Angie’s idea of ‘nice-looking woman’ didn’t really balance out this table. This chick was like a weed among roses.
It was a funny thought to go through Tony’s head, since he himself usually hung out with brassy women, too. He’d even thought that Billy was that kind of woman at first. He’d thought she liked to fight, to get loud and rumble, but that wasn’t it. She didn’t fight for the sake of it. She didn’t like the drama. She simply stood up for herself and was willing to rumble if she had to.
That was even sexier. And a whole lot less exhausting.
Billy was looking at him, and Tony realized the question Angie’s date had asked was about them. How long had they been together? He didn’t know—when had ‘together’ started for them? Was that what they were? ‘Together’?
“Just a couple weeks,” Billy finally answered.
“Aw, how sweet! New love! Well, you look great together.”
Tony turned to Billy. Her cheeks had pinked a bit, and that was cute as fuck.
~oOo~
There was no talk of business at this table—not Pagano Brothers business, anyway. That kind of talk didn’t happen, even sidelong, in mixed company, or in public.
To someone who knew what had gone down at the beginning of the week but didn’t know the Paganos, it might seem strange for the don to host a dinner in a popular restaurant tonight. They were at war, after all, and Dominic’s, with its big dining room and sweeping views of the ocean through glass walls, with every table full all night long, had them exposed. All those people, all that visibility, maybe it seemed reckless to be so out in the open.
But Dom’s was Nick Pagano’s favorite restaurant, and it had been Ben Pagano’s favorite as well. It was a base for the family, well guarded and geared, and almost as secure as Nick’s home, or the PBS office.
More than that, Nick would not be thought to cower. He didn’t hide. The Ukrainians were beneath him, and they didn’t change the conduct of his life.
He did not, however, put his family at risk. He would have brought his wife to dinner only if he were sure it was safe for her to be here. And it was. In addition to Donnie, Angie, Tony, and Trey—all of whom Tony could see were armed—there were three guards at the front door and three at the back, plus a boat on the water, in case anybody wanted to make a go at the bulletproof glass in those window walls.
So Nick and his guests enjoyed dinner.
For the most part, the women were the stars of the show. Donna Pagano—she wanted Tony to call her Bev, which wasn’t so easy when her husband was sitting right there—talked about Quiet Cove and a bunch of charity stuff she was doing. Billy fielded questions and told stories about West Egg. Donnie’s wife, Ari, who was a ballerina, talked about dancing and the ballet she was rehearsing. Brenda, Angie’s date, asked a lot of questions but didn’t have a lot to say for herself. Trey’s wife, Lara, didn’t talk much at all, but she seemed engaged.
Lara was a strange chick. She was about as important to the organization as a woman could get, far more important than Tony, certainly, and possibly as important as Donnie or Angie. But Tony thought she might be a little bit nuts. She rarely spoke unless she was asked a direct question, and then only enough to answer it. She almost never smiled, much less laughed. And, a new wrinkle Tony hadn’t known before tonight: she was a seriously weird eater. Even at this table, a meal Don Pagano had arranged, she was turning almost all the food away. They were on the third course—the olives and cheeses first, then assorted sausages and prosciutto and different cheeses, and they were finishing up a gnocchi, and all she’d eaten so far was a plain roll. And only water to drink.
She was skinny, too—like, malnourished. The woman clearly had some issues.
Nobody at the table seemed to notice, or care, that she was only picking at a roll, so Tony tried not to notice, either. But it was weird. Trey was Mr. Straight-As, Mr. Nice Guy, Mr. Athlete, Mr. Princeton, the Golden Fucking Boy, everybody’s hometown hero, and he’d hitched up with a humorless little waif.
Wouldn’t surprise Tony if Mr. Perfect had a savior complex or something.
They’d all finished their gnocchi, and Lara had eaten most of a whole roll, and Tony wondered what would come out next. Just as he had that thought, and was beginning to follow it with the realization that the other courses had been changed more quickly, almost the very same second the one before it was finished, the kitchen doors swung open.
He could see the doors just behind Lara’s head, and their swinging back and forth as the servers did their work throughout the crowded restaurant had been hard to ignore.
