“Yeah, but I want you to like what I pick.”
“Why?”
“You’re gonna be there all the time.”
“I am?” I asked.
“Yep. Naked or walking around in my t-shirts with come dripping down the inside of your thigh.” He said all that with a straight face, like he meant every word.
“Well, we’ll try to figure out a time when we’re both available.”
He took a drink from his coffee as he stared at me.
“I should get going. I know my father wanted me there by ten.”
“I’ll leave thirty minutes later.”
I rose to my feet and grabbed my plate. “Want to come over tonight?”
He grinned from ear to ear, the amusement entering his eyes. “You don’t need to ask, baby.” He gave my ass a playful smack as I turned to carry my plate back to the kitchen. “You know I’ll be here.”
I felt a shroud of guilt around me like a cloud when I stepped into my father’s villa. It was a normal day like any other, but I felt like I’d made an irrevocable choice. A choice that would feel like a betrayal to my father, who hadn’t warmed up to Wolfe, despite the retrieval of the guns.
My father liked few people, and to be honest, he would probably never like Wolfe.
I was in my office on the second floor when my brother walked inside. “Hey, Frankie.” He knocked on the open door. “Dad wants to have a meeting upstairs.”
I suspected I knew what it was about. “What do you think about the whole thing?”
He sauntered to the desk, wearing his chinos and a black t-shirt. “The guns?”
“Yeah.”
“I can say I’ve never seen a guy move like that. Wolfe looked like a guy who trained with MI6 or something.”
“But do you think he planted the guns?” I asked. “Or do you think he genuinely helped us?”
He considered the question for a while before he gave a shrug. “He’s a killing machine. I don’t think he’d need to plan all this if he wanted to take us down, you know? He would just blow the gate and kill us all.” He turned back to the door. “Come on, let’s go before Dad loses his temper.”
We headed upstairs to the top floor. My father was seated at his desk, while Elio was on the couch. Salvatore was in one of the armchairs, and a couple of Dad’s other guys were scattered around the room.
I took a seat in the corner of the couch, my heart racing and my hands clammy like I was about to go on trial. Ididn’t belong in this meeting, not when I couldn’t participate in this discussion objectively, not when I’d just had breakfast with him an hour ago.
“Salvatore, what do you think?”
Salvatore wasn’t normally in these meetings, but since he’d vouched for Wolfe, he was about to be interrogated. He rubbed his hands together. “His reputation precedes him. He’s not someone you want as an enemy, only an ally.”
“Do you think he’s fucking with us, Salvatore?”
His eyes dropped momentarily. “I can confidently say he doesn’t play games. If he doesn’t like you, he’ll say it to your face then stab you in the neck. He’s not a double-crosser. If he wants you dead, he wants you to know he’s coming. So, no, I really don’t think he stole those guns just to prove he found them. Not his style.”
My father turned to Leo. “You were with him. What’s your take?”
“He’s a menace,” Leo said. “You should have seen the way he took out that entire warehouse. It was someCall of Dutyshit.”
“Or did it look that way because he orchestrated it to?” my father asked.
“I don’t think he would have been the top lieutenant in Cosa Nostra if he didn’t do that kind of shit every day,” Salvatore said.
