7
Corrado sat back in the stiff wooden chair, his feet propped up on the corner of his father's desk. An old radio off to the side blared the sounds of a Frank Sinatra song, the speakers rattling as Corrado hummed along. His chair rocked on its hind legs, his hands clasped on the back of his head, his eyes closed as the lyrics washed through him.
My kind of town, Chicago is…
The office door opened, the chaos from the casino disrupting the melody. Corrado opened his eyes as Vito turned down the radio, so soft Corrado could hardly hear it anymore. His father stalked over, shoving Corrado's feet off the desk as he moved around him. The chair almost tipped as Corrado's feet hit the floor.
On his lap, Vito dropped a bag, the weight of it making him grunt. The black leather bag, round with a metal clasp, reminded him of one doctors carried when they made house calls.
Curious, Corrado peeked inside, finding it filled to the brim with old black $100 casino chips. There had to have been hundreds of thousands of dollars worth. "Do you want me to cash these in?"
"No," Vito said. "They ain't ours."
Corrado glanced in the bag again, seeing Sands written on the clunky chips. Sands Hotel was just down the strip, less than half a mile from The Flamingo. "Where'd you get them?"
Vito shot him a stern look. "You know better than to ask questions. Where I got them ain't none of your business. What is your business, what I want you to do, is run them down there."
"And cash them in?"
"Cash them in?" Annoyance flared Vito's voice. "Don't you listen? I said they ain't ours."
"Okay."
"Take them down there, and tell them you need to speak to Antonelli," Vito said. "They'll show you to his office."
Corrado stood, clutching the bag under his arm like a football.
"And make it fast, will you? I told your mother we'd be home for dinner tonight."
Dinner had long since passed. The clock near the doorway read a quarter after nine at night. His mother was likely already drunk and passed out in bed. "Yes, sir."
Corrado strolled down the hallway, heading for the back exit of The Flamingo to avoid the weekend crowds. Being as it was a Saturday night, the place was packed. He passed his father's bodyguards and nodded at them, but neither paid him any mind. They were busy staring out into the casino floor.
Corrado shoved open the door and slipped out into the dark backstreet, letting the metal door slam closed behind him. He hummed, the Sinatra song still stuck in his head, as he headed for the bustling strip. The moment he moved, something in his peripheral caught his attention, a slight shifting in the pitch-black alley.
A tingle swept through him, his skin prickling as the hair on his arms stood on end. He swung around, on alert, and barely had time to react when someone ran up on him. Two guys, cloaked in black from head-to-toe, both wearing ski masks, rushed him, a gleam of a gun catching Corrado's eye in a sliver of moonlight. One grabbed him from the back, tearing him away from the door, and shoved a silver revolver against the side of his neck. The other stood feet in front of him, a black pistol pointed straight at his face. The barrel of it shook as the hand clutching it trembled.
With his free hand, the man in front of him snatched a hold of the black bag, trying to pry it from Corrado's grip. He held on to it, refusing to let go. These men might hurt him, yes, but his father would definitely kill him if he lost the chips.
The man viciously tugged, and Corrado gripped it tighter, anger rushing through him. He shifted, yanking the bag back and sent both guys into a frenzy. It happened fast, split seconds passing in the blink of an eye. Corrado pushed away, fumbling and dropping the bag into the alley. Flustered, the guy aimed his revolver. Grabbing his arm, Corrado twisted it, grasping the gun, his heart racing so fast his vision blurred. He forced the gun around, deflecting, the barrel facing his attacker as they fought for control. A gunshot exploded in the alley, a bullet ripping through the side of the guy's neck when Corrado managed to squeeze the trigger. The attacker let go and dropped to the ground, horrific gurgling sounds rushing from the wound in his neck.
Somehow, Corrado kept a grip on the gun. He had no time to think, no time to second-guess. The second guy hastily grabbed the bag and ran. With no hesitation, Corrado raised the pistol and fired, again and again, bullets ripping straight through the back of the assailant. He dropped hard, the bag going down with him.
