“Look at me, moaning about myself, when you’re the one who spent all night out on the town just to teach his husband a lesson,” Celia says with a wink, getting up from her seat. “You sit right there, honey, and I’ll get you another cup, and then you can tell me all about how terrible your husband is until he gets here.”
I’m about to say that that sounds like a plan, when there’s a knock at the door.
“Ugh, already?” Celia sighs. “Better let them in.”
She hustles out of the room, while I help myself to another cup of coffee. She makes it strong and dirty, just the way I like it. Just as I hear Celia’s exclamation of surprise, I realize it can’t be Luca and Frank, because Frank lives here. He wouldn’t knock.
And then Celia screams, and I drop the coffee pot, shattering hot liquid all over the kitchen floor.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
FINCH
For the second time in less than a year, I come back to consciousness only to find I have a bag over my head, a bleeding lip, and a sore gut from where, I presume, someone has been punching me.
It’s enough to give a guy a complex.
But then I remember Celia’s scream, and things don’t seem quite so funny anymore.
“Hello?” I ask.
There are definitely people in the room. I can hear them breathing.
My cheekbone explodes in pain and I rock where I’m sitting. Ropes are biting into my wrists and arms, but at least they help keep me upright. Jesus, whoever’s hitting me has a mean right hook. It’s kind of familiar, actually.
In fact, I’d bet dollars to donuts that it’s Joey Fuscone beating on me right now.
And then my hood comes off, and I find myself staring into Joey’s ugly, grinning face, until I have to blink away the dust and sweat in my eyes. Any sense of satisfaction at guessing right is fleeting, though, because as I look around the room, I can’t see Celia. I see a group of men staring back at me with murder in their eyes, but no Celia.
“Is Celia—” I start, but I’m cut off by Joey’s fist, smacking into that cheekbone again. I see black, and I have to take a second to catch my breath.
“Yeah, you don’t ask the questions here,” he laughs. “In fact, you don’t talk at all, except to scream. Deal?”
“Deal,” I say, and for that I get another fist to the stomach. I bend double, the ropes cutting into me, as I fight to get my breath back.
“You don’t talk at all, dumbass,” Joey crows. “Didn’t you hear me?”
I just keep quiet this time. At least it saves me another punch. I look around, trying to take in where I am. It’s not unlike the warehouse where Luca took me after that first kidnapping, but smaller. I think? I was pretty high that day, but right now there’s nothing standing in between my synapses and Joey Fuscone’s fists to cushion the blows.
I do know I’m tied to a chair, and my hands are tingling like the blood is struggling to get through to the ends of my fingers.
“I’m tired of this shit,” one of the other men says, and pulls out a gun. “Let’s just do him now and get over to support Sam. I wanna blast Morelli myself.”
“Put your goddamn dick away,” Joey barks. “We’re here on my uncle’s orders, and he won’t be happy if you kill this fucker before time. Besides, you know we have a guest on the way to see it.”
My vision’s stopped swimming, and I take another, more careful look around the room. Still no Celia do I see, but no blood or other evidence of a previous murder. Well, nothing recent, anyway. There’s a dark stain on the back wall at about head height, but it looks old.
I’m glad Celia’s not here. I hope she’s still alive. I really like her, my outlaw sister. She doesn’t deserve this kind of treatment, that’s for sure. I mean, neither do I, but it’s what life has taught me to expect so far.
And I’m really starting to wish I’d stayed at home and talked things out with Luca. Even yelled things out.
Because now I’ll never see Luca again.
I squeeze my eyes shut as they blur. I won’t fucking cry in front of these assholes. I can feel my old friend Death standing in a back corner of this warehouse, only he doesn’t feel so friendly now. I can even hear his feet coming closer, clicking across the floor—wait.
Death wears heels?
I open my sore eyes, blinking to clear them, and I must be having some kind of drug flashback. Walking towards me, like a vengeful ghost coming out of the gloom, is my mother…
No.
