Swimming with Sharks

by Nele Neuhaus

  Nick introduced Alex to his assistant, who had rushed over from city hall. She had pictured him completely differently—much older and less pleasant—after their phone conversation the previous day. Frank Cohen was actually hardly older than she was, and he had a serious, narrow face and short dark hair. Behind his thick glasses, she detected an emotion in his eyes she was all too familiar with: fear.

  “Nick,” she said quietly, “I can’t tell the police where I know this man from.”

  He looked at her.

  “Before I talk to the police, I’d like to tell you everything. Please.”

  “Of course,” he said. “We’ll tell the police that you’re a random visitor at the cemetery. Okay?”

  Alex nodded in relief.

  “Come with me,” he said as he put his arm around her shoulders. “Let’s go to my office. They don’t need us here anymore.”

  This was Alex’s first time at city hall. She was impressed when she looked around the office of New York City’s mayor. During the past few hours, she had completely forgotten Nick’s position. She knew many powerful and influential men, but Nick Kostidis was the first to show her that even a powerful man could experience emotions.

  Frank Cohen brewed some coffee. Alex initially thought that she couldn’t eat anything, but then suddenly felt as hungry as a wolf. After two cups of coffee and a sandwich, she felt much better. She eased into telling her story. She briefly explained to them what she did at LMI and then talked about Sergio. She was astonished how easy it was for her to talk to the mayor and his assistant about all the things that she had been keeping completely secret. It almost felt like a confession, and she was relieved. She told them about the conversation she had overheard at Sergio’s birthday party last year, about the assassination attempt she had witnessed, about the warehouse in Brooklyn, and her suspicion that Sergio and Levy were exploiting her information for insider trading. Then she shared with them what she’d discovered about the secret slush-fund accounts on Grand Cayman. Both men listened to her with growing consternation. Nick stared at her, leaning forward with his elbows resting on his knees.

  “What do you think about that, Nick?” Frank said. “De Lancie, McIntyre, Whitewater, Rhodes, Senator Hoffman, even Jerome Harding.”

  “I can’t believe it.” Nick leaned back and ran his hand through his hair. “If that’s actually true, then…”

  Frank Cohen jumped up excitedly.

  “This scheme goes even deeper than we ever suspected!”

  Nick suddenly looked tired and very depressed.

  “Now I understand why I never had a chance against this man,” he said in a low voice. “Howard informed them about all of my actions. And all the others covered his back no matter what he did.”

  “We might be able to get all of them.” Frank’s eyes gleamed. “We could finally drain this swamp of corruption! Nick! This is what you’ve always been fighting for!”

  Nick stood up and stepped to the window. He looked out pensively.

  “No,” he said after a while.

  “But why not?” Alex asked in surprise. He turned around and met her gaze.

  “I can’t do this,” he said, shaking his head. “Vitali will find out where we got our information from.”

  “How could he find out?” Frank protested.

  “You must do this, Nick.” Alex made herself heard. “Frank’s right. You could free the city from this terrible corruption with a single blow.”

  “No,” Nick repeated, “I can’t take responsibility for this.”

  “But—”

  “I don’t want anything to happen to you, Alex,” Nick interrupted her. “Too many people have died on Vitali’s orders. He tried to have me killed again today. If he finds out that you’ve given me this information, then he’ll also kill you. And that…no…I don’t want that to happen.”

  He took a deep breath and straightened his shoulders.

  “I may need to resign as mayor.”

  Nelson van Mieren made himself comfortable in first class on the United flight from Chicago O’Hare to La Guardia. He had gone to Chicago for the weekend for business, but the talks went nowhere. He was frustrated that these three days had been nothing but wasted time. On top of that, he had missed his eldest grandson’s birthday party. While passengers boarded the airplane, Nelson opened the newspaper he had picked up in the departures lounge. One headline caught his eye immediately, and he froze when he caught sight of the drawing that was placed directly below the bold caption.

