Hidden Worthiness

by Susan Fanetti

  It didn’t happen often. Once every couple years, maybe. Marty handled it himself unless the betrayal was significant enough to earn death. Angie was sitting here, so the betrayal was significant. Donnie sighed again. “Who and how?”

  “It’s Alex Di Pietro, and it’s bigger than the swing.”

  The name was only faintly familiar. “Which one is Alex?”

  “He runs for Al on the south coast.”

  Donnie’s old route. Al Rizzo was the bookie who’d taken over after Freddie Fingers died. “Right. What’s he doing?”

  “One of Marty’s eyes saw him at a meet in Charlestown. Plates on the sedan he met up with were Jersey.” Angie pulled his phone, swiped around on it, and held it out to Donnie.

  As he expected, there was a photo on the screen. “Fuck.” One of their runners had met up with two of the men they’d ID’d as the Bondaruk advance team. “Fuck. Where is he now?”

  “He’s loose and stupid. Marty let him run until we made a call. He’s got eyes on him round the clock.”

  “Good thinking.” Donnie handed the phone back, and Angie put it in his pocket. “What about Al?”

  “Al brought it to Marty. He’s clear.” Angie slammed his fist on the leather arm of the chair. “These Ukie shits are camped in Jersey. Why the fuck are they pissing in our yard? They gotta cross through New York to get to us.”

  “I guess back in the old country, they bought into the hype. Everybody knows the New York and Jersey Families. A hundred bucks says they thought New York was too big to fuck with and New England was bent over and waiting.”

  Angie laughed. “Stronzi.”

  Donnie didn’t laugh. “We have to take this shit with the runner to Nick. He and Bev are with Sherrie at the funeral home, but I don’t think it can wait.”

  “You need me with you?”

  “You got something else to do?”

  “I thought I’d head south myself and nose around. We don’t know what this figlio di puttana is giving them. I’d like to know that when I put my hand in his guts.”

  It was good to go into an interrogation with as much information as possible. “Yeah, go. Just don’t miss the visitation.” Their third funeral in as many days.

  “I won’t. I’ll be there.”

  ~oOo~

  Since he meant to go back to the office and finish his paperwork before the visitation, Donnie left his Porsche in the PBS lot and rode to the funeral home with Dre, his bodyguard.

  For a long time, he’d resisted having a full-time guard. He lived alone and could handle himself. When he went out with a woman, or some situation in which he’d be in a crowd, he’d call for a guard, but he preferred being left alone. Nick had put his foot down a few years earlier, when the Council had been working on pushing out a New York gang trying to get an in along the New England coast. An SUV full of bangers had driven by and sprayed his house and car with bullets. Donnie had jumped to the front of his car—a Corvette at that time—and been spared. He’d caught some shrapnel and nothing else, and the Paganos had crushed the shit out of the gang days later. But on the day of the drive-by, Nick stopped humoring Donnie’s willfulness regarding security.

  Dre parked the SUV in the funeral home lot. He came around, doing his usual check, and opened Donnie’s door. Donnie went into the building knowing that Dre would hook up with Ray, Nick’s guard, and keep watch at the exits.

  He followed the sedate signs—black velvet with plain white plastic letters—to the room Bobbo was laid out in. The afternoon was for family only: Sherrie, their three kids, the grandkids—and Nick and Bev.

  Like everywhere else in the building, the room was so quiet it seemed to be packed in cotton. Bobbo’s wife and daughters sat with Bev on a silk sofa along a wall. The grandkids played quietly, also along the side of the room. No one seemed to want to fill the space in the middle, aligned with the casket at the far end.

  The casket was a large, pearl grey model, and a narrow, dark purple satin cloth lay over it, a trio of white crosses embroidered into the pointed end. Brilliant floral arrangements filled the nook the casket was centered in and spilled out along the sides. The lid was closed—his face had been too abused for an open viewing; besides the dismemberment, the bullet had exploded through his forehead.