Tony also had a nearly straight sightline to the front of the restaurant, the wall that discreetly screened the main entrance and the maître d’s desk from the dining room. Of vigilant habit, though he wasn’t on guard tonight, he’d returned his attention again and again to that point, noticing every time Gio or the leggy, redheaded hostess led diners into the room, or people who’d finished their meal headed out.
He’d even started to get bent about it—not only had his first, maybe only, dinner with the don been corrupted by the presence of the guy he disliked most in the family, but he had to look at the goddamn kitchen and front doors all night.
Because all that coming and going from two doors had drawn his attention for the past hour or so, had made him work hard to focus anywhere else, Tony saw a difference right away this time, coming from the kitchen and the front as if in sync. It was that sense of being synced up that set his internal alarm off instantly, and he said, “Ange.”
That was it. Just his capo’s name.
But Angie went live immediately, shifted his attention from the don, saw what Tony had glimpsed and now also saw clearly, and shouted, “DOWN!” just as AKs began thundering around the dining room.
Heavily armed men were streaming into the dining room from both points, kitchen and front, firing as they came.
Angie had stood straight up as he’d yelled, his hands gripping the edge of the big round table. He sent it flying up, flinging its contents as it landed on its side, creating a shield.
The table was covered in Kevlar. Nick’s special table, always reserved for him.
Bullets sprayed, thudding dully as they sank into the bulletproof surface and stopped. But the wild plumes of lead hit the wall, the other tables, the lights around them.
Tony had snatched Billy and dived behind the shield, then pushed away from her and pulled his Beretta. He could only hope he’d gotten her protected in time; he couldn’t spare the chance in the middle of this hail of bullets to make sure she was okay. He peered around the edge of the table, one quick glance, then back behind cover.
Eight. He saw eight men, in Kevlar vests and military gear like the men he’d killed in Hell’s Kitchen. They stood in a row, firing at Nick’s upended table. They meant to stand there and shoot until they were empty. Which meant they thought they had the time to do it—which in turn meant they’d neutralized the guards outside. At least those at the doors. Fuck. That was six good men. And maybe the staff here, too—how else would they have gotten so close without alerting any of their safeguards? These bastards were taking down collaterals like they were nothing.
He’d spared only a moment for those thoughts, but it was too long. Focusing instead on what he’d seen, he readied himself and ducked around the corner, firing four times, hitting his target each time—the legs of the four nearest gunmen, breaking their fire. They all fell, and he aimed head shots as they struggled against their pain to keep shooting. All four stopped dead.
Somebody else was firing from behind the table at the opposite side; Tony didn’t check to see who, but another man was down and a sixth winged, and then the winged man yelled for a retreat, and all three still standing headed for the door at a run. Tony stood and fired. Someone else was, too—probably Angie—and together they put two more down. The third cleared the door and ran. Tony chased after him.
He got to the door in time to see a dark blue Land Rover l
aying rubber out of the valet drive, but he didn’t have a clear shot at the driver through the darkly tinted windows.
“FUCK!” He spun around—and almost crashed into Trey, who had his Beretta in his hands, a combat grip. It had been Golden Boy fighting these guys off with him?
“Where’s Angie?”
“I don’t—” Trey turned back to the restaurant. Tony shoved past him and went inside.
The place was wrecked—and a lot of people were down. Blood was splashed on the walls; people were moaning and crying. The maître d’ was propped against the wall, his chest sopping blood from his open throat. The leggy hostess lay in a face-down sprawl, blood pooling around her head and chest. Jesus Christ.
Nick’s table stood on its side. The surface was dimpled all over with the dull sheen of embedded slugs.
And none of their party was standing yet besides Tony and Trey. Not one.
They ran to the table.
Behind the shield he’d made, Angie sat against the wall, gasping harshly. Blood spilled down his chin. Ari was opening his bloody shirt.
There was so much blood. Everywhere.
Before Tony could make more sense of the horror before him, Donnie yelled, “BOTH OF YOU! CLEAR CHECK! NOW!”
