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The office was a long, squat building where a lot of the legitimate business shit was handled. Because of the nature of the work, it was a big, intimidating-looking man always behind the desk, one who was associated with the family, but not entirely inside the organization.
Luca took the legit books from him, then cooked them in whatever way was necessary.
“Everyone is in the back room,” he said as we automatically turned toward Luca’s office.
“Thanks,” I said as we changed directions.
The back room was, in essence, a conference room with a long table and a bunch of chairs. I imagined that there were actually real meetings there for the docks on occasion. Tons and tons of containers came in carrying normal shit, and the men and women who those containers belonged to likely needed to meet Luca and sign contracts and official things like that.
The weird thing was, though, and I often wondered how this part didn’t weird out potential clients, it was a solid brick room. No windows.
Sure, the wall that would have normally featured windows had heavy drapery to create the illusion of windows. But it still seemed obvious to me that there was nothing behind them.
Because this room was, essentially, a safe room in case of a bad attack.
Reinforced brick walls, no windows, and only one exit. That was a reinforced bank-grade door.
Across the room, Luca nodded at us as we came in, then looked around the room.
“I think that’s everyone,” he said, jerking his head toward the door, and Milo slid it closed. “So, Dante decided to take the lead on this recon again,” Luca said, gesturing toward Santo who was seated at his side. “I’m going to let him tell you what he’s figured out.”
“Alright. So, William Warren Graves has been traced to eight different states, four of those since he took over for his father when his old man got gunned down about seventeen years back.
“From what we can tell, each time he moves, it’s because the heat gets too hot, and he needs to cut and run before he gets himself killed. So, he takes his old crew, and whatever new crew he’s built up along the way, and jumps.
“As such, his crew is bigger than we first thought. Our best count is about thirty to forty men, not counting the ones who died here at the ambush. He has a close personal guard of about ten, maybe twelve men who can almost always be found at his mansion.
“As for the mansion itself, there is a tall wrought-iron fence and a gate that is kept closed most of the time, save for when staff or deliveries are coming in. It’s definitely well-protected, but not impenetrable, if that is the move we want to make.”
“I got a question,” Milo said at my side.
“Yeah?”
“If his move is to cut and run when the heat is on, why is he still here? You can’t get much more heat than fucking with the mob. Why isn’t he making moves to get out of Dodge?”
Across the room, Luca’s gaze slid to mine, and a whole silent conversation passed between us.
The gist of it being… it was time to fess up.
“I have the answer to that,” I said, watching as all eyes turned to me. Including Milo, who looked pissed that I was clearly keeping something from him. “This is a bit of a long story,” I prefaced. “But it starts the night of the ambush, when there was a woman handcuffed inside Warren’s car, warning me about said ambush.”
“Handcuffed?” Nino hissed.
“I tried to free her, but she was having none of it. At the time, I didn’t understand. Not until she showed up on my doorstep with a baby in her arms.”
“Fuck,” Dante said, shaking his head.
Because if he’d been doing a lot of research into this organization, he must have come across some sort of information about how much this family’s legacy meant to them.
“Her name is Claire. Her son is Judah. He’s two. And he’s Warren’s. He’d been keeping them both locked up at his place since he was born, and abusing Claire for a long time before that. The ambush and the aftermath just so happened to give her the opening for her to escape that she’d been looking for.”
“And she ran to you?” Milo asked. “How’d she know to come to you?”
“She heard Warren and Denny talking about me. Then she used the library to find my address. And walked to me.”
“From Warren’s?” Dante asked. “That’s…”
“Two and a half hours, at least,” I filled in. “In her socks. Carrying a toddler.”