I squint, force my eyes into focus. Not Mom. It’s Maggie. With her long, pale red hair and close-fitting white suit, she sure does look like Mom did on that last day.
“Mags!” Joey cries out. “Lovely as ever, and right on time.”
He puts his hands on her. His dirty, groping hands go all over her as he pulls her in for a kiss, but even worse—she lets him. And I can only sit there and watch, nausea rising in my stomach, head aching and throbbing and feeling three times too big for my body.
After a moment, Maggie gently pushes Joey’s hands away, gives him a smile that I know is fake, because it’s the same one she always gives me, and takes those few last steps towards me. She looks me over, her face placid. “Hello, baby brother,” she says lightly, too lightly, given the circumstances.
“Hi,” I croak, hoping I won’t get another punch for talking. But Joey seems too delighted with the scene, chuckling and looking around at his men to see if they get the joke.
I don’t get the joke, but there obviously is one, because everyone’s laughing. Even Maggie is smiling now, a real smile, though not a nice one.
Maggie turns to Joey and says, “I’d like a moment alone before we get on with things.”
Joey claps his hands. “Everyone out!” he hollers, and all the men file out, some complaining under their breath, like they want to stick around and watch the show. Joey hangs around until Maggie goes over to him and whispers in his ear. He tries to press a gun on her but she waves it off.
“I think we’re quite secure, aren’t we?” she asks, glancing back at me. “And you know I abhor violence, Joey.”
I start laughing at that, and I can’t stop, getting louder and louder and more out of control until Maggie takes three quick steps over to me and slaps me hard across the face.
It calms me down, at least.
“Aw, Maggie,” I slur. “You gonna give me a speech before you kill me?”
“I’m not going to kill you. I wouldn’t dirty my hands with your blood. No, Joey will get that privilege.”
I lean my head back, trying to find a position where it’ll stop hurting so much.
“I ain’t leaving you without protection,” Joey says. “What kind of man would I be if I left my lady alone with—”
Maggie turns impatiently on Joey, and waves an imperious hand. “Fine. Give me the gun. Then leave us.” Joey doesn’t seem to like being bossed around, his eyes flashing, but he hands over the gun and then makes his way out the door. I guess Maggie has him trained well.
She follows him right up to the door and then locks it behind him, before coming back over to me. She leans down to take in my face, like she’s planning the next place to wallop me. “That door over there is the only door out of here, just FYI. And I do believe Joey Fuscone hates you almost as much as I do. So even if you somehow get free of that chair, get my gun and shoot me—which we both know you won’t—there’s still no way out. Are we clear?”
“How long have you been in bed with the Fuscones?” I ask, like that’s the important thing right now. But I can’t hide my astonishment. “And literally, too? How can you even stand letting him touch you?”
She gives me an allover stare. “I could ask the same of you and your husband.” She just about spits the word out. “And as for how long I’ve been laying my plans…well, this has all been a long time coming, Howie. A long time.”
I don’t like the way she’s waving the gun around casually, like she doesn’t really know how to hold it. Fuscone took the
safety off, too, so if she accidentally pulls that trigger, God only knows where the bullet will go.
I change tack. “Does Pops know about this?”
“Pops? What does he have to do with anything? Pops does what he’s told, just like these fool Italians do. Someone had to take the reins of our family, and it certainly wasn’t going to be you, was it?”
After Mom died, it’s true: Pops kind of gave up on the world. I never saw him much after that, but every time I did he was a little bit smaller, like a sponge drying up on the shore. Even at my wedding he seemed like a ghost of his former self. I guess it would’ve been easy enough for Maggie, always his favorite, to twist him to her will. “Okay. Well, if you want to play matriarch, I won’t stand in your way. You don’t need to kill me to lead the family. Nothing to fear here. I’m a D’Amato now, anyway.”
She sneers. “I can assure you, I’m not killing you because I’m afraid of you. And it’s been clear your whole life that you’d never be man enough to head the Donovans.”
