by Bethany-Kris
Cosa Nostra failed him.
La famiglia hurt him.
It was, undoubtedly, a part of their life. Antony was expected to accept the hit on Johnathan Grovatti as business and nothing more. He was meant to accept Vinnie’s choice to beat Johnathan to death with a baseball bat before leaving him for his father to find bloodied and dead with his head blown apart.
Antony was told to erase the years of friendship with John.
He was told the man’s death was justified—honorable.
John was Dante’s Godfather. He’d been Antony’s best man.
He remembered crying a lot after Paulie called. He remembered feeling broken and wondering why. He remembered Cecelia’s hands running over his trembling form, pulling him up from the floor as his emotions controlled what he couldn’t forget.
“I can’t breathe,” Antony whispered.
The mourners were too far away to hear him, but he knew Paulie could.
“I can’t breathe,” he repeated.
Paulie sighed shakily. “Just a little more, man.”
The longer Antony pretended like nothing was wrong with him for the sake of appearances, the more he believed he would forever stay this way. Cold, numb, and detached from the world. He had no other choice.
The proverbial weight bearing down on Antony’s chest, squeezing his heart and lungs to death, only seemed to get heavier with every step they took toward the hearse.
John had done nothing wrong.
He’d been mostly a good man.
He’d been Antony’s best friend.
John’s death was the first thing Cosa Nostra had taken from Antony. He’d watched other men suffer for their mistakes over the years. He’d buried other men he considered friends. John was not the same.
Antony wouldn’t be the same after this.
One word still pounded at Antony’s insides: why.
Antony’s gaze found Kate Grovatti.
Her. It was all because of her.
He beat me, she lied.
He hurt me, she said.
Her bruises came out of nowhere. Her cries were as fake as they’d always been. How nobody else could see it, Antony wasn’t sure. They could, he knew, but they all looked the other way because nobody wanted it to be them next.
Kate was rotten right down to her fucking core.
She stood next to Cecelia, Liliana, and an unruffled, cool Vinnie Catrolli.
The boss was watching. He was always fucking watching Antony.
“I wonder if he believes you’re planning something,” Paulie said softly.
“Good, he should,” Antony said, still walking his friend’s casket to his final ride. “I want him to see me coming.”
• • •
March, 1994
One week bled into two before Antony’s eyes. Two turned into three, and then to four. He couldn’t let it go. It ate at him constantly. John’s murder was killing Antony because he had yet to do something.
Anything.
The snow was taking longer to melt that year than it normally would. John had been placed in a crypt until the spring thaw came and he could be properly buried. Antony vaguely remembered pushing John’s casket into the slot, slapping the top one last time to say goodbye, but feeling like he never really let go.
“I miss him,” Antony said quietly. “Dante’s asked to go over there a couple of times. How do you explain to a kid that their grandfather killed their Godfather?”
“Antony, if Vinnie even gets the slightest inclination you’re planning something on him—”
Antony shut Paulie up with a single look. “Keep out of it.”
“How can I?”
“Paulie—”
“Cazzo, I just lost John. And this is worthy of you being taken, too. I can’t do that, okay. John was too much. Leave it alone.”
Antony swallowed hard, watching his sons chase one another through the backyard. “I can’t, Paulie.”
“Tony—”
“Antony,” he corrected sharply.
Paulie’s brow burrowed. “What?”
“Antony, not Tony. Not anymore. Tony lived for Cosa Nostra and gave too damned much to it.”
“Cosa Nostra didn’t do this.”
“Same thing,” Antony murmured.
“You swore to this, Antony.”
Antony nodded, his gaze finding his boys again. “I promised it my life. I know what I said when I took the omertà.”
“This is for life.”
It was.
“So I’m going to build it better, make it bigger and stronger. Cosa Nostra is our thing—it’s ours, Paulie. My boys won’t do this like we did. I’ll make goddamn sure of it. Proper principes, it’s what they deserve. I will not put my boys into la famiglia, not one like this. They will have control. They will make the calls. Only them.”
“What are you saying?”
The killing years were coming. Antony could feel it in his bones. Nothing would be easy or safe for a long time.
“We’re not going to be the Catrolli family for very much longer.”
“Antony!” Paulie hissed. “What about your wife and kids? What would they do if you were the next one to show up beaten to death, huh?”
He waved off Paulie’s warning.
“I have other things to worry about right now.”
“Like what?” Paulie barked.
“Lina, John’s goomah. I need to find her. She deserves to know what happened to him.”
Chapter Eighteen
April, 1994
Antony flipped through the photographs of a beautiful young woman and a familiar man. If no one knew any better, they would probably look at the grainy pictures and think this couple had been close, probably married, maybe for a while.
The pictures spanned years.
Johnathan and Lina at a beach, at dinners, and holidays shared together.
Antony knew.
God, he knew it then.
It was the smile on John’s face, or the way he held Lina’s cheek in his palm. It was in the way John’s eyes never left his lover’s or how Lina tucked perfectly into John’s side.