The one behind him flailed on the ground, gurgling words Corrado couldn't understand. Turning to him, Corrado knelt down and grabbed the ski mask. The moment he pulled it off, a sudden rush of wooziness ran through Corrado, nauseating him. He stared at the flushed face, hazel eyes pleading with him, the ends of his blond hair stained red.
No. Corrado shook his head. No, no, no.
Charlie Klein.
Corrado hadn't seen him in years, not since breaking his jaw that summer, but he would recognize that face anywhere.
His grip on the gun tightened as Charlie raised a bloody hand toward him. His own friend. His friend had tried to rob him. He'd tried to kill him. If Corrado hadn't fought back, if he hadn't deflected the shot, it would've been him on the ground.
Numbness followed that thought, swarming his body. Instinctively, he raised the gun, his finger back on the trigger. He aimed straight for Charlie's terrified face.
The gunshot echoed through the alley, magnified to Corrado's ringing ears. He lowered the weapon again when a subtle cry in the alley pulled his attention away. Beside the Dumpster, crouched down, partially hidden, was a third guy. Dressed all in black, his ski mask perched on top of his head, his face was only faintly visible in the darkness.
Michael Antonelli.
Corrado stared at him as the backdoor to the casino flew open, Vito's bodyguards appearing. They blanched, eyes wide as they stared at Corrado. The men seemed torn between intervening and fleeing, frozen in shock. They were knocked to the side after a second when Vito burst outside. He started to speak, his mouth wide open, but no words escaped.
He stared at his son for a moment before glancing between the two boys, dead on the ground.
"You killed them," Vito said, raising his eyebrows. "You shot them both. You fucking killed them."
Corrado turned away from Michael to face his father. It didn't take a genius to figure out the other boy, dead in the alley, would be Shawn. Those three were inseparable.
Opening his hand, Corrado let the gun hit the dirty asphalt. He'd killed them, the only friends he'd ever had. "They were my friends."
Vito shook his head. "They weren't the kind of friends you thought they were, kid. They were friends in the life, and well, sometimes you gotta take those friends out." Vito slapped Corrado on the back, shoving him away from Charlie. "Go on. Do what I told you to do. We'll take care of this. "
In a daze, hands shaking, Corrado walked over and snatched the black bag from the alley.
Corrado didn't tell his father. Had he pointed him out, Michael would certainly be dead. But maybe, if he kept his mouth shut, he might walk away unscathed.
Corrado didn't want his blood on his hands.
The ten-minute walk to The Sands was a blur. He stepped inside the casino, telling the first person he saw that he needed to speak with Antonelli. Anxiety swirled inside of him when he spoke the name. A lady led him to an office near the front, where a stern looking man sat in a leather chair. Frankie Antonelli. Corrado set the bag in front of him, waiting to be dismissed.
Frankie glanced inside the bag. "Hope it wasn't any trouble."
"Of course not," Corrado said, his voice barely above a whisper.
Frankie pulled out a twenty and slipped it in the chest pocket of Corrado's button down shirt. He patted it. "That’s for you."
Corrado nodded and slipped out of the office, pulling the money back out. Twenty-dollars. That was what taking his friends' lives had been worth.
Passing a waitress, he shoved the crinkled bill in a glass tip jar on her tray and kept on walking.
/> The trip back took another ten minutes. He'd been gone less than a half-hour, yet by the time he reached The Flamingo, all signs of the struggle were gone. The alley was vacant, a subtle stench of bleach assaulting his nose when he reached the back door.
Instinctively, he glanced beside the Dumpster.
Michael, too, was gone.
He headed inside, hands shoved in his pockets, his head down. Both bodyguards were alert this time, addressing Corrado as he passed, but he didn't respond. Tapping on the office door, he turned the knob and stepped inside when his father acknowledged him.
Frank Sinatra again crooned from the old radio. Vito sat behind his desk, his feet propped up now as he moved his right foot to the beat. He seemed relaxed, almost as if the last thirty minutes hadn't happened, almost as if it were just a nightmare, but the revolver he fiddled with told a different story.
