by Hamel, B. B.
“You seem to really like this plant.”
He tilted his head. “I think I see a lot of similarities between that awful weed and the mafia families.”
I leaned back away from him, frowning. “What are you talking about?”
He reached out and plucked a leaf. I sucked in some air as he threw the leaf down on to the ground and shrugged. “Underneath this city, the mafia families are all interconnected. We pretend like we hate each other, but if one of us were to finally win the war and take control of the city, the powers that be would just stamp that family out and be done with the whole enterprise. It’s a delicate balance, one that we’re all aware of all the time.”
“You have a mutually beneficial war going on,” I said.
“Something like that. And just like this plant, we kill anything we come into contact with.”
“That sounds bad, though. Why do you work for an organization like that?”
He smiled at me. “Because I don’t think it’s evil. I think it’s the purest expression of this city. I don’t hate this plant because it’s aggressive or it’s toxic. I hate this plant because it’s ugly. But I don’t think the Leone Crime Family is ugly, Aida. On the surface, all those things might seem bad, but we take what we want and we grow strong. We protect our people, help those we love flourish, and destroy our enemies. There’s nothing more honorable than that.”
I stared up into his face and wondered what kind of man I was getting tangled with. I knew he was a killer, but I didn’t know he thought so deeply about the monsters he cared for.
“If you could take over this city, would you?” I asked.
“No,” he said. “There’s no profit in that. Where there’s possibility, there’s profit. But once you’re in charge, there’s no more growth, no more possibility. I don’t want any of that shit.”
I smiled and slipped my hand into his. Maybe he saw the mafia as just some weed curling its roots in through the city, but I saw it differently. I saw men that took what they wanted and lived a life outside of the law, outside of normal society, a life of death and violence and honor and devotion. They were loyal to their family above all else, and that was amazing in itself.
I open my mouth to argue when there was a loud bang from inside the house.
It sounded like a firework went off. I blinked, surprised, and Dante dropped my hand. He took a step toward the back door, his mouth hanging slack for just a half moment until we heard the shout.
“Stay here,” he growled at me, but I was already following. He sprinted to the back door and kicked it open, ducking down low.
I heard more bangs and more shouts, and it took me a moment to realize what was happening. I stared in through the open door at Gino, ducking down behind the kitchen counter, his gun held out. I could see three men in the hallway, pressed against the wall. One moved out into the open with a shotgun and pulled the trigger, blasting the spot where Gino was hiding with bullets.
Dante went careening into the room and lost his balance. He fell onto his side and slid along the hardwood floor, coming to a stop near Gino, who ducked down behind the counter again. He reached behind him and produced another gun, sliding it over to Dante, who grabbed it and got to one knee.
“Hold them off,” Dante growled.
“Run,” Gino said. “Just go.”
“Not without you.” Dante moved up and fired off a few rounds, the gunshots like explosions in my skull. I felt like I was stuck in place, nailed to the spot. Like I was a Tree of Heaven, my roots digging down deep into the concrete, connecting with all the other roots of the city.
“Go!” Gino shouted, standing up and firing his gun again. Another man ran into the room as a third came around the corner with a small machine gun that sprayed bullets in wild patterns on the wall. I ducked down, a scream leaving my lips.
The guy with the submachine gun had a hat pulled down low over his eyes and a black mask covering the lower half of his face. He wore dark khaki cargo pants and a button-down gray shirt. The others were dressed in similar outfits, black masks covering their faces, khaki pants, button-down shirts. One was tall and thin, one was average height. The other was muscular and bald.
Everything happened so fast. Dante came up, fired off a few rounds, and caught the average-looking guy with the dark hair in the leg. He screamed, staggered, shot his pistol a few times before falling over. Blood smeared all over the walls and the floor. Dante staggered back and ran, diving behind the couch as a shotgun blast boomed.
