by Scott, D. D.
The Temptress tossed back her perfectly-coiffed locks, although not in the confident way she’d previously been playing her hand.
“It was all about the conquest for me, Prince Bellesconi. And it’s all been mentally fabulous.”
“You’d best use your head one more time then, and hand over what we agreed on.”
The Temptress remained silent, but for only a moment.
“You’ll find what you need at Via Dante in Secondigliano,” she said, wrapping the scarf around her very squeezable neck.
All the systems in my body activated at once.
“I know that address!”
Before I knew what I was doing or why or definitely taking the time to think through that it probably wasn’t the smartest move given our current situation, I had announced my knowledge with gusto.
“You do?” All three of my cohorts in the floating mansion’s salon asked in unison.
“I am a Stylist to The Stars, and I know my Gomorrah,” I said, and I did, ‘cause I sure as hell had read every word of it once Granny V told me I’d be marrying into the mob on which it was based.
Before I had time to explain any further, our party of four suddenly became a party of nine.
The Mom Squad had at some point boarded The Temptress’s floating mansion and now had us all at gunpoint.
Well, Grams did.
She had the Glock.
The other Angels were apparently waiting on instructions.
Let’s hope Grams waited too.
“Okay, Amigos,” Grams said, “this party is over.”
“That’s Spanish, not Italian, Grams,” I said, barely able to hold in a giggle.
“Details. Details. The only details y’all need to know is that I’m now in charge of this Tramp, so y’all go ahead and do whatever you need to do, ‘cause I got this handled.”
“I think she’s known as The Temptress, not The Tramp,” I overheard Aunt Tulip telling Grams.
“Whatever. Wouldja look at her? She looks like a Tramp. Plus, it’s much easier to say. I’m stickin’ with The Tramp.”
Grams’ hands shook as she still aimed the Glock at Janeel.
“All right then, let’s move,” Roman said, motioning for R and I to follow him. “And I don’t think you’ll be needing this anymore.”
With one super slick move Roman had the violet, number-imprinted scarf swiped clean off of The Tramp’s neck.
Once he had the scarf, he plunged a needle into The Tramp’s sculpted bicep, and we all watched as she slithered to the floor of the floating mansion’s master salon.
“Now we won’t be needing this either,” Grams said, rooting around inside her bra and removing a tiny control.
She aimed the device through the salon’s window in the general direction of The Mom Squad’s hydrofoil. And with one, I-so-mean-it push of the red button now lit-up on the controller’s panel, an explosion rocked The Tramp’s vessel.
We all hit the floor.
“You didn’t?!” I asked, wondering what the hell was going on.
“R told me to, Plum Puddin’, so you betchya I did, “ Grams said her crooked-teeth grin way too pleased with herself to make anyone even think of arguing with her.
“Trust me, these ladies aren’t going to need their water wings for awhile,” R said, trying to make light of the fact that a fire still raged outside the salon’s window where a hydrofoil had once been anchored.
Evidently The Mom Squad was here with The Tramp for an extended, hostage-taking vacay.
“Nope. No water wings needed. We got us a major job right here on board this ship,” Grams concurred. “Don’t you worry, Señor, we got it all under control.”
“Again…that’s Spanish, Grams. We’re in Italy.”
“What difference does it make? They’re all romance languages. The languages of luuuuvvv, right?” She asked, then wiggled her badly-needing-waxed eyebrows at R.
“Definitely time to go,” R said a slight rasp clogging his normally crystal clear voice.
“Well at least I didn’t get the needle this time,” I said, following R out of the salon with Roman on my heels.
“Wait.”
I turned then ran around Roman to hug each of The Mom Squad members. I had no idea what all they were up to but I was sooo glad they were here.
Knowing the way Roman and R worked, now that The Mom Squad was back, my BFFs Roxy, Jules and Audrey wouldn’t be far behind.
That gave me a ton of courage, and I was going to need it to dive head-first into the life of Gomorrah.
Chapter Fifteen
I had chosen a life of glamour because glamour wasn’t about saving the world, it was supposed to be about living it up and making superfab fun and daring statements.
But after reading Gomorrah, then living life alongside my Italian Prince, I now knew that glamour could indeed save the world, one cash-and-carry, narcotraffic operation at a time.
Not until I’d read that book did I understand where most of the high-end fashion I saw and bought off the runways actually came from.
The men, woman, and yes, children too, behind these gorgeously sewn seams could often be found in the cement slums of Italy’s Secondigliano in the villas of Scampia and Campania. Where ecstasy was their Tic Tacs. And where the world’s finest fabrics were shipped, then sewn in underground sweatshops and then traded and transported around the world, from Naples’ ports, along with cocaine, heroin, hashish, marijuana and tons more drugs in candied-pill forms.
Whatever I’ve wanted out of my life, I’ve figured out how to get for myself and by myself. But the people who lived here never had that option. They either worked for the local clan bosses, or they and their families starved or were killed. Their choice.
So here I was…having made my choice.
If fashion and glamour could save the world or at least make it a better place for these people, I was hell-bent on doing my part.