He’d loved this woman.
I love her like you love Cecelia.
“I’m sorry I didn’t listen, John,” Antony murmured, flipping through the shoebox of pictures, documents, and knickknacks again. He wondered if there was something he’d maybe missed. “I should have listened to you.”
In the pictures, she seemed lovely.
Anything.
He needed something to find this woman.
Lina’s apartment had been gutted for a month, the landlord said. The man had been smart enough to keep whatever looked important that the woman might like to keep if she came back. Lina’s family had wiped their hands clean. In fact, the woman’s father practically spat in Antony’s face before he slammed the door in it.
He didn’t blame them, he supposed.
Not every Italian wanted something to do with the mafia.
“Was there anything else?” Antony asked, his throat thick and his words gruff.
The balding man shook his head. “Sorry, that’s it right there. The rest had to go. Shame though, because Lucky had a lot of stuff. Maybe she took his pictures because there wasn’t any in the apartment and I know she had quite a few.”
Antony was far too lost to hear what the man was saying. “All right. Can I take this with me?”
“Sure.”
Dazed and numb, Antony walked through the apartment building that was, for all purposes, a decent place and in a nice part of town. He’d parked his car down the road just in case someone recognized him. There had to be a reason Lina took off, after all. Like maybe the girl knew somebody would be coming after her next.
Once Antony was inside his car, he tossed the box to the passenger seat. A folded up piece of paper that he hadn’t noticed stuck between the inner flaps of the box, fell to the top of the pile. Reaching over, he grabbed it and opened it, reading over the document.<
br />
His heart sank.
Something good?
Something amazing, even it was stupid of me to let it happen. But I still can’t tell anyone.
Someday you’ll understand.
Yeah … someday.
Lucky had a lot of stuff.
While moments flickered one after the other like movie stills in Antony’s memories, he could only see three words.
A name, actually.
Luciano Johnathan Grovatti.
The date on the birth certificate said the boy was one year older than Antony’s son, Dante. In fact, their birthdays were just days apart.
Antony couldn’t breathe again.
John’s familiar scrawl had been scribbled in the left-hand, bottom corner, stating he was the boy’s father.
All that time …
Antony wasted years shunning John’s mistress and his second life. He’d ignored it simply because he didn’t agree instead of giving his friend someone to confide in. John had so much he never got the chance to tell.
Like the fact he had a little boy.
“I’m sorry,” Antony whispered, still staring at the name. “I’m so sorry.”
• • •
May, 1994
Antony held up the picture to the Plexiglas window and compared it to the woman on the metal slab with the sheet drawn down past her chin. She was little younger in the picture and, of course, alive.
No doubt, it was still her.
“That her?”
“Lina Bassanelli,” Antony confirmed quietly. “What happened?”
“Strangulation, it seems.”
“By hand or something else?” Antony asked.
“Something else,” the M.E. replied vaguely.
“A wire, then.”
It wasn’t even a question.
Vinnie liked his wires. Well, he liked ordering others to use them.
“And your name is, Sir?” the man asked Antony, pen poised over a pad.
“Nobody,” Antony answered with a shrug.
Nobody important.
Despite not wanting anything to do with Antony, Lina’s family had contacted him when she came out of hiding to ask for help. They gave what they could. She hadn’t stayed long but it was a mistake, nonetheless.
Vinnie had people watching. At least, that’s what Antony believed.
Antony had been spending all his free time checking out morgues all across the city looking for a woman who fit Lina’s description. Sadly, he’d found her.
“Sir, we need—”
Antony took the man’s pen and pad of paper, scribbling the address of Lina’s mother and father. “There, that’s her family.”
He’d contact them in a day or so.
The poor family wouldn’t be able to afford a funeral.
Antony would provide one for them.
Somehow.
• • •
June, 1994
“Nominations got opened up last week,” Antony informed the kid.
Giovanni, Antony’s favorite crew member who had saved his wife and son all those years ago, grinned like a motherfucker. “Oh?”
“Yes, and I nominated you.”
“Take your clothes off, we gotta make sure you’re not wired up,” Paulie said.
Giovanni shot Paulie a dirty look but did as he was told, yanking his shirt off and dropping his pants and boxers without an ounce of shame. “Keep lookin’, Paulie. I’ve got nothing to be embarrassed about.”
“Fuck you, cafone,” Paulie said, chuckling. He tossed the kid a towel. “Cover your junk up, keep your mouth shut unless you’re told to speak, and try not to piss yourself.”
Memories raced through Antony’s mind, threating to break his cool, calm façade. He’d been this kid once. He’d done this very thing.
“At least you have warm weather,” Antony noted, glancing up at the dark June sky.
“When was yours?” Giovanni asked.
“Middle of fucking winter. Froze my balls off.”
“You still got your button, though.”
“Promised my whole life to get it, too.” Antony sighed, eyeing the kid. “You ready for this?”
Giovanni smirked. “You know it, Boss.”
“I’m not the boss here, Giovanni.”