  Shots Fired at Mayor Kostidis

  Early Sunday morning, less than three months after his wife and son were killed by a car bomb, another assassination attempt was committed against New York City’s mayor, Nick Kostidis, at St. Ignatius cemetery in Brooklyn. Several eyewitnesses observed a man aiming at Kostidis with a precision rifle from a distance of about forty yards. It was one cemetery visitor’s presence of mind that saved the mayor’s life. The shooter was able to flee the scene, but police artists created this sketch based on eyewitness descriptions.

  Nelson van Mieren turned pale. His heart was racing, and he realized that he was breaking into a cold sweat. The drawing of the alleged shooter—whom Nelson knew all too well—was alarmingly accurate. There was no doubt that this was Natale Torrinio, called “the Neapolitan.” Nelson closed his eyes. His heart was pounding in his head. He realized that Sergio had sent him to Chicago under false pretense so that he could take his time and set the Neapolitan on the mayor. Sergio had lied to him when he reassured him that he had nothing to do with the bombing of the mayor’s car. The realization that his oldest friend had lied to him was the most painful feeling Nelson had experienced in his life.

  Sergio thought it was a bad joke when the butler from Mount Kisco called his office to say that Constanzia had left early in the morning by taxi—with four large suitcases and a few bags. She hadn’t announced where she was going. Although it didn’t fit into today’s schedule at all, he ordered his sons to go to Mount Kisco. Then he took his helicopter there to determine what had happened.

  Sergio was in a murderously bad mood after his best man Natale had botched the job yesterday. There hadn’t been an opening to get to Kostidis for weeks. He’d been constantly surrounded by a line of bodyguards. It was Natale’s idea to kill him at the cemetery because he found out that Kostidis didn’t let his security follow him to his family’s grave. It seemed like an easy enough operation. He could generally rely one hundred percent on Natale, but this time he’d not only missed his mark but had also been seen. Sergio could have dealt with that, but Natale also claimed that he saw Alex together with Kostidis at the cemetery.

  Sergio had unsuccessfully tried to call her at home and on her cell phone, so finally he sent his people over to her apartment. They confirmed that she wasn’t there. She only appeared again at six that evening. Someone with a blue Honda had dropped her off at home, and Sergio was close to going on a rampage when he heard about that.

  Then he found a letter addressed to him on his desk in his Mount Kisco house. He tore it open impatiently and read the few lines Constanzia had written in her sweeping handwriting:

  Sergio,

  I’m leaving you today. I thought long and hard about this decision, but after Cesare’s death I no longer see any possibility of continuing my life as it has been up to now. My sons don’t need me anymore. And you don’t need me either, if you ever have. I can’t stand the house and the loneliness anymore.

  Constanzia

  He stared at the letter in his hands silently. Fury consumed him. How dare Constanzia? She had packed her bags and disappeared like a thief in the night without even uttering a word. He crumpled the paper angrily and threw it away. Silvio and his sons stood in front of the desk with embarrassed faces while Sergio paced up and down the large room furiously.

  “How could she do this?” he roared. “How dare she? Didn’t I give her everything that a woman dreams of? Didn’t I buy her everything she wanted? She has countl
ess servants. Three cars!”

  “Mama was very unhappy,” Domenico said carefully. “And after Cesare’s death—”

  “Unhappy, ha!” Sergio cut him off. “She made him into what he was! A good-for-nothing, spoiled, and ungrateful brat! He was cowardly and dumb to boot!”

  He felt like killing someone with his bare hands, which is why these three men who knew him well prudently remained silent.

  “Domenico,” Sergio ordered, “bring all of the domestic workers here, right now. I want to know where she went. The last thing I can afford right now is the headline that my wife…”

  He fell silent. He couldn’t bring himself to say his wife had left him out loud. How could Constanzia humiliate him like this? If he’d wanted to get divorced, then it was up to him to do so, but the fact that she’d run away was more than his vanity could take.

  “I told you to get them!” he yelled at his younger son. “Pronto!”

  Domenico shot him an upset look and disappeared.

  “How could she do this to me?” Sergio continued his restless pacing like a predator in a cage. “How could she expose me like this?”