  A placard propped on a brass easel beside the casket showed an enlarged photo of Bobbo smiling at the center of a professional family portrait—his wife, two daughters, a son, two sons-in-law, a daughter-in-law, four grandsons and two granddaughters. And the incredibly annoying and equally ugly little miniature mutt he’d loved like a fourth child, perched in his hand. The words beneath that photo read ROBERT ANTONY MONDADORI Now In The Loving Arms of Our Lord.

  Bobbo. Fuck. The old bastard had lived through almost all the wars. Old as he was, he’d deserved to go out in his bed, asleep beside his stalwart wife, not executed while he was stuffed into a suit, working a security detail. But Bobbo hadn’t wanted that. Nick had offered him retirement once, and the tough old warhorse had burst into tears. He’d wanted to work, and he was good at it.

  A stir in the back corner of the room, where Bobbo’s grandkids were playing, caught Donnie’s attention. Knowing what he’d see when he looked, he turned to the right. The kids had seen him, his face, and they were all focused on him now. Three were staring. One of the smaller ones was yanking on the arm of her brother, or he might have been a cousin, trying to ask a question. Kids of that age often came right up to him and asked what was wrong with his face. And he always gave them a kid-friendly answer. That innocent curiosity was so much better than furtive stares.

  The toddler began to wail.

  That was the worst. There was no length of time that could pass and inure Donnie to the sight and sound of a child crying in fear when they saw him and thought him a monster. He’d learned long ago not to bother trying to ease their fear; it only made it worse when the monster tried to talk to them.

  Nick broke away from Bobbo’s son and came over. Before he’d left the office, Donnie had called to tell him he was coming, and give him the broad strokes as to why, so Nick came straight for him and indicated that they should leave the room. Relieved, Donnie followed him out.

  They went across the hall, into an empty visitation room, and Nick closed the door.

  “Tell me.”

  Shaking off the scene in the other room, Donnie told him, filling in all the details he had and offering some commentary as well. Nick listened as he always did, his focus complete and his posture still. “He’s still on the street, and Marty and Al are acting like everything’s good. Angie went down there to get his own look. He’ll be back in a couple hours.”

  Now that the report was finished, Nick reacted. “Fuck this scum. Let us bury our dead, goddammit!” After that growled curse, he was calm again.

  “Do you want to act now?”

  He didn’t hesitate. “No. The plan is good. They want us to react. They’re ready for it. No. We don’t play their game. They play ours. So we wait. But this Alex—”

  “If we keep him on the streets, we can feed him some poison and let him take it to the Ukies.”

  “It’s a good idea, Donnie. Yeah. But we are on him like glue, every second. I don’t want that little weasel taking a shit that I don’t get a report on its color and smell.”

  “Understood.”

  “Who brought him in?”

  “Al did. He was a neighborhood kid, hanging around the repair shop, just like me. He’s been running about four years.”

  “How old?” Nick was better than Donnie about keeping the names and details of his employees straight, but Alex Di Pietro was a bottom-rung guy, and it was hard to keep those details right to hand.

  “Nineteen.”

  “Fuck.”

  “Yeah.”

  By the time this was over, Alex Di Pietro would be dead; there was no other result to a betrayal like this. Nick hadn’t bloodied his own hands for several years, but Donnie knew he wouldn’t assign this kill. Al
ex wasn’t made, wasn’t truly one of their own, and he’d betrayed the Family, but he was still a damn teenager. Nick wouldn’t put his death on anyone but himself.

  With a deep breath, Nick regained his center. “You’re going into Providence tomorrow night, right?”

  It was the premiere performance of The Phantom of the Opera, and Donnie kept season tickets for a full box on premiere nights. Six seats. Often, Nick and Bev accompanied him, and he brought a date, and occasionally, they filled out the other two seats with business associates, or Donnie invited Trey and his wife, Lara. At Christmas, he worked it out with the theatre so he could squeeze in a seventh seat and invite Nick’s whole family, in what had become a traditional outing to see The Nutcracker.

