Page 98 of Effortless

“I don’t think anything, Tommaso. You know damn well what we agreed to.”

Tom sucked air through his teeth, refusing to show his irritation or frustrations in the presence of so many made men. “Yes, that my men would steal the truck, and sell the goods. They had the scheme worked out, and I brought it to your attention because of territorial lines. Not one thing was mentioned about who would handle the goods—you were only interested in money. My boys did the work, and so, they get the payoff from it.”

“As I told you, Marty,” Theo, the Outfit’s front boss, said.

“Any other Capo in here would—”

“Agree that if they wanted to handle the goods, it would have been brought up in the first conversation,” Adriano put in. “I mean, I’ve done these boosts between our territories before, and you didn’t try to pull this shit on me.”

Marty’s face reddened. “I didn’t pull anything on Tommaso. I can’t help that the boy doesn’t know how business works when a man who has been in it for longer than he has asks for something, Adriano.”

Tom stiffened, but still refused to let his anger bleed into his tone when he said, “That’s it, right?”

“I beg your pardon, Tommaso?”

“Because I’m almost twenty-two now, and you’ve got forty years on me. So it’s easier for you to think you can screw over a young gun like me because I won’t speak up, right? I’m a Rossi—my dad’s the boss—and you had it in your head I probably wouldn’t run to the boss because it would make me look like a boy who needs his daddy to fix shit for him.

“Nobody is fixing anything for me,” Tom continued, unaffected. “My offer stands, Marty. Twenty for the territory, and five for the misunderstanding. And since you tried to pull this nasty shit on me this time, you can trust that I’ll never work with you or your crew again on anything else.”

Finally, Tom’s father decided to speak up again. It was not like Tommas to stay quiet when his men argued. He usually culled that nonsense as soon as it started.

“Take the extra five, Marty,” Tommas said, “because if it were me, I would have dropped you back down to fifteen just for thinking you were smart and could pull one over on me.”

Nods passed around the room.

Confirmative agreements echoed from several men.

Tom had not been in the wrong. He could handle his business. He fucking hated being a Capo, but he knew how to be one.

Sometimes, the politics weren’t such a bad thing. At least, not when they kept him distracted from something else. Like the phone in his pocket that still hadn’t rang in a month with a call or message from Camilla.

Fuck his life.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

THE WORDS on Camilla’s laptop seemed to be bleeding together the longer she stared at them. She blinked, and when that didn’t work, she rubbed the heels of her palms into her eyes just for good measure.

It also did nothing.

The words were there, sure. Black strokes in Times New Roman font against a white backdrop. Her essay due on the correlation of lack of available healthcare to women living below the poverty line, and inadequate maternal care leading to premature births. She had been given the assignment a month ago, and should have had it done already.

This was one of the areas she excelled in. This was a topic she could discuss for days and days. She knew the ups and downs, and exactly how she wanted to handle the posturing of the essay. It should have been done already, yet here she was, still looking at the damn thing and wondering what else she could write into the opening paragraph.

It was due in …

Camilla checked the date at the right hand, lower corner of the laptop’s screen.

One week.

It was due in a fucking week.

She tipped her head to one side, trying to stare at the words from a different angle. Then, she tipped her head to the other side.

She probably looked like an idiot.

August confirmed it. “What are you, a bird?”

Camilla straightened on the couch. “No.”