  “But, Papa,” Massimo tried to argue, “she didn’t expose you at all. No one but us knows about this.”

  “Soon everyone will know!” Sergio yelled. “Everyone will make fun of me!”

  “Ahh, I don’t believe that.”

  “Shut up!” Sergio snarled at his son. His face was pale with anger. “She makes me look like an idiot in front of my people. I’ll never forgive her for that! Sergio Vitali left by his wife! That’s unheard of!”

  Sergio’s anger wasn’t really about his wife. What really made him furious was the fact that Alex had lied to him. She had told him that she was with the Downeys on Long Island. But instead, she’d snuck behind his back to see Kostidis!

  “Silvio,” Sergio said after a while, calming down, “make sure that Constanzia comes back here. I don’t care how you do it. But if I read a single line about it in the newspaper, you’re fired! Capito?”

  Silvio nodded calmly. He had gotten used to his boss’s temper tantrums years ago.

  “Hold on!” There was a cruel smile on Sergio’s face.

  “Call Luca. I have a special job for him.”

  Silvio nodded and left the room.

  “What’s your plan, Papa?” Massimo asked, concerned. “What will you do with Mama?”

  “Nothing.” Sergio waved his hand dismissively and walked to the bar to pour himself a whiskey. “I just want her to return to this house.”

  “What about this special job?”

  “It has nothing to do with your mother.” He downed the whiskey in one gulp. That damn bitch Alex was about to really get to know him! First she’d pretended that she couldn’t wait to get married and live with him, and then she met secretly with his archenemy!

  Alex looked around her now-empty apartment as she waited for the movers to arrive. Maybe it was naive of her to think that she could escape from Sergio, but at least she no longer owed him anything. Alex checked her watch and lit a cigarette. Her thoughts drifted back to last Sunday. She was deeply touched that Nick put her safety ahead of her information against Sergio. She had assumed that he’d do anything to avenge the murder of his wife and his son, but the bombing and the shooting at the cemetery had changed his mind. When he called her late Monday afternoon, they talked for nearly fifteen minutes. But he didn’t utter a single word about what Alex had told him on Sunday.

  The doorbell rang right at that moment. Alex walked across her apartment, opened the door, and froze. Constanzia Vitali was standing in front of her.

  “Excuse me for showing up unannounced,” Sergio’s wife said. “May I come in?”

  “Umm…of course.” Alex was astonished and embarrassed at the same time. Had Sergio actually filed for divorce? Did his wife come here to make a scene? Constanzia Vitali stepped into the foyer.

  Alex had only seen Sergio’s wife once before, and that was a year and a half ago. The woman had visibly aged since then. Deep wrinkles had settled into her face, and she had bags under her brown eyes. She couldn’t hide her unhappiness. She had lost her son, and Alex suspected Sergio did little to comfort his wife during this difficult time.

  “You won’t be surprised to hear that I don’t want to see your husband anymore,” Alex said.

  “You’re leaving him?” Constanzia raised her eyebrows in surprise.

  “That’s my intention,” Alex replied.

  “Well,” Constanzia said, smiling with wicked amusement, “then Sergio has been left by his wife and his lover on the same day. That’ll be a big blow for his ego and his pride.”

  “You…left him?” Alex asked in disbelief.

  “Yes.” Constanzia nodded and gave her a probing look.

  Constanzia sat down in one of the rattan chairs and observed Alex, who was her absolute opposite in terms of appearance. She was silent for a while as she considered how to phrase her question.

  “I have known Sergio since we were small children,” she began. “We grew up in Little Italy. Everyone knew everyone there. Ignazio Vitali sent Sergio to a boarding school when he was six years old, shortly after his brother Aldo was killed by a rival gang.”

  Alex was astonished because Sergio told her that his brother died of an illness, but she wasn’t surprised to learn he had kept the truth from her.

