Mercenary (Gangsters of New York Book 3)

by Bella Di Corte

  “Listen to this: He goes home to a fish every night named Gilberts, and he talks to the motherfucker like he’s a dog. Here Gilberts, Gilberts, Gilberts.” Adriano said it in a monotone that sounded like here fishy, fishy, fishy, while he acted like he was sprinkling food over a bowl.

  He laughed. “So much fucking fun.” He opened the door and cool air blasted against my face. It smelled fresh, like new paint, wood, and metal.

  I fixed my suit jacket and tie before I went to the counter where a guy, maybe around my age, looked down at something. At the sound of our footsteps, he looked up, narrowing his eyes.

  “I’d like to see Mr. Kelly,” I said. “I heard he was in.”

  I’d also seen Cash Kelly eating at Macchiavello’s the day after I’d eaten there with Alcina. I went back to talk to Sylvester, who was nowhere to be found. Kelly was with the same red-haired woman that I saw him with in Modica.

  Even if no one was willing to talk about Mac, or he wasn’t willing to talk to me, I assumed he had something to hide. A man like Cash Kelly didn’t eat at just any place on the street.

  “Mr. Kelly sees people by appointment only,” the guy said.

  “Your name?”

  He narrowed his eyes at me. He was probably calling me Pinky Ring in his head. It was no secret that the connected Irish thought we were too flashy with our expensive suits and cars and jewelry.

  “Harrison Ryan,” he said. “I’m Mr. Kelly’s legal counsel. We’re short a person at the desk. So you’ll have to come back, Mr…?”

  I set my hand on the counter, so the gold ring on my little finger would glint a little. “Corrado. Corrado Scorpio.” News hadn’t spread yet, outside of the families, of my new role. For the moment, I wanted to keep it that way. “I’ll wait if he’s busy. As long as it takes.”

  He eyed Adriano behind me and then watched him follow as I took a seat in the waiting area. I picked up a magazine about my grandfather that was left out as reading material.

  Harrison Ryan cleared his throat a minute later. “Mr. Kelly will see you now.” He looked at Adriano. “Only you.”

  I stood, removing my jacket, proving that I wasn’t packing any heat. I lifted my shirt, turned around, and then lifted both pant legs.

  “We can skip the shake down,” I said. “If this is sufficient.”

  Harrison Ryan nodded. “Follow me.”

  I tucked my shirt back in, slipped my jacket back on, and nodded once to Adriano. He nodded back, touching the gun underneath his jacket in a subtle way.

  Cash Kelly started an assessment on me the moment I walked into his office. In the brief second it took for him to stand, for us to shake hands, his mind worked out three things: who I was, what I was about, and what I wanted. After that, he’d decide if he would be willing to help me with the latter.

  I doubted it.

  He worked with select families. The Irish and Italians sometimes worked together, but it was never close. We had our own thing; they had theirs.

  He checked out the scorpion on my hand, and I checked out the tiger on his neck. His old man was a legend around here. He was following in his footsteps.

  I respected Cash Kelly’s stance on drugs, how hard he fought to keep them off his streets. It spoke to the tradition in me. My grandfather never allowed it, and neither would I. There were too many other opportunities to make money if a mind was creative enough.

  I also knew that Kelly was more willing to trust a man who had spent some time in jail. Maybe he would sense that about me. Maybe he wouldn’t. Either way, though, my message would get back to its intended target through him.

  He nodded to the seat across from him. I took it.

  “I’m going to be brief,” I said. “Word on the street is that you know a man that goes by Mac Macchiavello.”

  “Know him,” he said, studying me harder. “Or can get close to him.”

  “I don’t need you to get close to him,” I said, sitting up some, fixing my suit, before I relaxed again. “I’m here to confirm that you know him.”

  “That he exists.”

  I waved a hand. We could play this game all day long. I pulled out a picture of Emilia and slid it across the desk toward him. I wanted him to know there was more to this situation than just me looking for him.

