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He sighed and shook his head. “I received a call from some of our friends on the coast.”
“Jersey? What the hell do they want?”
“They say that some things are going on at the Agnelli family. They've got movement. Tightening up at the stronghold. Bringing family members in.”
“Like for an attack? Nobody has a shootout in this day and age, Pops. That’s old shit, from your time.”
He shook his head at me. “It's always my time.”
I sighed. “I know, I know. But really. No one wants to go to jail these days. Nobody wants to do what I just did. What do you think they want, anyway? What do you think they're after?”
“You.”
“What?”
“I have it on good authority that there's a rumor going around that you killed Maria's husband. And as a result, her husband's best friend came and killed her and those two men. Now the Agnellis are after the person who started that mess, and that, my son, is you.”
“You're kidding. Roberto hasn't done shit in a decade. Why now?”
“People say they figured it out years ago, but they couldn't touch you on the inside. Not enough of their own people were at your facility. Your mother and I worked hard to keep you in protective custody there. We paid a lot of guards a lot of money to keep you safe, kid, and you're out for three days and this? Who have you even been talking to?”
I shook my head. “Talking to? Nobody! The lawyers said nobody would know that I was out. My name wasn't in the papers or anything. I have no fucking idea how they would know.”
I sucked in a breath. There was only one way that they knew.
Vienna. She was the only one outside of the family that knew I was out. But she had come back, I thought that meant she was clean. I still couldn’t believe she had returned. I was just so happy to have her back in my life, in my bed.
Her mother had been part of a rival mob. She walked away from them years before she had Vienna, though. No one in our family ever knew what had split them up, but when she came to us and needed a job, we gave her the benefit of the doubt. She understood the obligations that the family could put on you, she grasped all the risks. And she was great with money. She knew how to cook the books like no one else that we ever worked with. I'd always guessed that that was what she had done for the Agnellis as well. But I didn't even think that Vienna knew that her mother was from another mob family. She never mentioned it when we were kids. Her mother hardly talked about it. And when she did, it was only in the confidence of my father.
“Why did Maria leave the Agnellis? What did she know?”
Pops put his hands up. “You don't betray the dead.”
I leaned forward. “If you don't want me to join her, tell me.”
He shook his head, but he made the cross symbol across his body and kissed his hand up to the sky before he spoke. “Maria left to be with her husband. Roberto hated that asshole, something we had in common, but she abandoned the family. It's that simple. You can never leave. So they disowned her. But that doesn't mean that Roberto wasn't broken up about her death. He talks a big talk, that man, but at the end of the day, Maria was still family. And he was in a bad way when she died. We set off that domino effect, and because of that, they want you gone.”
I shook my head at him, “No we didn't! Maria made it clear. That bastard needed to die. So what if I pulled the trigger? Shouldn't Roberto be happy that she was free of him for years? Or that she would've been…”
“Apparently not. You know her husband’s friend, her killer, is still in the slammer? Maybe if we took him out… maybe that would appease Roberto and stop this blood feud.”
“How the hell are we going to do that? We have to find him first, and then see if any of our guys on the inside have access to him. Has anybody been sent away that I don't know about?”
He looked pensive. “Not recently. I'll make some calls. In the meantime, you handle this job and then you stay quiet for a while. Spend some time with your mother, she misses you. She hasn't seen you since we had dinner the other night. What the hell is the matter with you?”
Since that night, my face had been buried between Vienna’s legs, but I wasn't about to tell him that. Not when I thought she might be a snitch. My heart fell down to my stomach. Shit, I really hoped she wasn’t the reason all this had started. I had some serious shit to figure out. I cracked my knuckles. “You know, I'm really looking forward to kicking the shit out of this kid tonight. I need to let off some steam.”
My father crookedly smiled at me. “That's my boy! Now go, go see your mama and then handle your shit. I’ve got work to do. Phone calls to make, see who’s upstate.”
I nodded and stood. He extended his hand for me to shake, and I grasped it with both of my own. “You want me to call you when it's done?”
He waved me off. “You’re always good for your work. I never worry about you. You're one of the few I can trust to get a job done.”
I nodded at him and inhaled deeply as I walked away. My father trusted me. He trusted me while I was sleeping with the enemy. With the girl who might want to kill me. Like hell if I was going to let that happen, though.
The Agnellis could take whatever they wanted, but Vienna was mine. There was no way I was letting go this time.
15
