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It’s almost 2 A.M. by the time I sink down into my study chair. A color-coded map of New York city blurs in front of my vision. A red X is scrawled over the high rise where Gio Lovera lives. His safehouse in the sky. Across the map, territories are drawn out among the various crime families, gangs, corporations. Truce markers with our allies speckle the page.
Marcel stares out the window, looking for phantoms in the dark. Patrol flashlights light the edges of the property. It’s a sleepless night.
“We won’t be able to have a funeral. Not for a long time.”
“It’ll never be safe,” I say, cutting off that line of thinking before it can start. “We can arrange something. Give Gio some of his bodies back to bury. While he’s busy collecting his dead, we can pay respects to ours. Private service, no announcements. I don’t even want a death certificate signed until they’re in the ground. He might do the same, but keep an ear out for any funeral announcements on their side—”
Marcel sighs.
“You know I disagree with this. That meeting? I saw a lot of hot blood and angry men, and very fucking few good ideas between them.”
“Lovera can’t take shots at this house. Not for free.”
“Does this look like a free shot to you? He lost twice as many as we did. He sent his own blood on a suicide mission.”
“It’s not a fucking numbers game, Marcel. It was our blood, too. Vinny. Lance.”
“You think I of all people don’t know that?” Marcel demands. “But castles win sieges, Sal, and this is a siege. All we have to do is hold. This attack was delusion at its finest. You think Lovera’s support isn’t crumbling out from under him?”
“You think mine won’t if I let our men get killed and do nothing? If I can’t make this family safe in their own goddamn house?”
Everything on the desk goes flying, crashing to the ground. Heaps of papers, planners, a laptop. The lamp snaps free from the cord and plunges the room into darkness. I stare down at my own action as if someone else did it.
The silence is strained.
“Go to bed, Marcel.”
For a moment, I think he might disobey. Instead, he only sighs.
“You, too, Sal.”
His hand squeezes my shoulder, only for a moment.
“We both know that bullet was meant for you.”
Marcel’s footsteps fade on the floorboards. I take up his place at the window and light my last cigarette. The empty carton joins the pile of trash on the floor. I’ve torn through more smokes today than I usually do in a month.
I leave the office for tomorrow—just another mess to deal with come dawn.
Upstairs, Tessa’s light is still on. I find her sitting up in bed. She’s hugging her arms around her knees, her eyes tired and empty. When she sees me, she asks if I’m alright.
‘I am,’ should be the two easiest words to say. A couple syllables, whether they’re true or not. But I don’t lie to Tessa, and so I just don’t say anything. She comes straight to me, pressing four quick kisses against my lips.
It’s like she’s slipped a knife through my armor. Plunged it right in a part of me I didn’t know how to protect.
I’ve fucked plenty of women. Made deals. Had my fair share of pretty little gold diggers that were good for the short-term but never built to last.
But I’ve never been loved by a woman before, not even by a mother.
What do you do with something that delicate? Like holding a bubble in your bare hands. I pull her up into my arms and carry her to my bedroom. The rules be damned.
Without her there, I think I’d be in the same state I found her in. Staring out into the dark, sleepless.
I have to have her with me; I have to hold her. A clutching, desperate grasp, telling the world that she’s mine, and the devil himself won’t pull her away from me. The fact that they even tried—
It makes my vision red, my thoughts bloody.
She takes my hand in the dark and scrubs her thumb over my battered knuckles. She brings my hand to her mouth, pressing the softest kisses to each one.