  His eyes moved over her face, studying her, trying to place her. He released a breath when he did. “My condolences.” He slid the picture back. “But I can’t help.”

  “Can’t.” I grinned. “Or won’t.”

  He waved his hand—either way, it was a hard no.

  I shrugged. “I’ll find him, regardless.” I took the picture, slipping it back inside of my pocket, and then I stood.

  He stood and offered me his hand. We shook once more. I stopped when I was at the door. “You didn’t ask why I wanted to find him.”

  “Why?”

  “Because when I do, I’m going to fucking kill him.”

  My gut told me Mac Macchiavello was Vittorio Scarpone—the Pretty Boy Prince. Even back in the day, he was a smart motherfucker. Machiavellian to the highest degree. Men used to talk about how he was the only one who was capable of getting out of the life without help—help meaning, either in a body bag or by becoming a stool pigeon.

  His old man saw to it by trying to get rid of him in a body bag. I’d seen it before. Father and son. Brothers. Best friends. If it was time to go, it was time to go. Vittorio Scarpone did a stupid thing by not killing the entire Palermo family, and stupid things had punishments.

  Deep down I was thankful that he spared my sister. I wasn’t a fucking monster. Besides, killing children was against our code. If anything, Arturo Scarpone should have gotten whacked because he even ordered such a thing. But I wouldn’t give Vittorio Scarpone a pass for doing it. The Scarpones had no feelings for the woman I called mother—and they all needed to be destroyed.

  I actually wanted to applaud this motherfucker Kelly for helping take out Arturo and his sons. The commission had been considering taking out Arturo for a while, and since his underboss happened to be his son, all of the men who could rise in ranks had been destroyed at once. It was about time.

  If Mac Macchiavello was Vittorio Scarpone, Cash Kelly would tell him I was here. Hopefully he’d get the message: where his old man had failed, I’d fucking succeed.

  23

  Alcina

  His hands slid around my waist as he helped me walk from the Cadillac to…wherever he was leading me.

  “Are you bringing me somewhere quiet?” He had tied a silk scarf around my head again, hiding my eyes from the surprise he had for me.

  He kissed me behind the ear. “We have a place where you can scream as loud as you want.”

  I smiled. “The last time you blindfolded me…” Cool air rushed over my face, and familiar scents almost made me take the scarf from around my eyes. I could tell we had moved from the busy street to a quiet area. “We are not in a library?” I whispered. I wondered if he was going to take me there like a dare—see if he could keep me quiet enough to get away with it.

  “Even with something in your mouth, you’d draw attention in a library.” He roared with laughter.

  “Apparently not as loud as you,” I said, searching for him. He had moved away from me. His heat had become something reassuring to me. Something I was drawn to. Addicted to. I could not sleep without him by my side now.

  He hands found mine, and I intertwined our fingers together, holding on tight. I leaned in, and he knew what I wanted. He kissed me. As he did, he untied the blindfold. Even though I could open my eyes, I didn’t. Not until the kiss ended.

  “Where are we?” We were inside of a store, that much was clear, and it was Sicilian-inspired. It brought me home with the tiles and textures of Palermo. Vintage looking wooden shelves lined the walls. They were all empty. There was a checkout area with no one behind it.

  I stepped away from Corrado, narrowing my eyes against two painted ceramic heads that were the focal point of one wall. He
r brown hair was pulled back, a crown atop of her head. Lemons were woven into her side-parted hair, but the inside fruit looked like the inside of figs. The man next to her was clearly a king. Red chili peppers and the same lemons with figs weaved around his crown.

  “This place is perfect,” I said, reaching out to stroke the king’s face. “What do they sell here?”

  After a minute or two went by, I turned to look for Corrado. He stood next to a shelf, a few of my candles lining them. He lit them one by one with a lighter from his pocket.

  “Candles,” he said. “Yours.”

  I stared at him, not truly understanding.