Gino fired his gun over and over again, shouting something incomprehensible. Dante rolled on the floor and sprinted at me as more bullets flew in the air around him. He slammed into me, shoving me back and away from the door as bullets ripped into the frame and the walls all around where I had just been. I slammed into the ground hard and felt pain flare in my elbow, but Dante didn’t give me a chance. He dragged me up and shoved me toward the back fence.
“Jump it,” he screamed. “And fucking run.”
I staggered over toward it, but didn’t go. He turned to the doorway and fired inside again. I heard shouts and more gunshots.
Dante turned and ran at me. He grabbed me, shoved me toward the fence, and practically threw me at it. I hit hard, wood biting into my hands. I jumped and caught the top, hauling myself up as a guy appeared in the doorway. It was the bald man with the shotgun, and Dante gunned him down with a shout, blood spurting from the wounds in huge waves.
Gino came stumbling out of the door as the bald guy collapsed. He was bleeding from his chest, the blood pouring from between his fingers.
“Gino!” Dante screamed.
“Go,” Gino gasped.
I hung there at the top of the fence. Dante looked up at me, eyes wild, and shoved. I teetered sideways then went over, falling over the fence.
I landed in a bush, the branches cutting into my skin. I heard a scream and more gunshots. Holes appeared in the fence nearby. I yelled Dante’s name and jumped for the top again, desperate to see him.
But Dante appeared at the top. He leapt over it, his shoe catching the top just enough to trip him up. He landed off balance, rolled to the side, got to his feet and ran to me. “Come on,” he hissed.
“What? Where’s Gino?”
“Gino’s dead.” Dante fired at the fence blindly, wood ripping up from the holes. “Run!”
He grabbed my hand and pulled me as he sprinted at the backyard neighbor’s house. He slammed into the side fence, fumbled with the latch, and flipped it open. We were running down a brick side walkway, skirting along pretty yellow flowers and a rosebush, as we came to the hill that led down to the sidewalk. I stumbled and almost fell but Dante grabbed me, held me up, and pulled me along.
We hit the sidewalk and he slowed his pace. We crossed the street and Dante shoved his gun into his waistband, covering it with his shirt. He held tight to my hand, and I saw blood on his shirt. “Dante,” I said. “You’re hurt.”
He looked down and shook his head. “Gino’s,” he said.
“What… what happened? Who was that? Dante?”
“Gino held them off,” he whispered, and said nothing else.
We walked for a while. It was a hot morning, muggy and disgusting. People stared at us, some of them wary, some of them confused. Dante didn’t speak to anyone, didn’t acknowledge anything, until we reached the center of town. He ducked into a small dry cleaning place with a pretty older Korean woman sitting behind the table in black jeans and a white button-down.
“Mr. Dante,” she said, eyes going wide with shock.
“Let me use your phone, Mrs. Kim,” he said.
“Of… of course. Yes, of course. Here you are.” She placed a landline on the top of the counter and moved away, lingering just a few feet away.
Dante picked it up, dialed a number, and waited. I leaned close and heard a voice answer on the other end, but I couldn’t hear what it said.
“It’s me,” Dante grunted. “Found the house.” He waited a moment.
“Gino is…” He stopped himself, looked at Mrs. Kim, and looked back down. “Need a pickup. I’m at the dry cleaners downtown. Be here in five minutes.” He hung up the phone and pushed it back toward Mrs. Kim.
“Is there… is there anything I can do for you?” she asked.
He shook his head. “Privacy, please. I’ll be gone shortly.” He reached into his pocket like he wanted to give her something, then stopped himself when he realized they were empty. “Please,” he said again.
“Of course.” She frowned, her hands wringing in front of her, then turned abruptly and walked off. He waited until she was gone then turned to me, putting his hands on my shoulders.
“Are you okay?”
“I think… I think so.” I stared at him, eyes wild and wide, my ears ringing again. “Gino. What about Gino? We have to go back. He could be—”
“He’s dead.” His grip on my shoulders tightened then relaxed. “He’s fucking dead.”