And who was I to fear the mob?
I worked with Hollywood Divas for God’s sake. A mistake on the Red Carpet was ten times worse than what these guys could do to me.
As R drove our tiny car over the big and wide asphalt streets steaming from the hot, mid-afternoon sun, I watched as massive concrete buildings, and weeds I swore were the same size, passed on both sides of our vehicle.
Vespas and motorcycles driven by young boys who couldn’t be much more than eight to thirteen or so years-old whizzed by us, evidently in a hurry to deliver their next deal or report back to the bosses they served as look-outs for.
“I don’t know how Roman can take the heat,” I said to R who didn’t appear to be as worried as I that Roman was basically in a vault back there in the false bottom of our car’s trunk.
“No worries, Zoey. He’s taken this trip with me many times.”
“That’s comforting. Not.”
“Just whatever happens stick to our plan,” he warned, as our car slowed and got in line with several cars in front of us. “It’s just about our turn.”
“I can’t get over how you can be a cash, leather and fabric, and narcotics entrepreneur all-in-one here,” I said, watching now, in real-life, what up ‘til now, I’d only read about.
We were now in line to deal at one of the open-air drug markets common as a fruit and vegetable stand in this region. Actually, more common.
“All the world’s cash funnels in and out of the same trades and industries, My Princess. It’s all cleaned, or laundered, if you will, the same way. And most of it, at some point during its journey, comes here, through Naples and Campania, my childhood haunts.”
“Can’t the government here do anything to stop this?”
“Does your U S of A government do anything to stop people like McCall?”
“Good point. Not until they have to in order to save their own necks and livelihood.”
“There’s your answer. We just had another provincial official arrested last week for embezzlement and a vote-buying scheme with these bosses. But he w
as only arrested because he was more than likely working with a rival clan, fighting for control over the economic activities of this area.”
I listened to R’s story but was also silently rehearsing my role in our plan. We only had one more car in front of us before it was our turn to deal.
We’d timed it perfectly too. It was around five in the afternoon, so we wouldn’t need to worry about added inspection or questioning by the Italian police and carabinieri. They were normally out only in the mornings, leaving the streets to the bosses from around three in the afternoon to four the following morning.
With the car pulling away in front of us, another young boy on a Vespa leading the way, a service the local boss provided his customers — safe purchase and transport of said purchase — it was game-on for this Stylist to The Stars.
A good stylist is a “master of illusion” says Rachel Zoe, one of the greats in the biz I’ve always looked up to. The stylist who I also happened to be named after ‘cause my mother Mrs. Claus is big into fashion too.
The crème de la crème know how to play-up the positives and hide the negatives by using contrast, color, proportion and attitude.
Being as there weren’t too many positives in the job now before me, other than the beautiful clothes I was about to see, straight off the tables and machines from which they were cut and sewn, I tried to focus on that aspect of our plan.
Also like a great stylist, though, I know what works and what doesn’t for me. I know who and what inspires me.
And seeing Chinese immigrants and Italians, working their fingers to the bone in the nasty conditions I was about to see in these textile sweatshops almost made me sick to my stomach.
The young teen boys holding iron — as in big guns — to the car windows didn’t faze me a bit. But seeing under-paid and overworked, scared out of their minds people did.
The boys told us to get out of the car, which we did, only to be welcomed by the end of their iron sticks in the middle of our backs.
Since I was still not very good at my Italian, I followed R and his escort’s lead and remained silent.
We were lead through narrow, cement-wall-lined paths, with such huge, scraggly sharp weeds growing from them, I felt like we were in the middle of a concrete jungle.
Just as we were guided through a series of doors and covered walkways, leading into yet another cement warehouse behind the street-side shops, I noticed an addition to our entourage.
As Roman whispered to me through the earpiece wirelessly picking-up on the intercom feature in my brooch, I didn’t acknowledge the new guy’s presence. Thanks to my magical brooch, which also now secured The Tramp’s violet scarf to my neck, I never let on that I knew Ross was the new guy who’d joined our little party.
So what was Ross’s real gig…a double agent?
I thought double agents had to be especially brilliant.
Hell, maybe, to put themselves at that kind of risk, they had to be especially dumb too.
All I knew now was I was sort of glad Ross was here, although, I’d have felt a whole helluva lot more comfortable if it was Ross suffocating in the trunk of our car and Roman watching my iron-prodded back.
We were ushered through another cheap, squeaky-on-its-hinges screen door, held open by yet another mafia thug with a big gun then down one more concrete, weed-infested corridor before we made it to the textile sweatshop.
Now that I was standing in one of these shops, I couldn’t believe what these places actually looked like. Every documentary I’d seen was coming alive right before my eyes.
Who knew that when a stylist talked and bragged about his or her ability to mix a five dollar item with a five thousand dollar piece that, chances were, they all were made in the same room.
I often collected images from magazines and books showing the fashions that inspired me, but after what I was seeing now, I don’t know if fashion could ever again inspire me.