"I take it everything went smoothly."
"Yes, sir."
"Let me ask you something, kid." Vito sat forward, putting the gun down on the desk as he clasped his hands together in front of him. Corrado tensed, waiting for the anger over what he'd done, but instead a small smile quirked his father's lips. "You ever think about coming to Chicago with me?"
Corrado didn't hesitate. "Every day since I was seven years old."
8
They didn't call it the Mafia. No, the undignified term, according to Vito, tainted their image.
They called it La Cosa Nostra instead.
The words flow beautifully from the tongue. This thing of ours. It's a brilliant sentiment—belonging to something powerful. Corrado had jumped into it with preconceived notions, just like most others did. He went for the money¸ for the power, for the respect, and he stayed because, well… he stayed because he had to.
After they invited you in, after they embraced you, there was no walking away. It's a beautiful web of glorious silk, intricately woven together with deception, which draws you in like moths to a flame. But as soon as you're close, as soon as you approach, the web snatches a hold of you and refuses to let go.
And once you're stuck, the black widow comes and fucks you good before eating you alive.
Corrado learned that lesson quickly. Despite the allure of the words, there was nothing poetic about La Cosa Nostra. But there wasn't a single moment, as he settled into the life, that he regretted his decision to move. It wasn't pretty. But compared to his life back in Nevada? His life with his mother? Being in Chicago was a cakewalk.
It turned out to be monotonous at the beginning. At seventeen, a high school drop out, he was back to acting like that eleven-year-old kid, running errands and delivering packages for a few dollars here and there… money that disappeared in the blink of an eye as he regularly picked up the tab for everyone. He was a peon, a disposable messenger boy, a kid with no voice and no opinion. Corrado was the bottom rung of a ladder, one that got stepped on by those on their way to the top.
He was nothing. He was nobody to them.
But he never complained. He did what was asked of him, no matter the time of day, no matter how menial the task. If a capo wanted food at three in the morning, Corrado was out the door in less than five minutes, searching for a place still open at that hour. He picked up dry cleaning, filled shopping lists, and even made coffee. He did it all, because the alternative was doing nothing.
"Here, kid. Got a job for you."
The moment Corrado opened the front door of his rental house on Felton Drive, a thick manila envelope was shoved at him. He groggily stumbled a few steps as he clutched it, still half-asleep. Pitch-black night hung thickly outside, cold air prickling the bare skin of his chest. It was a cloudy, dreary night… or morning, Corrado thought, since it was well past midnight.
Had he not recognized his father's voice, he would've never known who delivered the package. Vito turned away, rushing from the porch and disappearing down the street. Corrado closed the door and strolled through the downstairs of his house, his bare feet dragging against the chilly wooden floor. Flicking on a lamp in the living room, he glanced down at the package, seeing an address scribbled on the front of it. No other instructions.
"Just great," he muttered, heading upstairs to get dressed. He threw on some black slacks and a gray button-down shirt, walking a fine line between lazy and presentable, exhausted but not knowing what situation he'd walk into it. It could be as simple as handing it through a crack in a door, or as extravagant as crashing a formal party. He had to be prepared for anything.
He just wanted to go back to bed.
Grabbing a jacket, he concealed the envelope in the large inside pocket before picking up his gun and heading out into the night. The shiny Ruger Mark II revolver slipped nicely in the holster in his jacket, hidden but fully loaded, just in case.
Unfamiliar with the address, he pulled the crinkled Chicago map from the glove box of the car he'd bought—a beat up, old black Mercedes. He unfolded it, scanning the neighborhoods until he found Kessler Street in the south side of the city. He drove there, creeping down the street until he located the address written on the package. It turned out to be a decrepit little brick building, more of a rundown business than a house, the windows boarded up, the outside crumbling.
Corrado parked along the curb in front of it, beneath a flickering streetlight, and climbed out of the car. He glanced around, studiously checking the neighborhood for any signs of trouble, but it appeared abandoned. He scanned the building, noting the exits and entrances as he approached the door. It seemed to be made of steel, a slide slot where a window usually would be.