  “Sergio only returned to the city after his father’s death,” Constanzia continued. “Ignazio, who was the padrino of the Genovese family, was essentially executed because he was in the way. My father was his successor. I didn’t understand the intricacies of the power structure among the city’s families back then. I fell head over heels in love with Sergio when I saw him at a girlfriend’s wedding, and I could hardly believe it when we got married just a short time later. I was deaf and blind with love and didn’t listen to my father’s warnings. However, I realized very quickly that Sergio didn’t love me.”

  Constanzia’s face hardened when she remembered the humiliation that Sergio had caused her.

  “When I was pregnant my husband cheated on me with every cheap whore on Mulberry Street, but I didn’t say a word, just like any good Italian wife. Sergio was much too busy becoming rich and powerful to be interested in what I was doing. He married me for just one reason—because I was Carlo Gambino’s daughter.”

  Constanzia looked inquiringly at Alex.

  “You’re not surprised to hear that Sergio comes from one of the city’s most powerful Mafia families, are you?”

  “He told me that his father was a known killer,” Alex replied hesitantly.

  “Pah!” Constanzia exclaimed. “Ignazio Vitali wasn’t just a killer. He was the feared enforcer of Lucky Luciano and Dutch Schultz—both of whom he later shot, by the way. But this is old stuff. They’re all long dead. Sergio bought the house in Mount Kisco after he made his first millions. It was terrible for me to live so far away from my family and friends, but Sergio thought it would be beneath his dignity to keep living on Mulberry Street. He bought the apartment on Park Avenue and only came home to me every now and then. He’s always been an inconsiderate egomaniac, and our marriage was never worth more than the paper it was written on. Sergio always did what he wanted, and I knew from the very first day that he couldn’t resist a beautiful young woman.”

  Alex blushed, but Constanzia didn’t seem to notice.

  “As the years passed, our sons grew up and left the house. All of them, except Cesare.” Constanzia sighed heavily. “Sergio always despised Cesare. He was different from his brothers, weaker and not as intelligent. He was in trouble all the time, and I lived in constant fear of Sergio’s temper tantrums when Cesare got himself into hot water.”

  She smiled sadly, and the tears shone in her big eyes.

  “It happened on the day of Sergio’s birthday party last year, as you probably remember. Sergio threw Cesare out of the house, and he never came back. He called me every now and then, but I didn’t kno
w where he lived or what he was doing. I was terribly worried about him. Whenever I tried to talk to Sergio about the boy, he got angry. A few days after the party, I heard that David Zuckerman had been shot. He and his wife were good friends with my eldest son and often came over to visit. I knew right away that Sergio was responsible for his death.”

  Alex held her breath.

  “Then came the day Sergio was shot. I wasn’t shocked when Massimo called to tell me that his father was injured. No, I wasn’t hysterical. I laughed. May God forgive me, but for a second I hoped that he was dead.”

  She smiled briefly at her own ridiculousness, but quickly her expression turned grim.

  “Cesare was arrested that very same night. When I learned that he was…dead, I almost lost it. I was sure that Sergio had something to do with his death. I accused him of it a few days later when he came home from the hospital. I screamed and said all kinds of hideous things to him. Everything that had accumulated inside of me over the years burst out, and I finally realized that it was the truth that I never wanted to see.”

  Alex saw Constanzia’s tears, and she understood how this woman felt. Wasn’t she in a similar situation?

  “On that day it became clear to me that I hated Sergio. I wished him dead. I decided to leave him right then, but I lacked the courage. Then I heard about the assassination attempt on the mayor that killed his wife and son. I know how much Sergio despises Mayor Kostidis. Even though he never talked to me about business, I witnessed enough in thirty years to put two and two together.” Constanzia shrugged her shoulders. “Sergio orders people who stand in his way killed. Ever since childhood, I’ve been used to people around me dying—but not from old age in their bed. My father was a Mafioso, just like my brothers and uncles, but my husband Sergio is the worst of them all—more brutal and ruthless than even Lucky Luciano or Al Capone ever were. He’s a criminal, and I know it. I’ve endured all of this for my boys through all these years. But now that Cesare is dead, I can’t go on like this anymore. All of the blood, violence, and death—it’s too much for my conscience.”