“I’m so sorry.” I choked on something, gagged, and looked away. I stumbled and nearly fell, but he caught me, hugging me tight against him.
Gino was dead. One second, I was saying good morning to him, and the next… he was dead.
“How did that happen?” I asked, my voice a whisper. “I thought nobody knew where that house was.”
“They didn’t,” he said, his eyes narrowed. “I saw Vlas in there.”
“Vlas?” I turned and faced him. “I didn’t see Vlas. I saw the three guys… I didn’t see Vlas.”
“He came in last, just before I ran out. I saw him, Aida.”
“No,” I whispered. “That can’t be right.”
“Who else would do that?”
“You killed his gang. You took…. You took them out.”
“He could’ve hired more muscle.” His face screwed up in anger. “I knew I shouldn’t have let him go. I knew he was the real problem. I should’ve rooted him out, burned him to the fucking ground.”
“What are you going to do, Dante?” I whispered. “Where can we go?”
“We’re going back,” he said, his eyes hard. “We’re going back to war, my little Aida. I’ll speak with Don Leone… and then I’ll make sure this town burns for what Vlas just did.”
I stared into his eyes and I saw it there, the death and the fire, the violence beneath it all. I knew in that moment what he meant about the Tree of Heaven. The violence and destruction inherent in the mafia was built into the structures of the city, into the very fabric.
And he was going to tap into that destruction like a vengeful god.
I felt my stomach do flips as I stared into his eyes.
Outside, tires screamed.
He reached behind him, gripped his pistol, walked to the door. He opened it a crack then relaxed his grip as Steven shoved open the door. “Dante?” he asked. “What the fuck?”
“Vlas,” Dante said. “We have to go.”
Steven looked at me then back to Dante. He hesitated for just a moment before walking to Mrs. Kim’s counter, taking out a roll of cash, and placing it down near the register. Then he left with Dante just behind him. I followed the two men, casting a backwards glance at that money.
That was their power. That was their poison.
We climbed into a black SUV and Steven drove away, back toward the city.
26
Dante
Steven parked the car outside of my house and looked at me. “Guys are on the way,” he said.
“Tell them to wait,” I said. “We need to get cleaned up.”
He nodded once and frowned. “You sure you’re okay?”
“Fine.” I pushed the door open and got out. Aida followed, taking a tentative step toward the tall brick-fronted house with a large porch and a high, sweeping roof. The houses in that area were all slightly different from the classic Philly rowhome, with more decorative patterning around the roofline . It was right in the middle of Nineteenth Street with a large shade tree in the front.
“This is nice,” she said.
“Don’t sound so surprised.”
“You always make your city place sound so…” She trailed off.
“Dangerous?”
“Yeah, something like that.”
“That’s because it is.” I walked to my pale white front door, unlocked the locks, and pushed it open.
“Neighborhood seems quiet though,” she said. “There’s a mom with a stroller just down the block.”
“It is quiet,” I said. “But that’s not why it’s dangerous. People know I live here, they know they can find me here. That’s the real problem.”
She nodded then followed me inside. I shut the door behind us and gestured at the place. “Home sweet home.”
She hesitated and looked around. The front door opened up into a small living room with an L-shaped brown velvet couch. Plants sat on the door windowsill and several more were hung along the wall behind the couch. There was a flat-screen TV and a small coffee table. Just beyond that, the staircase was painted a fresh white, and a strange chandelier hung from the ceiling. A kitchen table sat underneath it. A small door led into the kitchen, with granite countertops and a nice sized island, though it was all much smaller than his Mt. Airy place.
“This is nice,” she said.
“Of course.” I leaned up against the counter and ran my fingers down the top. A little dust came up and I frowned. “Doesn’t get used enough though.”
“I thought you stayed here when you didn’t come home?”
“I sleep here,” I said. “But I don’t do much living here. Truth is, I don’t like even sleeping here all that much, but I have to make a show of keeping a place in this neighborhood. Helps keep the people happy if they know you’re one of them.”