  But tomorrow was Bobbo’s funeral, and the wake after, which would go on into the night. Besides, he was alone, and not in the mood to sit alone in a theater box. “No, not with Bobbo’s funeral tomorrow. I’ll let the box sit empty.”

  “No, go. I want you to touch McCauley, but I don’t want to make a thing of it. He’ll be there, right?”

  Parker McCauley was the mayor of Providence. “He usually is. What do you want?”

  “I want to know if he’s seeing Ukrainian movement in the city and what it is.”

  “Okay, I’ll go.”

  ~oOo~

  Tonight’s visitation was open to the public, and the funeral home that night was packed. Friends and family, the people who knew and loved Bobbo and his family, came and stayed. Quiet Cove citizens and Paganos business associates, the people who knew Nick and wanted to be sure to pay their respects to the don as well as to the deceased, moved through more fluidly.

  Standing some distance from her husband’s closed casket, near enough to be convenient for the vague condolences of people she didn’t know, but not so near that a crowd amassed at the bier, Sherrie stood and shook hands, accepted hugs. She smiled softly and was unfailingly gracious, but she was obviously exhausted. She was younger than Bobbo, about Nick’s age, Donnie guessed, but since her man’s death, she’d been aging right before their eyes.

  She needed some coffee or something to get through the rest of this evening. Donnie looked around for a grunt to send on the errand, but the room was too crowded, so he made his way to the door himself. As he entered the hallway, he came face to face with Sonia Evans.

  A defensive reflex threw his hands up to grab her arms. “What are you doing here?”

  She shrugged him off. “I’m not here for you, Donnie. I’m here to pay my respects. I called to let you know I’d be here, but you wouldn’t take my call.”

  Sonia was an attorney; Donnie had met her when one of the PBS attorneys had brought her in for advice on a legitimate business idea they’d considered. She specialized in international business law. She was tall and beautiful and smart—and among the toughest of the women he’d dated long-term, one of the few he didn’t intimidate in some way. He’d really enjoyed her company. But she’d tried to convince him she’d fallen in love, that she wanted things he knew damn well she didn’t want, and she’d ruined what had been a good thing.

  None of that was relevant now. Tonight wasn’t about them, and she had no reason to be here. She didn’t even live in the Cove. “You didn’t know Bobbo.”

  “Sure I did. We were together almost a year, Don. I met him several times. I had a couple nice talks with him. He was a good guy.”

  “Fine.” He stepped out of her way. “Pay your respects and go.”

  Her brown eyes narrowed. “You are a sad man, Donnie Goretti.”

  He had his hands around her arms again, and before he knew what he was doing or why, he was dragging her to and through the nearest closed door, into an empty visitation room. She stiffened but didn’t fight him. Sonia was not one to make a scene.

  As soon as he stopped, though, she shoved him away. “What the hell, Donnie?”

  “Watch how you talk to me.” The words came off his tongue with serrated edges.

  The anger she heard made hers flare. “I didn’t mean it as an insult. I meant that you’re sad, and it makes me sad.”

  “Fuck off, Sonia. I don’t need your pity, and I don’t want to hear any more of your bullshit.”

  “Donnie. It’s not bullshit. Or pity. You’ve got more than enough pity for yourself. All I wanted was to be able to kiss you. We were together ten months, and you never kissed me once. I just wanted to be closer to you. I was falling in love, and I was doing it alone, because you’re so fucking scared.”

  He laughed at her sanctimonious, wrongheaded judgment. He wasn’t scared. Over twenty years, he’d built himself into a man who could win with the hand he’d been dealt. His scars had never held him back. Every day, he moved through a world that looked on him with horror, but he’d become a man people either feared or respected too much to show their revulsion. Yes, they called him ‘The Face’ behind his back, but they knew better than to show him anything but respect. More than respect—obeisance. They were afraid of him, not the other way around.

  The people he trusted, those he knew truly cared for him, to those few, he was only Donnie, as he’d ever been. He understood how rare those people were, and how valuable.

  Romantic love and sexual attraction were something else entirely, though, and he understood his limits there. The only thing about him women could be attracted to was his wealth. He knew better than to trust any word they said otherwise.