Donnie had his hands on Bev’s. Her hands were on Nick’s chest. Blood pumped through the pile of their fingers.
Nick had been shot. He lay on the floor, unconscious, his skin already grey.
As Tony turned to check the kitchen, his eyes frantically sought Billy. She was there, sobbing hard. Her face dripped blood and gore.
He had to make sure there were no other shooters lying in wait. He had to do it now. But his knees gave, and he dropped his gun to grab her face. “Billy! You hurt?”
She shook her head. Her rushing tears made ghoulish streaks through the blood on her cheeks. When she looked down, Tony’s attention followed, and he understood where the blood had come from: Angie’s date, Brenda. Half her head was gone.
Jesus. Jesus. Jesus.
They were behind the shield! Had all this damage been done before Angie had gotten the table up? That had to be it—in that single second, maybe two.
Sirens began to wail outside.
“TONY!” Donnie yelled. “NOW!”
Tony snapped to. He got up and ran to the kitchen. Trey had gone toward the restrooms.
The kitchen was clear, but for the bodies of the staff and the food left to burn. Tony turned off all the burners and ran back to Nick’s table. Bev and Donnie were still trying to hold back the tide of Nick’s blood, and it didn’t look like it was working. “Is he dead?”
“NO!” shrieked Bev. “HE CAN’T DIE!”
Trey pushed his way around Tony and crouched low, before his wife. Lara sat quietly, muttering silently to herself, her arms crossed tightly and her fingers drumming on her shoulders. She was spattered with blood.
They all were.
~oOo~
Brenda was the only woman in their group who’d been hurt. Bev, Billy, Ari, and Lara were rattled and in shock, but none had more than a few scrapes from flying debris, though they all wore the blood of the men.
Angie had taken two bullets to the torso, one high on his shoulder, the other to the side. Donnie had been hit in the arm.
And Nick had been hit once in the chest. Left side. At his heart.
Six Pagano men had been killed, including Tony’s buddy, Chubs. The entire shift at Dom’s was dead—ten people. And three civilians had been killed and five more wounded.
Not counting the Ukie scum, it was a casualty count of twenty-seven, eighteen of them innocents.
Nick and Angie were in surgery, still alive, as far as anyone had heard. All the Pagano Brothers had taken up a vigil in the surgical waiting room, and most of the Pagano family, too. The waiting room was so crowded they’d sent associates around to lift chairs from emptier areas.
Donnie’s bullet had gone straight through and missed bone, so he was getting stitched up and would be joining them soon.
For now, Tony sat and waited, with Billy at his side. She rested on his shoulder, and he held her close.
Trey sat beside him, pale and silent. His mother had taken Lara away from the hospital, leading her as if she were a child. She’d still been muttering and drumming her fingers.
“You okay, bro?” Tony asked. He was feeling warmer toward Trey; they’d been through something, and Trey had stood up tall. Maybe he was more than flash and charm and privilege.
“I do not know,” Trey answered.
“I hear ya.” Tony’s head was nothing but throbbing noise. He tried to form thoughts, to think through what had happened, how it had happened, what would happen next, but the pulse of senseless noise overtook every thought.
Nick might die. Angie might die.
Mac Halloran, the Quiet Cove Police Chief, came in. Nick owned the Cove cops, but a hit like this made the kind of damage that couldn’t be swept away. Tony couldn’t imagine how deep a crater the Ukrainians had made in the Cove tonight. They might have won tonight. Nick called them roaches, and yet they might have won the war. They’d been willing to kill innocents to get their job done. Random innocents, with no connection whatsoever to the sides in the fight.
There were capos in this room, men who outranked Tony by a lot, but it didn’t occur to him to defer to them. He’d been there tonight, in the thick of it all, so he’d talk to the cop. He stood up, setting Billy gently aside, and went straight for Halloran.
“Tony,” Halloran said with a nod. “Any word?”
“Not yet. Nick and Angie are still in surgery. Bev is with Donnie. Ari is, too.”
“I heard Donnie wasn’t hurt too bad.”