  “I called Anna and had her send some of your candles from Bronte. The ones that you had ready to sell before we left.” He looked around the store. “I invest in men every day. In business that I know won’t fail.” He looked at me. “You, Alcina Maria Capitani, invested in me. Not the other way around.”

  I smiled a little. “Let me understand. If you fail me—”

  “I fail at life.”

  Our eyes connected from across the room.

  “I’m going to fuck up, angel eyes,” he said. “But I’ll always redeem myself with you—understand?”

  I touched the necklace around my neck, the cross, and then my throat. I nodded. “Sì. Love does not come naturally to you.”

  “It came naturally for you, but not how to react to it.” He grinned. “I understand it in these terms. Plain and simple—I can’t afford to lose. I can’t afford not to pay my debt back. Because make no mistake. I’ll never be able to pay you back. We’ll never be square. There is no price on your love.”

  “Instead of roses or jewelry, you buy me a…candle shop?”

  “Bella Luna Candles by Alcina Capitani.” He pointed at his chest. “My wife.”

  Anna had encouraged me to do something special with my candles when I lived in Bronte. The furthest I got was choosing a name for a business I never thought I’d have. Bella Luna Candles.

  I smiled a little but then stood up straighter. I walked around him, my hands behind my back, eyeing him from head to toe. “This business will be legitimate, yes?”

  “Assolutamente,” he said, watching me move around him from the side of his eye.

  “I will name a candle after my husband.”

  “That depends.”

  “On?” I stopped in front of him.

  He reached out and pulled me toward his body. I lost my breath when I crashed into him. He looked down at me, moving a strand of hair from my face.

  “The name.”

  I grinned. “Lo scorpione.”

  He threw back his head and roared with laughter again. “I fucking like it,” he said.

  “I fucking like it,” I said.

  He put his fist up to my chin, like he was going to give me a punch, but instead, he brought my face closer so his lips could claim mine.

  “That mouth on you,” he said after he’d pulled away. “I fucking love that.” He turned and blew out all of the candles he’d lit. Then he swept me off my feet, carrying me toward the door of the shop. He stopped before he stepped out of it. We stared at what was starting to become something special.

  “This is all you, angel eyes,” he said. “This is your thing.”

  “It is,” I whispered. “And this—” I put his hand against my stomach. “This is ours.”

  “Il nostro sangue in un cuore,” he said. Our blood in one heart.

  I kissed the pulse in his neck. “It is an honor to carry a piece of you within me,” I said in Sicilian. In that moment, I could not remember a time when I did not love him.

  L'ho amato per sempre. Lo amerei per sempre.

  I loved him forever. I would love him for always.

  He had been warning me of the hurt he could cause. I accepted the warning. All things in life worth bleeding for are worth living and dying for.

  24

  Alcina

  Pulsing music blared from inside of The Club. I felt it rattling the cement underneath my heels as we made our way to the door from the car. Corrado put his arm around my neck, pulling me closer.

  A line wrapped around the building, hundreds of people waiting to get in.

  I looked at Corrado as we passed the crowd. He kept his face forward, his arm tight around my neck, ushering me past.

  Some of his men were ahead of us, a couple on each side of us, and a few behind us. The men working the security at the door allowed us in without even looking at us. They wore headpieces, and I heard one speaking in Italian. “He has arrived.”

  Corrado wasn’t flashy, but he was stylish, and the papers were reporting that he had started a new era of bosses. He was an ode to days long gone, when men wore suits to be respectful of the job. They said he was bringing back the Golden Days of Capone.

  He is quiet about his dealings, one paper said, like his grandfather. Even though they knew what he was, they couldn’t prove it. He was exactly what had gone missing in this modern society—he didn’t exist even though people knew he did.

  His nonna, Teresa, made sure the news was on whenever I went into the kitchen. She’d leave me newspapers and articles to find.

  I kept to myself in the house, because the women who spent most of their time with her did not like me.