  “I’m not scared. I’m a realist.”

  “No. You’re a pessimist. You hate yourself so much that you can’t believe anyone would love you, and you won’t even open yourself to the possibility. You think every act of desire for you is a fiction. That’s fear—and it’s sad as hell.”

  The anger was so strong, the urge to do violence so acute, that his hand became a fist and began to rise. Sonia noticed it with a glance, then met his eyes again. “You won’t hit me. That’s not who you are.”

  She was right. He never did violence with hot blood. He had control over himself, in every way. “Things with us were good, but you fucked it up. You don’t love me. You don’t want this mouth on you. You couldn’t.”

  “Things weren’t good with us. I was hurt and frustrated trying to love you and not feeling anything like it back. There’s a massive steel cage around your heart. You think I’m so shallow your scars are all I see of you. You’re the shallow one, Donnie. Your scars are all you see. But your face isn’t the ugly part of you. It’s your fear that’s really ugly.”

  His control was slipping; he hadn’t been this angry at a woman since Lissie took his son from him. No woman had ever said such things to him before. “You need to get away from me. Pay your respects to Bobbo’s wife and get the fuck out.”

  For a few seconds, she simply looked at him, calmly, her eyes locked with his. Then she nodded. “You’re going to die alone, Donnie. Because you hate yourself so much you won’t let yourself feel love.”

  She walked away, leaving him alone in the dim, silent room.

  Donnie stood where he was with his fists clenched.

  ~ 6 ~

  There was no serious rehearsal on premiere day. Dancers warmed up, they worked through any choreography that had been particularly difficult to master, but otherwise, they saved their energy for the performance and took to their own premiere-day rituals. Ari, Julian, and Sergei had met up first thing that morning for a last run through the final act, which was particularly intense in both emotion and movement. After that, Sergei went off to the PT room for a massage, and Julian left the theatre altogether. It made him nervous to ‘lurk’ around—his word—waiting. He thought the energy of the building was too ‘noisy’—also his word.

  Ari knew what he meant. The anticipation in every room was nearly audible—and she loved it. It matched the same buzz she felt inside, the one that made her heart pound. She stored all that energy up like a battery and brought it onto the stage with her.

  That was true when she danced in the corps or had only a solo. Today,
when she’d dance the starring role, the same energy felt a bit more brittle, a bit too loud, and she almost wished she was hanging with Julian at the movies for the afternoon.

  But she had her premiere-day rituals, and she was too superstitious to set them aside. So, after a lunch of a single grilled chicken breast and a bottle of Pellegrino—she needed the protein but needed not to feel full—she sat on the floor in the far corner of the main rehearsal room, her legs spread wide and covered with her favorite pair of black-and-white-striped legwarmers. While corps dancers worked on their own around her, she broke in her performance pointe shoes.

  A ballerina’s pointe shoes were nearly as important as the feet she put them on, but they didn’t last long. Each dancer in the company had her own favorite brand, and each shoe was custom-fitted for her. Ari liked Freed shoes. Her foot was a bit wide across the ball, and the Freed’s shape fit her right and gave her pointe a nice, smooth line. The shoe room upstairs kept dozens of each girl’s shoes in stock all the time, and dyed them to match costumes when that was necessary.

  The eight costumes she’d wear for Phantom didn’t require dyed shoes, and Ari would have time for only two dressing-room costume changes—at the intermissions. All the others would occur just off stage, a quick addition or subtraction to what she had on. So, barring catastrophe, she’d wear one pair of shoes all night, and that pair would be demolished by the time she took her bow.

  Like most of the girls, Ari went through about ninety pairs a year. At nearly a hundred dollars a pair, the annual cost was significant, but the company paid for them. New shoes came out of the box rigidly shaped, so hard you could knock them on the floor and get a hollow sound. Because they lasted so briefly they were essentially disposable, a dancer could not break her shoes in with wearing. They had to be nearly destroyed out of the box and rebuilt for the fit the dancer liked.