Chapter Six Tom
Chapter Six
Tom
Folding my peacoat over my forearm just so, I nodded hello at my secretary, strode into my office, and closed the door.
My partner, Gene Sullivan, also known as Sully, would be here at some point in the morning, and I planned to redivide our work in a manner that would put as much distance as possible between me and Enzo Ferrante.
After hanging my coat and suit jacket on the hanger, I rolled up my sleeves, powered up my computer, and sat at my desk, waiting for my desktop to come to life.
I wondered if Enzo was still sending me five hundred messages per hour, but not enough to unblock him. My self-preservation and circumspect nature always prevailed, so the best course of action was to ignore the ridiculous man-child and find another pretty hole to sink my dick into sometime soon.
There were apps for that. I used them scarcely, carefully, and within my rigid rules for sexual encounters. I always went for one-off, no-strings-attached meetings in anonymous hotel rooms.
I enjoyed sex, but I didn’t enjoy people, and when it came down to it, I’d rather give up the sex if it meant not having to socialize.
I found myself checking Enzo’s Instagram profile as soon as my computer was up and running.
This was a routine procedure; no one else in the Camorra had any social media accounts. In fact, Luca and Achilles went to extreme lengths to keep their names off the internet. Enzo had no such compunctions. He loved being seen and relished the adoration he received online.
I made it a point to check his profile every other week. I never expected to find something incriminating there. He wasn’t that stupid. But it gave me insight as to what was going on in his chaotic life.
Logging into my fake account, I typed out his username, cringing at his tacky moniker. @ItalianSausage was hardly the height of sophistication. He’d posted another picture this morning, which had already garnered over two thousand likes and three hundred comments.
It was of him, holding up his phone, shirtless, in front of a round bathroom mirror adorned with steam.
His hair was wet, falling across his tan forehead in stygian strands, his back and shoulders ripped to sinful perfection.
I’d never had a man this fit between my sheets, and I’d sampled quite a few athletic men in my lifetime.
My throat bobbed with a swallow, and I pressed my hand over my zipper to stop myself from forming an erection.
Say what you will about Enzo Ferrante, but the kid knew how to take a thirst trap.
My eyes wandered to the caption, and I nearly sprayed my espresso all over the screen.
This is intended for my not-so-secret admirer. Here’s your sign to do more than stalking
#comegetme #idontbite #unlessyouwantmeto
The little shit knew I was checking his profile.
That, in itself, didn’t bother me. It was just work. But he was egging on a federal agent. Unacceptable.
Despite all my functioning brain cells telling me not to open the comments section, I did anyway.
The internet, as always, didn’t disappoint.
Nikki2013: big fan of whatever’s happening in this picture. Lol
Audrey_baby: who’s dumb enough not to jump your bones???
CourtneyS:
Swaggybaggy: if she won’t have you, I gladly will. Just sayin’
A knock on the door made me minimize the window and lurch back like a teenager caught with his hand in his pants. Jesus Christ, I needed to get a hold of myself. I wasn’t doing anything wrong—just following leads for my case.
“Yeah?” I cleared my throat, folding my legs to hide the evidence of my newfound idiocy.
Zeke, my superior, popped his head through the gap between the door and the frame.
Deputy Director Ezekiel “Zeke” Maddox was the only person I considered a true friend in this world, and even that was reluctantly.
The bastard never gave up when others did.
He’d been my commander once upon a time, when I was first deployed, and as soon as I got discharged, he knocked on my door with a Cornell leaflet for a master’s degree that’d fast-track me to a desirable FBI position.
“Rothwell. Conference room. Two minutes.” He slanted his shiny bald head toward the hallway.
I nodded. He was about to leave, then stopped, working his jaw back and forth. “Oh, and bring the Ferrante file.”
My interest was piqued. “Sully’s here?”
“Don’t act so surprised; he’s still on my payroll.”
I didn’t like his tone. Then again, I didn’t like most of everything.
Grabbing the thick file on my desk, I pushed to my feet and followed him into the conference room.
To my surprise, Sully was seated and even looked half alive.
I checked my watch. It was just shy of nine o’clock.
He usually didn’t grace us with his presence before ten, and was never fully awake before eleven.
Gene Sullivan was in his early sixties. A portly, old-school Irish New Yorker, with salt-and-pepper hair, red suspenders, and a don’t-bullshit-me scowl wedged so deeply between his bushy eyebrows you could tuck nickels into it and they’d hold.
He lived off caffeine, alcohol, and sheer grit.
Even though he was a lazy bastard, I liked working with him well enough, since he wasn’t into small talk, and let me lead the investigation on account of him eyeing an early retirement and not giving too much of a shit.
“What’s going on?” I sank into a chair at the oval table, my gaze flickering between them.
Zeke fell to the seat at the head of the table, grabbing the file, mindlessly flipping through it. “We’re at a standstill with the Ferrante case. It’s going nowhere, fast. Headquarters said we’ve got more pressing issues to tend to.”