  The feeling was mutual.

  There was one—the one with the evil eyes—who cursed me every time I walked into the kitchen. Her name was Martina.

  She was one of the reasons why I was with Corrado tonight. He spent a lot of his time doing business, and even though he had the pool house converted into a place for me to work on my candles, the mansion felt suffocating.

  I needed to breathe. To live outside of the confines of the baroque gates.

  It did not seem as if the wives usually came with the men to places like this. Corrado did not say as much, but this was not a social visit. He was here for a different reason, one that was not entirely business-related, either. He had told me he was looking for a man who had something to do with his past, with his father, Corrado Palermo.

  I had never been to a place like this, and when I told Anna I was going, she demanded that I send her proof or it did not happen. I slipped the phone out of my pocket, taking pictures of the people, of the stage, of the entire setup as we made our way to a private table.

  The music, the lights, the smells…it all started to move through my bloodstream. I had the urge to dance.

  We stopped at a booth tucked away in one of the darkest corners. The seats were blue velvet and plush.

  “No.” Corrado helped me slip off my dress coat. “No dancing.” He set it over the crook of his arm, gesturing for me to sit. He eyed me up and down before I did, looking over my dress again.

  It was a shorter version of the one I wore to the opera. The rich gold fabric hugged all of my curves, even the small swell of my belly. He had gotten me out of it before we left. The look in his eyes told me he wanted to do it again.

  It must have been written across my forehead that I wanted to dance, though, since he mentioned it. “Have you ever been to a place like this?”

  “Yeah,” he said. “But not to dance.”

  A candle burned in the middle of the table. I put my hand over it, feeling the heat beneath my palm. I inhaled when some of the smoke lingered in the air. Chocolate. I wondered…no. It could not be, even though they smelled the same.

  My family in Modica was not the only ones who made candles that smelled of lemon and chocolate. I even asked Anna about it. She said she was not aware that the zie shipped their candles to America.

  “The same man who owns the restaurant owns this place?” I asked.

  Corrado stared ahead, his eyes turned up to the second level of The Club. It was made of glass. It seemed like he was trying to see through it.

  I touched him on the arm. It took him a minute, but he looked at me. He took my hand and kissed my fingers. “You thirsty, angel eyes?”

  “Yes,” I said. When we walked in the air wa
s cool, but back here where people crowded around the stage, it felt like a sauna.

  Nunzio turned around and Corrado nodded at him. That was all it took for them to move. A woman working the club came back with a tray with two drinks and a bottle. After she had gone, Nunzio set everything in front of us.

  Corrado had ordered Amaro del Capo. The glass was frosted to keep it cold. As he drank, I could smell mint, anise seed, and licorice floating in the air.

  My mouth watered as I imagined how it would taste on his tongue. I picked my glass up to take a sip of water with lemon, but he set his hand against my neck and pulled my mouth to his.

  “You make me do things I shouldn’t while out in public,” he said against my mouth before he kissed me again. He tasted like the drink, and I did not want him to stop. He did, though, when he must have sensed one of the men wanting his attention.

  Nunzio cleared his throat. “Mariposa and Keely are here to see your wife.”

  I went to get up when the name made it to my ear. Mariposa. Mari. I had not seen her since Modica. I remembered then that she and Amadeo lived in New York most of the time.

  Hearing her name was like catching my breath.

  Corrado put his hand on my arm to stop me. He nodded at Nunzio to let them through. She stepped through the men as if it were an everyday occurrence to have to bypass a muscle wall to get to someone. Keely, her red-haired friend, was beside her. Keely sat next to me, and Mari hugged me from across the table before she took a seat next to Corrado.

  He studied her face, a little harder than he had in Modica.

  “Corrado,” I said, “this is my cugina, Mariposa. Mariposa, this is mio marito, Corrado.”

  She held out her hand and he took it, but she did not let go right away.

  “It’s nice to meet you,” she said, staring at him in the glow of the flame.