“Huh. So…why am I even here? Is kidnapping me part of some revenge plot against the Morellis for Mom’s death?”
“In part,” Maggie says coldly. “But not in the way you’re thinking of it. And it’s not just business, Howie. Watching you die will be a great pleasure for me.”
“Yikes. I gotta say, I really didn’t think our sibling rivalry ran that deep.”
She slaps me again for that, even harder than last time. “You’re no brother of mine,” she says softly, once I’ve shaken off the stars again. “I am my father’s daughter. But you—” She gives me a contemptuous look. “You’re just some mutt. But we wouldn’t even be here if it weren’t for you. If you’d just died when you were supposed to…” She gives a sigh, a fake sigh.
“You mean a few months back when the Fuscone crew kidnapped me?” I ask slowly. “Or do you mean the time someone tried to kill me on my honeymoon? Or do you mean…”
“You know what I mean. When I mean.”
Her deep blue Donovan eyes look into mine, and yeah. I know. “That hit that took out Mom—”
“Was meant for you. Now you’re finally catching up.”
“You ordered the hit? But you were only…” I trail off. Maggie was in her twenties when it happened—young, but she knew the family business even then.
She laughs at me, a tinkling, refined little laugh completely unlike mine. I wonder now if she’s consciously decided to do everything opposite to me. To be reserved, cold, ambitious. To learn the family business, work hard, win by whatever means necessary. “Oh, don’t give me too much credit, darling. Pops ordered the hit on you—on my recommendation, it’s true. But if it’d been left up to me, I would have seen both of you dead. You and that whore mother of ours, may she never rest. But Pops was still in love with the whore, and couldn’t bear to do it. It was only supposed to be you, but things didn’t work out that way, did they? Afterwards, it was too much for Pops, her death. But then, he never had the stomach for what it is we do. He’s weak, Howie, weak like you. He called off the contract on you, said you could live out your life as long as you never came back to Boston. So off you went to boarding school.”
My mind is ticking over. It explains a few things, but not all. “But Pops reached out to me a few times. He wanted me to go to Harvard, come home to Boston. He gave me his old hoodie and everything…” I decide not to add that I palmed it off on Luca. Probably wouldn’t help my cause right now. Besides, I’m really over being slapped, punched, hurt. I want to get out of here.
I don’t want to die.
And that’s the scariest thing of all right now, that I actually want to live.
“Yes,” Maggie muses. “Yes, you’re right about that. Over the years I could see Pops softening towards you. Start to change his mind. Start to forget. You have a penis, after all, and I don’t. Pops is nothing if not a traditionalist.”
I’m not going down that road. Besides, I’m still trying to get things straight in my mind. “Did he really blame me so much? Mom’s death—”
“You’re not listening to me. Pops didn’t hate you because of Mom’s death. He hated you long before that. Hence the hit he ordered on you.”
“But why—”
We’re interrupted by gunfire and shouts outside the door.
Maggie starts, looking towards the door, and then her head whips around and she glares at me. She raises the gun. “You little—” she starts, but before the words come out, there’s an enormous thump, and the door shakes and shudders in its frame.
“Finch!” a voice shouts, and my whole body turns to jello, my limbs drooping in relief even as my heart leaps in my chest.
“Luca,” I try to shout, but my voice isn’t strong enough.
There’s another jolt of the door, and a splintering sound. Maggie reacts immediately, running around behind me to grab my hair, keeping my head still, so she can press the barrel of her gun to my temple.
And with one last smashing kick, the door bursts open.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
LUCA
I’ve killed a lot of people in my time, but I’ve never actually hated them while I was doing it. I’ve always kept my cool in a fight, and even when my adrenaline spikes, my hands have stayed steady and my mind clear. It’s been that way today, too, plowing through a handful of Fuscone men with my brother, right up until Frank kicked open the warehouse door and I saw Finch sitting there with a gun to his head.