“More pressing than catching bad guys who flood the streets with drugs, prostitution, and violence?” I sneered.
Even though Zeke and I were friends, we had little in common.
He was a Black man in his fifties, married with four kids, an amateur chef, enthusiastic marathon runner, and a standing member of a professional poker league.
I was single, actively avoided people, content in my carefully constructed bubble, and had lived off the same three meals on rotation for two decades now.
“Too many resources have been poured into this project, with no real progress.” Zeke shoved the file back to me, folding his muscular arms over his chest. “This is an order from above, Rothwell. My hands are tied.”
He had to be fucking kidding me.
The Ferrantes needed to be stopped. For the sake of this city—and humanity as a whole. Beyond this family of psychopaths living their best, murderous lives as free people, I had extra skin in the game.
Nailing this case would put me at a point of advantage in the FBI where I could cherry-pick my next position. I wanted to switch to counterterrorism. I was fucking done chasing sleazy men with too much hair product who popped kneecaps as a hobby.
“You okay with this shit?” I eyeballed Sully, the pulsating vein in my neck throbbing.
He shrugged. “Zeke’s right. Besides, I don’t think I’ll get to see us wrap the case up before I retire. The Ferrantes have too much money and hold too much power for us to lock them away.”
Raw frustration churned inside me. My hands clenched into fists.
“It’s bullshit.” I forced myself to measure my tone, my words, my reaction. “And you know it, Zeke. These things take time. The Ferrantes aren’t common criminals. Sure, they have lawyers and judges in their pockets. But no one is immune.”
“No one’s immune.” Zeke clicked his teeth in agreement. “But they’re too careful, and we’re too short-staffed. We keep hitting one dead end after another.”
“So we just quit?” I growled, knowing I sounded like a newbie.
“No, but we put it on the back burner and revisit when the setting is ripe. You’re needed in the Chicago division, anyway, to deal with the Outfit. The Bandini family is out of control.”
Like fuck I was. Chicago was a hot mess, and none of my business. The Camorra file had prestige, and would likely gain me promotion.
“I’m staying here to deal with the Ferrantes.”
“Look, I know this case is your baby.” Zeke massaged his eye sockets. Understatement of the year if I ever heard one. This was the only case I’d yet to crack, putting me at a 99.99% success rate. “But this is beyond my control.”
Running a hand over my face, I clung to the last shreds of my composure.
The Ferrantes had become my obsession, my life’s mission, the very thing that kept me going.
I’d put all my chips on this case, betting my entire career on it, and failure wasn’t an option.
I needed this promotion. And, on an ethical level, I just knew that I wouldn’t be able to breathe right until I saw every single motherfucker with that last name rotting in prison.
The sheer amount of blood on Achilles’s and Enzo’s hands alone could refill the ocean.
Maybe if we had new information…if I detected a chip in the Camorra’s armor…
An idea sprang into my mind.
“I have a new in with them.”
Zeke tilted his head. “What do you mean?”
“Enzo.” My throat constricted around his name, for an unknown reason. “He and I… We got close.” I guess you could call it that, seeing as we’d played tonsil tennis less than twenty-four hours ago and I could still taste him. “I can establish trust there.”
“Trust, with the Camorra’s enforcer?” Sully’s bloodshot eyes glared at me like I was the drunk one.
“Yeah.”
“Someone’s ambitious,” he puffed out sarcastically.
“But he knows you’re on their case.” Zeke frowned. “Why would he cooperate?”
I wasn’t going to out Enzo—his sexual orientation had nothing to do with any of it—but I had to throw Zeke a bone. “He’s not as guarded as his brothers. We bumped into each other the other day. Shot the shit. He’s like an eager puppy. Easily manipulated, if you know what points to press.”
Zeke considered my words while I held my breath. He turned to Sully. “What do you think?”
Sully shook his head. “I don’t know.”
I stared him down, my gaze demanding this blank check. I was the brain behind our operation. I called the shots while he pickled his liver to shit. He wasn’t in a position to defy me.
Sully rubbed a palm over his stubble, grunting. “I’ll follow Rothwell’s lead, but it better take us somewhere this time. I’m tired of taking pictures of that Ferrante kid doing his squats in front of Love Island.”
Enzo watched Love is Blind, not Love Island.
Not that it mattered in any way.
Zeke worked his jaw back and forth, touching it absentmindedly. “I meant what I said, Tom. Priorities have changed, and you’re needed in Chicago. I can buy you a couple months, at best. No more than that. And then we have to bury this case unless something significant pops up.”
“Two months are enough,” I clipped out.
He nodded.
I got to my feet and headed toward the door. I had no time for chitchat. I needed to come up with a plan to draw Enzo closer to me and gain his trust.
That, unfortunately, required unblocking his number.
And intentionally putting up with his annoying persona.
I could do this.
I could lure the Camorra’s social butterfly into my web.
Watch him thrash, struggle, and beg as I swallowed him whole.