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“I don’t want her back,” Notte said more firmly. It took a lot to surprise Anteros. A lot of people said they’d seen it all but really hadn’t. Anteros, though, he’d seen pretty much everything. You don’t ascend to the head of a crime family without seeing some fucked up shit. When Antonio Notte stared back into the eyes of Anteros, voice clear, and stated he did not want his daughter, for the first time in years, Anteros was surprised.
Then again, he shouldn’t have been. He’d seen first hand how terrible parents could be.
Quickly Anteros stood up, trying to regain composure, “What are you playing at, Notte?” he asked brusquely.
“Nothing,” Notte declared. “Take the girl and leave me alone. I don’t want her.” Rage filled Anteros, white hot like the sun. He knew Notte was many things—craven, foolish—but this? Anteros reached and grabbed him by the neck, throwing him against the wall. He waited until Notte’s face reddened and then spoke.
“You would throw your own blood to the wolves?” he asked. “What kind of man are you?” Notte clammed up, clenching his jaw. Anteros thrust him again. “Answer me.”
“I should never have agreed to help a fucking Pavoni,” Notte spat. “No matter the money. Frankie and this fucking fairytale have cursed me! I used to be a good man, I had plans for a future, and now look at me—”
“Explain yourself,” Anteros interrupted, curling his fingers tighter around Notte’s throat. “What fairytale? What do you mean you shouldn’t have agreed to help a Pavoni? Frankie helped you. She absolved your debt.”
Notte paled. “I—that’s what I meant. What you said. I shouldn’t have taken any Pavoni money.” Anteros narrowed his eyes. Something was off. He dropped Notte and Notte stared up at him like a child who’d just been scolded. What a waste of life—not a man, not even a person, just taking up oxygen.
“Tell me the truth,” Anteros said. “What fairytale?”
“I am.” Notte rubbed his neck. “I just got mixed up is all.”
“What fairytale?” Anteros bellowed.
Notte dropped his head between his knees. “I just got mixed up…I just got mixed up…” He kept repeating it over and over again, like a child afraid of a monster.
“If you are lying to me about anything, I will find out. I will come back,” Anteros declared. Staring at the man on the floor, he clenched his fists, deciding to deal with the problem once and for all. A man who would give up such a beautiful, smart, and rare daughter to death deserved to die. Frankie flashed into his mind, though, and he unclenched. With a sigh Anteros said, “You are lucky I gave the girl my word, otherwise you would be dead at my feet.”
Anteros stared out the tinted windows of his town car up at Notte’s house. Frankie and this fucking fairytale have cursed me! That’s what he had said; Anteros hadn’t misheard him. He’d said Frankie and the fairytale had cursed him.
The screen dividing him and his driver parted. “To Lucio’s?” Nikolai asked.
“Yes,” Anteros replied, still staring up the hill at the small house. “But we have one stop to make first.” Anteros told Nikolai where to go, and the car pulled away from the curb. Dragging his attention from the house and Notte’s odd proclamation, Anteros thought back to the previous night.
He vividly remembered the way Frankie looked up at him, bright blue eyes big and leery—and why wouldn’t she be? He thought back to the room—no, closet—he’d just been in, filled with small wrinkled photographs like wallpaper. Anteros knew she’d been thrown into the deep end, but he had no idea how shallow her world had been before.
She was twenty. When he was twenty, he’d seen the world, seen bloodshed, was climbing the ranks, only a decade away from being the boss of the most dangerous and formidable criminal organization in the world. That room made him wonder.
It was one thing to be a virgin, but Frankie appeared to have come from a world of complete naivety.
With an exhale, he ran his fingers through his hair.
Suddenly it made sense to him why she’d traded herself.
She had no idea what she was getting herself into.
The car slowed down outside a construction site. Snow was falling gently, making the industrial bank softer. The black partition slowly lowered and Nikolai’s golden mane appeared. “We’re here, Boss.” The partition lifted back up and a few seconds later, Nikolai opened the door. Putting one foot first, Anteros stepped out onto the snow-covered ground.
He adjusted the lapels of his wool pea coat and nodded to Nikolai. “Be back in an hour.” Turning, Anteros faced the skeleton building. Steel beams and wood outlined what it would soon become. Tarp clung to the open sections as wind whipped it back and forth, and a razor-wire fence wrapped around the entire thing to keep people out.
An hour was merciful.
No one would question the screams because there was no one there to question them; it was an underdeveloped area. The sound of hammering, the sound of a drill—that was all very common. By the time the construction crew came tomorrow, the body would be cut up, poured into cement, and ready to disappear into the next wave of gentrification.
But not before Anteros made a point out of him.
Taking out a key, Anteros bypassed the razor wire and came upon the skeleton. When Anteros entered the room, the sound of the door echoing in the empty space had Arlo shooting his head up. Pale light streamed into the dank, barren construction site and Anteros's shadow was briefly emboldened before the door shut behind him with a harsh snick. Gray darkness enveloped them.
Arlo looked like shit. After the beating Anteros gave him the day before, he was near death. His eye looked like it was out of its socket. His entire face was black and blue except for red drainage in the most garish of spots. His nose was swollen and jagged.
“Boss?” Arlo’s shaky voice echoed. Anteros's Ferragamos clicked against the concrete in response, the loafers shining in the darkness. Arlo’s head shot to both sides as if trying to locate the source of the sound. Next to Arlo a table with a cordless screwdriver had been set up, along with pliers and a hammer, just as Anteros had requested.
