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“My consigliere is quite busy, Signor.” She said it like it was an obvious point, and I was stupid if I didn’t realize it.
“I’m sure, my lady. But we feared it might have something to do with… the appearance of the situation.”
A hint of a smirk appeared on her face. “And what appearance would that be?”
“A Sicilian named Mezzasalma killed the entire Agrella family and tried to make it look like our doing.”
Her consigliere leaned in and whispered in the Widow’s ear.
Once he was finished, she asked me, “Are you saying you didn’t kill your business partners of 20 years?”
“No, ma’am, we did not.”
“It would be understandable,” she said with false sympathy. “Your brother, a recently crowned don… a brand-new regime coming in, eager to expand your territory, even at the expense of old alliances… by the way, my condolences on your father’s death.”
She sounded genuine when she mentioned my father.
I bowed slightly. “Thank you, Signora. But we did not betray the Agrellas. Rather, they betrayed us by working with Mezzasalma… who then turned on them and killed them all.”
“Mm-hmm. And this Sicilian… is he alive?”
“No.”
“And neither are the Agrellas. Pity that all the witnesses are dead, isn’t it?” she asked sardonically.
I struggled not to sound like I was agreeing with her, yet also acknowledge that it wasn’t the best look for our family.
“It’s… inconvenient, Signora.”
She burst out with a single laugh. “‘Inconvenient’! Yes, it is. So how can you prove that you didn’t betray the Agrellas?”
“It’s impossible to prove a negative, Signora. But – ”
“That’s very slippery of you, sir,” the Widow interjected. Then she smiled the tiniest bit. “You sound like my granddaughter.”
I’d heard of Lucia Fioretti.
None of it was good, other than she was very pretty.
But I had to play the diplomat.
“I’m sure she’s a charming young lady,” I said.
The Widow snorted.
“She’s a brat. Spoiled rotten and thinks she knows everything. But she is my granddaughter.” The Widow lifted her chin and peered down at me from beneath her eyelids. “So what are you hoping to achieve in this meeting, Signor Rosolini?”
“As I said, to reestablish contact between our families.”
“So you can get close enough to slip a stiletto in my back, perhaps?” she purred.
I gave her an alarmed look. “We would never do that, Signora – I assure you.”
“I did not attain my standing in the Cosa Nostra by taking mafiosos’ assurances at face value,” she said tartly. “If all you came here to do was say ‘hello,’ then consider contact reestablished. Otherwise – ”
Things were not going the way I’d hoped.
Time to bring out the big guns.