She frowned and looked inside the stainless-steel refrigerator. It had three bottles of beer and nothing else. She shook her head and shut it again. “You really weren’t kidding.”
“Nope.” I turned away from the kitchen. “Come on.”
She followed me back through the dining space and up the steps. I took her down to the end of the hall, past two nearly empty guest rooms, filled only with a single queen bed without any blankets, pillows, or sheets, just a bare mattress on a streel frame. I opened my bedroom door and stomped inside.
It was as spare as the rest of the house. I had my clothes hung in the closet, a bed and a dresser, but not much else. I sat down on the edge of the bed and Aida lingered in the doorway, frowning around her.
“I gotta admit, I thought there’d be a little bit more… personality.”
I shook my head. “No time for that shit.”
“Your other house felt like a home.”
I stared at my hands and could hear the gunfire again. I saw Gino stumble out the back door, bright blooms of blood welling up in his chest as he took more wounds.
Leaving him there was the hardest decision I ever made, but he was dead. Nothing I could’ve done for him. I knew it the second he fell off the back step and his head slammed against the ground with a dull thud. In that moment, I knew I could stay and get myself killed too, or I could run and keep Aida safe.
So I jumped the fence and I ran.
That moment will haunt me for the rest of my life, I’m sure of it.
The thing is, I didn’t regret my choice. I couldn’t regret it. Aida was still safe, still with me, and still needed more protecting. She was everything to me, the whole reason I had Gino there in the first place was to keep her safe. If I had gotten my ass killed too, that would’ve made Gino’s death worthless.
Or maybe that was just selfish rationalization, I couldn’t say.
“That place was more of a home than this one.” I stood up again and let out a long sigh. “I need to shower.”
“Okay.” She bit her lip. “Right now?”
“Right now.” I unbuttoned my shirt and let it drop to the floor. I felt bruised and beaten up, but I wasn’t bleeding, wasn’t dying.
Small victories. I’d take them where I
got them.
I took off my pants and slipped past Aida. I walked across the hall and into the bathroom. I had it redone last year with all new beige tile along the floor and walls, a new shower with a new tub, and new fixtures. Aida followed as I turned the water on, got it nice and hot, then stripped off my boxer briefs.
I didn’t care about anything else but getting under that water. I stepped inside and let it run down my skin. I took a sharp breath through my nose and let it out, closing my eyes. As soon as I did, I saw Gino again, saw his last moments.
But instead of feeling sadness and regret, only anger was left.
I stood there and let the water wash the grime away. I heard Aida undress, heard her take off her pants and top. She slipped into the shower with me, her body wet in moments. She turned me away from the water and let it run all down her body. I leaned back against the wall and admired her flat stomach, her round breasts and hard nipples. I watched her hair get soaked, her lips falling open as my cock began to stir.
Couldn’t help myself. Even after the shit we’d been through, I still wanted her.
She stepped toward me, pressing her body against mine. She was wet and slick and soft, and I cupped one breast in my hand as I kissed her. I tasted her deep and long, taking my time as my other hand moved down between her legs. I felt her pussy wet already, and I wondered if the girl got off on excitement, on action, on danger the same way that I did.
“Fuck,” I whispered in her ear. “Look at you. Dripping wet. Almost like we didn’t almost get killed.”
“Is it wrong if that makes me even wetter?” she asked. “I feel insane, Dante. But my heart won’t calm down.”
I bit her bottom lip and teased her pussy. “You like the rush,” I said. “Nothing wrong with that. Now you know it about yourself. Maybe that’s why you like being with me.”
She stared at me for a long moment. I kissed her breasts, licked her nipples, and switched positions with her. I pushed her against the wall, letting the water run down my chest, over my shoulders, and down my back as I lifted her wrists up above her head. I loved the way her breasts lifted with them, loved the long lines of her body.