Not yet, anyway.
It was as black as tar outside the familiar warehouse. Even a decade later, Vinnie was the same as he’d always been. The man liked things to be similar. He didn’t enjoy change in his life. Since being a made man, Antony had watched a dozen or more men be made in this very warehouse. Just like his initiation ceremony had gone down all those years ago, Antony knew how Giovanni’s would tonight.
Well, partly.
“What about you, Paulie?” Antony asked. “Are you ready for this?”
Paulie didn’t even hesitate. “For John, yeah.”
“For John, then.”
The inside of the warehouse was silent and shrouded in darkness. Antony gave a mostly naked Giovanni a shove, pushing the young man to the middle of the room. He then stepped back and hit the button that would turn on the spotlight and expose Giovanni to the room of men, while ensuring the man wouldn’t be able to see the men of la famiglia.
Hell, even hidden in the shadows all through the warehouse like they were, sitting on top of boxes, crates, and standing in corners, the men of the Catrolli crime family couldn’t see one another.
Seemed like a good time to do what needed to be done, as far as Antony was concerned.
Antony walked along the east wall of the warehouse, keeping his eye on the Don of their family as Vinnie stepped into the circle to greet Giovanni for induction. The omertà was sacred to them—even to Antony. It was a ceremony untouched by years of change. Sure, the words could be said differently. Every family had their own way of doing or saying things, but the meaning of the omertà, the end result, would always remain the same.
“There are only two ways you will leave here,” Vinnie said, his voice echoing throughout the silent warehouse. “As a made man, or a dead one. Are you prepared to follow this night through, regardless of how it may end for you?”
Antony smiled, knowing Giovanni’s answer.
“I am.”
“Then, let’s begin.”
Antony finally made it to the spot in the warehouse he wanted to be. Keeping his gaze on Vinnie as the boss began to question the young man about la famiglia and his desire for the button, Antony pulled off his jacket, not wanting it to hinder him later.
There was no hesitation or concern weighing down Antony’s mind.
A smart man waited.
He planned.
Those kinds of men were the most dangerous. They were quiet men. A man who didn’t strike out of emotion alone, but instead, let that rage and need for vengeance fester until it was eating him alive.
But, only from the inside.
Outside, no one could tell.
Antony was a smart man.
Vinnie came to stand at the edge of the circle of light, Antony stepped forward, closer to his boss.
“Do not move, stay quiet unless directed or asked to speak, and answer all questions la famiglia demands of you, Giovanni,” Vinnie said.
When Vinnie disappeared from the view of the other men by stepping back into the darkness like Antony knew his boss would, it was time. Antony pulled the coiled wire from the back pocket of his slacks, let it unwind, and struck.
The wire was effective. Vinnie liked it, actually. Antony thought it appropriate for the man’s death that he go out in a way he might have chosen for someone else. A way he had chosen for someone else, actually. Lina.
Vinnie struggled, but he didn’t make a sound. Antony tightened the wire at the Don’s throat, forcing the man’s body into his as he twisted the wire around his fist for an extra bit of tautness. Vinnie’s hands came up to slap at Antony. His fingernails dug into Antony’s cheek, surely drawing blood.
It hurt. It hurt like a motherfucker.
Antony di
dn’t make a sound. He just kept holding that wire, counting the seconds down until Vinnie would stop fighting and his heart would stop beating.
Maybe then … maybe then, Antony would finally be able to breathe again. Maybe he would be able to visit John’s grave and properly apologize for the things he didn’t take the time to learn. Maybe then he would feel like he’d finally done something right and worthy of Cosa Nostra.
Antony would start by removing one thing that poisoned it: Vinnie Catrolli.
“I would have bashed your skull in like you did to John, Vinnie, but this is far more effective for my purposes,” Antony whispered in the choking man’s ear. “You see, what you did makes you nothing more than a coward. You had someone else beat my friend to death. You had someone else drop his body off for his family to find. You had someone else do all your goddamn dirty work. Don’t you know it, yet, Vinnie? A good boss does their own.”
Antony chuckled. The sound was as hollow as his heart felt.
“Yes, this is better,” Antony continued, holding the wire strong and refusing to let go as Vinnie’s fight started to leave. “It’s better because when the lights go on, they will all see. Every single one of them will know exactly what I am capable of. I’ll have killed you with some of them less than fifteen feet away, yet they didn’t know a thing. If they’re smart men, they’ll be frightened of me and they’ll stand down. If not, I’ll take care of that, too.”
Vinnie felt far too warm against Antony, like his blood was rushing through his veins, completely out of oxygen as his body gave one last fight to survive. It would be pointless.
All the while, Antony focused on the young man in the middle of the circle of light, answering the questions thrown out at him by the men in la famiglia. Giovanni answered with his usual wit, earning him rounds of laughter.
“You called me filthy once,” Antony said to Vinnie, a ghost of a smile tugging at his mouth. “Time to show them just how fucking filthy we Marcellos really are.”
Vinnie’s body finally stopped fighting.