Rinaldi was clearly working with Accorinti. One more smile and I could have sworn they were fucking each other’s asses in their spare time, not that I had anything against it. AntonioPalumbo, on the other hand, was a closed book, as he always had been. An old, cunning fox.
After dessert, they brought us coffee, and I let Accorinti continue with his nonsense a little longer, looking down at my espresso. For a second, the room faded. My focus drifted to a small restaurant lost in southern Mississippi.
I remembered the childish mug of hot chocolate being placed in front of me and a sweet accent licking my skin. Daisy looked beautiful in her pale-yellow uniform, of course, but not as beautiful as she did on my table that morning, moaning my name.
I drank the velvety, pungent coffee. From her body to the way she spoke, I couldn't get that woman out of my mind for an hour. She had taken root in me, awakening each of my worst fantasies.
My hostage. The only witness to my crime.
I placed the cup back on the white saucer with a discreet clink. I wondered if she was reliving the way I’d tasted her that morning, just as her scent still clung to my skin.
Dio. I couldn't wait for that damn lunch to end.
“Don Vicari?”
Clearing my throat, I sat up straight, realizing I hadn't heard the last few minutes.
“Cosa?”
Cazzo. Daisy Parker was my hostage, she had to be eliminated when the time came, I couldn't allow myself to dream about her while awake.
It was decided. That night, I would have her for myself. I would begin to get her out of my system, satisfying my most sordid desires.
Cissio Accorinti cleared his throat, and I gave him my full attention. “I was asking if you've changed your mind about my offer.”
I stared at him without moving, fervently wishing I could wipe the stupid smile off his face. I noticed the pathetic tattoo under his left eye, a broken heart, and could barely contain a scornful laugh.
A complete imbecile who wiped his ass with the Omertà.
“I think I already have made that very clear.”
“Are you going to say no to hundreds of millions of euros, Don Vicari?” Rinaldi asked me, showing off a set of teeth mostly replaced by gold implants. “Not to mention the pleasures.”
Don Zaccaria coughed and lowered his face. It was more than clear that the old man wanted nothing to do with it.
“What pleasures?” Filippo Barone drawled, lighting a cigar without even looking at the other two.
“Young pussy.” I filled my lungs with a gulp of air and lowered my head, drumming my fingers on the tablecloth. I wanted to throw up. “You should have seen the thirteen-year-old beauty Don Accorinti got me!” Rinaldi's laughter filled the room and my blood pulsed with hatred.
“A child, you mean.” The courtesies that the moment demanded were gone. The only dialogue to be had with that kind of vermin was made of gunpowder, and if Rinaldi's blood hadn'tyet splattered those beige walls, it was because there would be a mutual obliteration that would not resolve the matter.
I would rather destroy him patiently, tearing down his empire stone by stone. When nothing remained of the Rinaldi, I would then be happy to give him a very slow death.
“The younger they start, the better.” The smile with which he said that, licking his lips covered with grease from lunch, forced me to put my hands under the table so that no one would see me clench them into tight fists. The tingling was there, tempting me to pull out my gun. But I couldn't.
Not yet, not there.
But,Dio! There was nothing I abhorred more in the world than creatures like Rinaldi. I didn't consider them human. If there was a hell, guys like him came from there.
“Ma Dai, since we've brought up the subject...” Filippo Barone's voice sounded slurred as he blew smoke rings. “I want you to know that the famigliaBarone will not be entering the flesh business, and I would appreciate it if you would keep your distance from our area of operations.”
Rinaldi's smile faded, and I saw him puff out his chest as if he just got stabbed in the ribs, and Accorinti exchanged a glance with Antonio Palumbo that did not go unnoticed by me.
There it was...
Perhaps it hadn't been such a bad thing that Accorinti was at that meeting. It spared me the word games and implied intentions. After all, a look was worth more than words.
“Gentlemen, you are wasting the opportunity of a lifetime,” Accorinti declared with excessive pride. “Every day we receive orders from all over the world. Just yesterday, a six-month shipment left for the island of an American millionaire.”
