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Chapter Nine
- Gabriel -
He brought out hisbest brandy, poured two snifters halfway, and handed one to me.
I accepted it with a wary glance his way. “You must want something very badly.”
He shrugged as he sat in the overstuffed recliner like another king on his throne.
“A few things, actually.”
I took a swallow and let the smooth burn slide down my throat. I needed this after leaving Suzanne at her door with nothing more than a forehead kiss. Fuck forehead kisses. Even that had been too much.
“I’ll call you later this week. We’ll do something this weekend,” I said when I forced myself to step away from her. I wasn’t used to asking the same girl out two weekends in a row, but I didn’t want Suzanne to think I just wanted to get her into bed. I don’t know when the fuck I became such a boy scout, considering I was going to use her and then walk away when I’d gotten what I needed. I guess that was the point. I hadn’t received what I wanted from her. I’d sacrifice a few more weekends of my time until I did. I might as well enjoy myself during the process.
He laughed as he leaned back in his chair. “You’re distracted. I’m guessing drinks with an old friend wasn’t what brought you to New York tonight.”
“Because I know this isn’t a social call. And, yes, there is somewhere else I’d rather be. But you said we needed to talk, so here I am.”
“Then I’ll cut to the chase. I wanted to tell you myself before you hear it in the news. When Carlo Romano was killed last year, he left a shit ton of evidence behind. Didn’t just leave it behind, actually. He mailed it directly to the FBI. Conveniently, it arrived on an agent’s desk the day after Romano’s body was found in a burned-out car.”
These were the words a mafia king never wants to hear. Someone had ratted. But not just any someone. Carlo Romano was head of one of New York’s biggest crime families. We knew each other through various connections; had done business occasionally. His operation was old school, though when he inherited his business from his father, as I had, Romano dropped anything and everything narcotics related from his organization. He was the biggest ball buster out there - feared but respected by most of the other families.
Hearing that his final act had been to turn on these same men made me ill.
And made me wonder...
“I didn’t want you to sweat it. When this hits the news, they won’t have access to the details. They don’t know what’s in those files.”
“And you do?”
He nodded slowly. “Most of it. I haven’t seen them personally, but we had an emergency committee meeting last week to prep for the fall out.”
“It’s that good?”
“It’s thatdetailed. Gabriel, there were names mentioned, specifics about things I’ve never heard about until that meeting. He rolled on a hell of a lot of people. Big people. People I personally have wished for a long time would go the fuck away. Now there’s enough evidence to do just that.”
He shook his head and took a swallow of brandy, followed quickly by another. “There are things in that dossier that would turn your stomach. I don’t know if you’re aware of the proclivities of some of those men you did business with...”
“I try not to think about it.”
Tried not think about it as in, I had limited my dealings over the last few years, routing out the men’s whose “proclivities” were particularly repulsive. You want to run prostitution rings - fine by me. You kidnap and force teenage runaways to sell themselves for food - you can fuck off and die for all I cared. You wanted to keep dealing with the name Calegari, then I gave you a list of demands and what activities were off limits. You continued your perverted ways, I cut you out. Most couldn’t afford to do that. The money I would make them could replace the income they made with their depraved activities. I’m no prude. I own shares in sex clubs, porn companies and some elite properties across the globe. But there was always one word I made sure was in every contract -consensual. No forced acts. No coercion. Sex is big money, more than drugs when done right, but anything that involved kidnapping, blackmail or children - and animals those fucking soulless wastes of breath - was not just a pass for me, but would make me blacklist the son of a bitch from anything I had my hands in. I wouldn’t be a party to any of that shit and wouldn’t let it taint anything else I did. I’m no angel. I’m a criminal, just like the rest of them, but I liked to think I had a few morals left in my hardened soul.
I didn’t know whether to praise Carlo Romano for turning on those depraved assholes or if I suddenly needed to take a page out of his book.
It all depended on what he said next.
“Do I need to worry?” I didn’t believe I did, but apparently, I didn’t know Romano very well. I had an entire lifetime’s worth of work to hide, but unless Romano had something against me that I was unaware of, I’d be surprised if he included me in his group of reprobates.
“No. You don’t. That’s what I wanted to tell you. The guys on this list... the things they did... this goes beyond the scope of decency. It may be their day-to-day illegal activities that bring them down, but countless lives will be saved because of it. I don’t know whether Romano’s a traitor or hero. If someone hadn’t already killed him, he’d have to spend the rest of his life in hiding after this.”
As I said. I knew Carlo Romano, and he was no fool. I didn’t think my friend was a fool either, but he and the FBI seemed to have swallowed everything Romano fed them. Because he made it worth their while to not look twice.
But thanks to my sometimes neighbor, this was one thing that wouldn’t keep me awake at night when the story finally broke. “What else? You said there were two things you wanted to talk about.”
He stared at the floor before he spoke, then looked at me like he’d rather do anything else than continue our conversation. “What do you know about a man named Christian Delacroix?”
I drained the last of my brandy. “I know that if we’re going to talk about him, I need a refill.”
He played his cards right. I didn’t have a good thing to say about Delacroix and if I now didn’t owe the senator a favor, I wouldn’t waste a minute’s breath talking about that bastard.
He refilled my drink and waited expectantly as I downed nearly the entire glass before I spoke.
“I don’t know what shit you’ve gotten into, Senator, but if it involves Christian Delacroix, there’s a few things you should know.”
