Page 1 of The Fixer

1

Jet

Tension swirled around me, like the cigar smoke that hung heavy and bitter in the air. The lieutenants were gathered with their families, each one oblivious to the tightness wound around my shoulders and constricting my throat.

Across from me, Adalberto Vinci stood there with his pretty little family, while, beside me, I was stuck with mine.

I was sure it was my failures that caused it. All the things I’d done wrong, things I had no control over. Everything came piling down on top of me, along with an avalanche of guilt and regret.

Moving from my spot, I tracked Paulo D’Angelo as he made his way around the room, glad-handing the men, kissing the cheeks of the women. I came to a stop near the entry to the opulent dining room, wishing I could turn, run away and never look back. But I did. I looked back across the room to where I had been. To the world I wanted to be in mingling with from the world to which I’d been condemned.

It was difficult to school my features when Paulo shook hands with my father. I thumbed at the skin of my neck, trying to loosen the invisible noose that tightened with every breath.

“What is it?” Mateo Medina stood beside me, his voice almost making me jump. I’d been so lost in my thoughts I hadn’t seen him approach.

“What is what?” I asked, barely looking at my friend.

One of my best friends.

One of my brothers.

A man I’d nearly gotten killed.

“What’s bothering you, dimwit.”

“Nothing.”

Across the room, D’Angelo moved on from my father, pulling Zeno Fierro out of his thoughts with a light slap of his hand to the man’s shoulder. The doctor gave D’Angelo a tight smile and a handshake, his lips only parting as D’Angelo’s daughter, Queenie, stepped to his side.

“Bullshit.” Mateo’s voice was a harsh whisper, coming from the opposite side he’d been standing on before.

Turning my gaze from D’Angelo and his guests, I tried to shoot Mateo a warning glare.

The man was watching me with one eyebrow raised, his deep blue eyes glowing behind the thick black rims of his glasses. Those eyes dipped, following my hand as I smoothed it down my chest.

“Bullshit,” he repeated as I forced my hand to still and narrowed my eyes at him. “You’d be a better poker player if you didn’t have such obvious tells.”

I ran my tongue over my teeth and my gaze lifted, sweeping the room as a sigh escaped my lungs.

“What do you want, Medina?”

“I want to know what’s eating you. What has you stroking your chest like it’s your lover, and fiddling with your sleeves like a wet pussy?”

My gaze whipped back to him, my eyes going wide. “Keep your voice down.”

“What?” Mateo shrugged, a shit-eating grin crossing his lips. “You afraid I’ll get kicked out? Have you forgotten who I am now?”

I hadn’t forgotten.

And that was the problem.

Swallowing against the tightness that strangled my throat, I met my friend’s gaze head-on. When I knew I held his attention, I let my eyes dart to the ceiling and back. Let my hand rub at my ear like it itched.

“Go back to your lover, Medina.” My hand drifted from my ear, rubbing down my face. “Tell Shaw I said hey.”

Mateo had few tells of his own, and none that I’d found when it came to poker. But the slight lift of his chin told me my friend had gotten my message. The slight tilt of his head let me know he wasn’t the only one.

Before the man could slip away, another stepped up to our side. Lorenzo Giordano gave my shoulder a hard squeeze, then extended his hand toward mine. As D’Angelo’s lieutenant chatted with me and Mateo, my mind drifted to another of my failures. Giordano’s son, Rolly, was now talking to Vinci’s kids, his hand massaging the place where a bullet had pierced him, just above his heart.