Page 217 of Made in Love and Blood

Nico kept his face passive but realized in that moment he had missed something important within the ranks of the family. Then again, he did have a lot going on, and he hadn’t been home to pick up on those details being away from Giorgio.

“Killing my wife was a necessary evil,” Christiano replied.

“Do you expect me to ask why?” Salvatore shook his head. “Giorgio thought it necessary, too, but of course, he’d been trying to hide a bigger sin.”

Christiano’s face hardened. “His first wife was my cousin, too.”

“And your wife was someone’s daughter, friend...sister.”

“Oh, no. That was my first wife. She’s dead, too, remember?”

“Who picked the second one?” Salvatore asked. “I can’t remember.”

“Giorgio.”

“Right. Was it unavoidable, at least?”

“Couldn’t have stopped myself if I tried,” Christiano muttered thickly.

“Well,” Salvatore said, then, sighing, “I suppose it doesn’t matter what the rest of the people at this table think I should do with you, or what I want to do with you, if you choose to take the deal I offered you months ago. I never take something back once I put it out there, after all.”

“I’d like to be free,” Christiano told no one in particular.

“A made man is never free...just gone. In one way or another.”

“Is that what you want me to be—gone?”

“You and others,” Salvatore replied, eyeing Carmine again. “Give me the word, Christiano, and I will make your freedom happen. Take the money, I don’t need it. Let the narcos have the territory, it doesn’t matter. None of these men were doing business with you, so it doesn’t affect them in the end.”

Salvatore pointed at the man’s marble. “Put it where it goes if that’s your agreement and then take your leave. As everyone else should do as well once they’ve decided the offer on the table for them is one they’d like to see through with me.”

Quite an offer for the rest of them, Nico thought.

Agree, or die. But that’s how it worked. This was their life. The better man made the move; the rest would follow.

With a solemn nod, Christiano stood from his seat and grabbed the marble from the plate ahead of him. He leaned across the table and dropped the marble loudly into the middle centerpiece.

“Let me know when you’re ready,” Salvatore told him. “I’ll make the plan happen.”

“I will.”

“Exit my property promptly.”

The man didn’t need to be told again. Christiano’s footsteps could be heard until they diminished completely outside the study. Nobody spoke at the table. Only then did Salvatore gesture with a waving hand at the others, as if to urge the rest who he’d already told to vote, to now make their choice.

Johnny, the boss’s cousin, stood first.

“Well done, your father would’ve liked that,” Johnny told Salvatore as his marble dropped.

“I didn’t do this for him.”

“All the same, Sal. I’ll be seeing you.”

“I look forward to it, cousin,” Salvatore replied.

The factions from Maine and Vegas made their move, dropping marbles into place one after another, and then heading out without a word.

Nico couldn’t help but notice the way Salvatore continued staring down Carmine at the other end of the table as Big Mike finally stood to place his marble into the centerpiece.