I’ve never known the kind of red frenzy that’s coming over me now, like I could stretch out my hand and make this whole warehouse blow away just from the force of my will. My first instinct is to rush forward, gun popping, but the icy glare of the woman standing behind me gives me pause.
“If you come any closer, he dies.”
Finch’s head is pulled back, his throat bobbing as he swallows, his eyes trying to find me.
“If you kill him—” I begin, and my voice is shaking with rage.
“I won’t kill him if you don’t make me.”
I take a deep breath and force myself to think.
First of all, I know this woman. Finch’s sister. The eldest—Maggie. The one who gave him the phone. “Did your father send you?”
Her hand tightens in Finch’s hair and he yelps. “I am not my father’s servant,” she hisses.
Finch clears his throat. “Maggie’s a queen in her own right,” he says hoarsely, but somehow still snarkily, and I could die of love for him right now.
Frank, thank God, is keeping quiet, watchful. Waiting for orders.
“What do you want?” I ask.
She considers. “I think, for now, I simply want my life. I’ll walk away from this—if you will.”
I want to shoot her. I have her in my sights, my hand is as steady as ever despite the red veil over my eyes. One shot, right between the eyes. I could squeeze softly here and watch her drop over there.
But could I do it in time? Her hand looks unsteady enough on the gun even from this distance. And I don’t want to chance a death spasm of her hand, those trembling fingers clamping as she dies.
“Put your gun down,” I tell her.
But she must see plain as day in my face what I mean to do. Or she’s just not stupid. She gives a grim smile and shakes her head. “Put your gun down.”
“Maybe everyone should just put their guns down,” Finch suggests.
Keeping my eyes on her, I say, “Frank.”
He only hesitates for a moment, but he bends over and places his piece on the dusty floor, then stands back from it.
“Now you,” she says.
“Not yet. First you take a step back from my husband.”
Her eyes are watchful, but I can see she’s in over her head. Maggie Donovan might want to play this game, but she’s never been so close to the business end before. The bloody business end. Her hand eases up in Finch’s hair and she takes one small step back, but her gun is still pressed into his head.
I lower my gun, pointing
diagonally at the floor a few feet away.
“Drop it,” she says.
“No. You lower yours and walk over here slowly. I’ll let you leave.”
“Put your fucking gun on the ground!”
She’s terrified, and she should be. The knowledge helps calm me. But Finch looks up at me. “Luca. Put your gun down,” Finch rasps out. “I really don’t want you to kill my sister—” here he tips his head back, trying to get a glimpse of her “—if it can be avoided.”
He’s asking me to just trust that she won’t shoot him? I can’t do that. Besides, she’s not getting out of here alive. Maggie Donovan is going to die as soon as the barrel of her gun is off of Finch’s head. But Finch’s eyes are on me, one of them swelling shut, but the other shining green-gold.
“Baby,” he says. “Please.”
I almost have to fight my own body to do it…but I do it. I lean over and put my gun on the floor, next to my foot.
“Kick it away,” Maggie says now, her voice shrill.
“No.”
We engage in a battle of wills, our eyes locked. I win; there was really no contest. She begins to move away from Finch, still pointing the gun at him as she does. She’ll have to pass between my brother and me on the way out, and I know she’ll get nervy, start waving the gun around at the both of us. As soon as her aim is off Finch I’ll dive for my gun, roll, shoot her.
She’s close now, coming into triangulation with Frank and me—it’s almost time, her gun is beginning to wobble from Finch’s direction, and I let my muscles tense up—
“Luca.” Finch’s voice…his pleading, vulnerable tone is like a stiletto right to my heart. I can’t deny him anything when he sounds like that.
And so, although every atom in my body is screaming at me to eliminate the threat, I step back slowly and carefully from the door and let Maggie Donovan walk through it. Her gun is, as I foresaw, waving around wildly in her hand, from me to Frank to Finch and back to me.
Married to the Mobster Page 24