“I guess he wasn’t. Last I heard, they’re doing tests to make sure, then they’ll stitch him up and turn him loose.”
“Okay. I’ll wait. I need to talk to him.”
“What’s up?”
Halloran hesitated, squinting at Tony like he was trying to see past his eyeballs. “What’s the chain of command, with Nick, Angie, and Donnie all down?”
Tony didn’t know the answer to that question. There were capos, but the only people who had the full picture of Nick’s business were the three men who’d been shot.
He looked around the room. Marty Bianchi? He had the most seniority, but he managed the runners, which was the bottom of the rung. But none of the other capos knew anything but their own work, either.
Shit. It was Trey, wasn’t it? Trey knew Nick’s business, he was the only one out here who did, and he wasn’t even made yet. Jesus Christ. Tony turned to the fucking associate who had all the secrets. “Trey.” He waved him up.
Tony wasn’t about to back off and let an associate run this show. Technically, Trey reported to Marty, but Tony didn’t even look back to see if the capo was paying attention. He would stand here and make sure Trey didn’t do or say anything stupid.
Halloran didn’t hesitate to talk to Trey. Of course. “Tonight is bigger than what went down at Dominic’s,” he said.
“What do you mean?” Trey asked.
“There were more targets. They shot up Cover to Cover Books, Corti Market, and Christ the King. ”
“They shot up the church?!” Tony’s hands clenched. “The fucking church?”
Trey set a hand on Tony’s shoulder and asked Halloran, “Anybody else hurt?”
Halloran shook his head. “A lot of property damage, but everything was buttoned up for the night, so nobody was around to get hurt. It was drivebys—according to witnesses, they shot semi-autos and lobbed grenades. Dom’s was the only place they entered.” With a sigh, he crossed his arms and went on, “Fellas, we all know how things work here in the Cove, and until tonight, they’ve worked well. But I got four huge crime scenes all over town. Dozens of 911 calls about it all, on the record. I got more dead bodies than the morgue here can handle, including civilians. Every hit was on a location known to be closely linked to Nick.” He ticked them off on his fingers: “His
favorite restaurant. His wife’s business. Angie’s family market. And the Catholic church. I do not know how to clean this up. The Feds have already called in. If they get jurisdiction over this, we are all screwed. So I need somebody who can make a decision. How do we fix this?”
“Mac.” Donnie walked up. He looked twenty years older then he’d been at dinner. Even the scarred side of his face seemed to sag. His right arm was in a sling. His wife and Nick’s stood at his sides, and they might well have been holding him up—though Bev looked ready to fall over, too.
“I need to call the kids. I have to tell the kids,” Bev muttered and glanced around the waiting room with eyes unfocused and wild.
Trey went to her and put his arm around her. “Is there news, Aunt Bev?”
She shook her head. “Not yet. But the kids ...”
“They’re coming. My dad and Aunt Carmen went to get them, remember?”
“Oh.” She started to wander off, but Trey kept hold of her and led her to sit. Ari sat with her, and Trey came back to the group of men. Donnie didn’t wave Tony or Trey off. For now, it seemed, they three were in charge.
“Tell me what you told them,” Donnie said to the police chief, who told him. “Okay,” he said when Halloran was through. “I’ll make some calls.”
“You think you can get control of this?” Disbelief warped the chief’s words.
“I’ll make some calls. You make sure your cops are in line, and I’ll handle the rest.”
“I’ll do my part. Keep me apprised of what’s goin’ on here.”
Donnie nodded, but it was clear he’d already dismissed the chief in his mind. “Trey, come with me. Tony, keep an eye on Bev, and hit me the second there’s word.”
“On it, boss.” Tony watched Trey walk off with Donnie, and for the first time, he didn’t feel resentment.
~oOo~
Tony watched Donnie walk off with Bev, his good arm snug around her shoulders. They were following the surgeon; Nick was finally out of surgery and in a recovery room. The bullet had missed his heart but nicked an artery and punctured a lung. He’d lost thirty percent of his blood volume and gone into cardiac arrest on the table. It had taken some time to get his heart beating again.
Accidental Evils Page 23