He hesitated, finding no doorbell or knocker, before tapping on the metal. No sound came, no response or movement. He tried the knob, curious if it was unlocked, but it didn't budge. He knocked again—two, three, four times. Was anyone even here?
He took a step back, assessing, when a stirring caught his attention. It was subtle, the rustling of grass. His defenses went up, the hair on his arms standing on end. Reaching into his coat, he grasped his gun, whipping it out as he swung around.
Corrado was fast… but not fast enough.
A hard blow to the face knocked him off balance, his surroundings a blur as he stumbled. Before he could regain his composure, another strike knocked him back against the metal door, forcing the air from his lungs as someone pinned him there, an elbow going straight to his gut. A thick hand grasped his wrist, viciously pulling it backward, and Corrado gasped as a sharp pain shot up his forearm.
The gun was ripped from his flimsy grasp within a matter of seconds, the pressure restraining him releasing once he had been disarmed.
Corrado blinked, his hazy vision coming back into focus, as his own gun pressed to his forehead. "And who might you be?" a deep voice asked, strikingly calm.
Struggling to catch his breath, suddenly on the defense, Corrado gaped at the man in front of him. Corrado wasn't short or scrawny, but his assailant was a beast of a man, making him feel as puny as a stuffed bear. He was shrouded in darkness, an oversize hood covering his head, concealing his face. His free hand held a white plastic bag containing Chinese food containers.
"A friend," he managed to say, his jaw throbbing as he forced out the words.
"A friend," the man echoed, "of whose?"
"Yours."
"I have no friends." His answer was immediate. "Try again."
"I have something for you," Corrado said. "A package."
"Ah." The gun withdrew from his head and slipped into the man's pocket. "Why didn't you just say so?"
The man reached past him and unlocked the door, shoving it open. Corrado tried to move out of the way, but the man grasped his arm and shoved him inside, relocking the door behind them.
Heart beating rapidly, Corrado assessed the building as the man hit a switch, only one bulb working on a hanging light. The place was in shambles, even more so than the outside. The stench of chemicals and something rotting hung in the air. Chinese containers were strewn around the floor, dozens of them
from a place called Lang Miens.
One room, Corrado noted. Furniture scattered throughout the space, a grimy couch and chair in front of a small television with an antenna; an old mattress in the corner with a pillow and blankets; a small heater beside a massive black trunk. Along the back, aligning the wall, were half a dozen gallon drums, some empty and tipped over, others sealed. In the back corner set a refrigerator.
He lives in this dump?
The man strolled over to the heater and lit it before removing his hood. Corrado's blood ran cold at the sight of the familiar withering, pale face and beady blue eyes.
Luca Esponzio.
Corrado had never met him before, and hoped never to have to. He'd seen his face, though, on the front of the newspaper. Reported serial killer, suspected in over fourteen disappearances, but they never found any evidence to prosecute him. People vanished into thin air after being spotted with Luca, never to be seen again.
"You say you have something for me?" Luca asked, raising an eyebrow as he stepped toward Corrado, holding out his massive right hand. It was calloused and dirty, with a gold ring wedged on his swollen middle finger.
Reaching into his coat, Corrado pulled out the envelope and handed it over. Luca opened it right in front of him, skimming through a stack of cash before pulling out a photograph. Corrado caught a quick glimpse of it, recognizing the man in the photo as a mobster in New York: Johnny Canella.
Luca stuffed everything back into the envelope as he plopped down on the couch and tossed it beside him. He pulled out his dinner, expertly using chopsticks to eat. "You like Chinese food?"
Corrado watched him curiously. "Occasionally."
"You should give Lang Miens a try." He motioned to the container. "Best Orange Chicken in Chicago."
"I'll keep that in mind."
"You do that." Luca waved him off. "Unless you have something else for me, I recommend you leave."
Corrado turned at the dismissal, taking a few steps toward the door before hesitating. "Sir?"
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