I’m not sure why I’d been so naïve back in the early 2000s when major retail firms vowed they had rigorous factory-monitoring programs. Now I knew better. If you had a basement or attic or backroom crammed with immigrants, like these shops, you qualified as an approved supplier. Those big corporations knew damn well what outsourcing meant…and this was it.
Rows and rows of very thin Chinese and Italians pulled loops of thread through the tiniest of tiny sequins and plastic beads. For sixteen plus hours per day, their dark hair was coated with dust, and their faces dripped with sweat. Without breaks. Without food or water.
Roman and R had explained to me, and I’d also read it in Gomorrah, that often, more times than not, when the labels bear the logos of international fashion houses and corporate chains, the real truth was what I was now witnessing.
Too sick to my stomach to see anymore, I decided to put an early end to our fashion underworld tour.
Seeing the small, elderly Chinese man Roman was describing to me in detail in my earpiece, hunched over a cutting table three-fourths of the way back in the shop, I casually made my way over to him, with Ross now pressing iron to my back instead of one of the boys.
The poor little man never looked up from the table to acknowledge me.
As Roman instructed, I removed my scarf.
Evidently seeing the violet scarf’s contrast to the bolt of brown silk fabric he had partially rolled out on his table, the Chinese tailor, who I now knew was one of the premiere tailors in the world, although no one knew of his existence, met my soft, seeking gaze.
Taking my scarf between his fingers, as if to admire the quality of the fabric, he then laid it onto to the top of his piece of silk.
And there…right before my eyes, the sequence of numbers on my scarf, once lit only by backlight, now matched up with numbers that I swear popped up out of the brown silk.
At Roman’s cue, I said my line.
“Yes, we’ll take this bolt.”
The tailor nodded and without so much as a smile, wound the fabric back around the bolt and handed it to me.
I then felt Ross’s cold iron barrel in the center of my back, and heard Roman’s orders to move out and do it now without looking back.
Chapter Sixteen
Every great stylist learns to include one “wow” factor with every outfit…something for dramatic flair.
Well how’s this for flair?
Swiss Bank Account numbers hidden in the bolts of fabric used for scarves and silk wraps.
In my styling book, that’s definitely a “wow” factor with major dramatic flair.
A stylist knows clothes, but even more, he or she knows their clients — what they think and feel, how they react in situations, how they move, their dreams, attributes, aspirations and insecurities.
But their bank accounts?
Not so much.
To bring out the best and most beautiful in our clients, we don’t need their routing and account numbers.
But this time, I got ‘em.
Roman, Vinnie and I are now trying to match ‘em all up.
“You know,” Roman said as we carefully arranged both the brown bolt of silk and The Tramp’s violet scarf across the hand-made tiles making up the floor of our Le SirenMuse suite, “this reminds me of a statement the United States Attorney for Manhattan said following Raj’s conviction.”
While listening to Roman work through our cozy cash puzzle, I sat back on the heels of my new combat-style boots and studied the scarf as it flowed into the rolls of silk blanketing the sun-glistened tiles.
“The US Attorney said something to the effect that the court was sending a clear message that there are rules and laws, and they apply to everyone, no matter who you are and how much money you have.”
“What a joke, right? Obviously, said attorney hasn’t read Gomorrah and has no clue how money, and all international commerce moves. Whether it’s narcotraffic, cash, fabric or shoes, it all comes through Naples, and I have a feeling through your clans and families.”
At my mention of his family
’s involvement in all this trafficking, Roman’s body tightened, starting in his strong jaw line and moving down into his shoulders and the squaring of his body to mine.
As soon as the words were out of my mouth, I regretted ‘em. Like I do a lot. Sometimes I really should think before I speak.
“I’m sorry…”
“There’s no need to apologize. You’re right. In a lot of ways, you’re right,” he said, running his fingers through his black as coal and ultra-unruly hair. “I spent years trying to cover-up and hide from the truth. But not anymore. Now, I’m going to unbury the rest of the truth and then do everything I can to make things right.”
“So how are these pieces of fabric and numbers gonna get us there?”
Roman took out a super tiny digital camera and began snapping images of the numbers as they sequenced together across the scarf and silk pieces.
“How ‘bout I begin writing down the number-sets as well?”
“That sounds good,” he said continuing to take pictures while he talked. “Raj based his defense on what he called his mosaic theory of investing.”
“Coincidence that what we’re seeing here looks almost like a mosaic?” I asked.
The collage of numbers superimposed on the fabric did indeed look like the mosaic patterns of the best works of batik-print, the wax-resistant dye technique used on bright and brilliant fabrics from Indonesia and other regions of the Far East and Africa.
“I don’t believe in coincidence. Coincidence gets you killed,” Roman said.
I sure as hell didn’t doubt that, not after hangin’ out with The Royal House of Savoy.
“Raj may have been famous for his dogged digging for information about all the publicly traded companies in his hedge funds, but part of the complete picture that gave him an edge over other investors didn’t come from newspapers, analyst’s reports and company press releases. His mosaics were completed by people, like The Temptress and his other cronies, who gave him info from inside the boardrooms, bedrooms and R&D Labs of the companies off which he made millions.”
With that revelation, Vinnie ouffed.