairghread’s waiting for what comes next.
Tre looks up at me as I perch on the arm of the sofa beside her.
She looks uncertain as her attention shifts to the others before returning to me.
I stand, and a flash of panic crosses her face.
I ease her to her feet before taking her seat and guiding her to sit on my lap.
It’s a domino effect. The other men slowly shift and sit where their wives were, holding them on their laps now. Even the older generation.
It means everyone gets somewhere comfortable to sit.
Sure. Like there aren’t already enough seats for everyone.
Tre leans into me as Laura’s terse voice comes through the phone.
“What do you want from this?”
“Are you asking just me? I think you should ask Mairghread and Sylvia that question first. They’re the injured parties as much as los Diaz.” Tía Elle couldn’t give a shit about the other two women’s opinions, but she won’t let the bratva off easily.
“Mairghread?” Laura sounds like she’s choking on nails.
“A brunch your family hosts. During it, every man in your family apologizes personally to every woman he’s wronged.” Mairghread doesn’t pause before she offers her suggestion, clearly having prepared her answer before being asked.
“Sylvia?” Laura’s no more thrilled to ask her Mafia equivalent.
“Whatever each couple lost, the bratva returns or replaces.” Sylvia rarely sounds smug because she doesn’t need to, but she does now.
Ouch. That’ll be to the tune of a few billion dollars.
“Elodie?” Laura will never show resignation to someone outside her family, but I’ve known her since we were kids, so I can tell she’s ready to be done with this.
“I suppose I should say that instigating this is our retribution, and the brunch with the apologies will be reparations. That works for the grander scheme of things. Women and children are supposed to be off limits. I understand my family’s role in how that rule was shattered.
But it wasn’t us alone. Each of your families played a part in it, and as we saw tonight, it wasn’t one family after another.
It’s all been at the same time. Targeting a pregnant woman is the epitome of violating that cardinal rule.
Many of you have children. You can imagine what Trish has lived through.
All Four Families will take a borough of their own, and we’ll divide Manhattan.
Each family donates one billion dollars to the lowest-income schools and child development centers.
Mairghread, I’m certain Jocelyn can help us determine which places. ”
Cormac married a social worker. She’s the most equipped to give advice about where we can best give our support.
“Fair.”
Mairghread, Laura, and Sylvia respond with the same word.
“Ladies, as of tonight, women and children are off limits again. Any family who violates this will be the target for the other three families. It will be open season on the men in that ruling family. You will be widows.”
Maybe the syndicate wars will end one day.
Not today.
But maybe.
The call wraps up with all four in agreement with Tía Elle’s terms. Cold War-era MAD still remains the prevailing principle among the New York underworld.
Tre gets up and disappears into the kitchen before I can offer to help with whatever she’s doing.
My jaw drops, and heat surges up my neck and into my ears when I see what’s on the tray she’s carrying.
I close my eyes before I meet her gaze. She comes to stand in front of me, a Cheshire cat smile on her face as I rise.
“Cupcakes, anyone?”