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Dante ignored my question.
Not much of a surprise.
“It’s not like I’m asking for your social security number. A simple yes or no answer would suffice.”
His jaw clenched as he glared at me. “I’m trying to eat my lunch and don’t like to be disturbed with questions.”
“Why are you so uptight all the time? I’m just trying to get to know you, Dante.”
“I’m a very private person. And I don’t like being bombarded with questions during the only moment of the day I have to think without someone bothering me.”
I wiped my mouth with the cloth napkin and sighed. “Look, I’m doing illegal shit for your family.” I lowered my voice to a hushed tone. “Things that could put me in prison for the rest of my life. I’m not complaining. But at the very least, you can talk to me like a normal person. I think I’ve earned even the smallest amount of your respect.”
He finished another slice of pizza before he looked at me again. “Yes, the restaurant is named for my mother.”
“She must have been an excellent cook because this is the best pizza I’ve ever eaten.”
“My mother was originally from Sicily,” he admitted. “It’s an old family recipe passed down for generations.”
“The gnocchi you made for us. That was her recipe, too?”
He bobbed his head to confirm.
“You must miss her.”
Dante turned his head away from me and lifted the paper from the bench. As if I hadn’t said anything, he went back to reading. Well, so much for having small talk with Mr. Personality.
I was lucky to get anything out of him. Stefan made it pretty clear their mother was a sensitive topic for Dante. She died in his arms when he was twenty-one.
The same age as me.
I couldn’t even imagine what that must have been like for him. It explained why he was so harsh and closed-off from the world. No one knew anything about him. Even his brothers only got the bare minimum.
Dante drank a cup of espresso, and then we left the restaurant without speaking another word. He enjoyed the silence, while I couldn’t stand it. We were opposites in every way. So I wasn’t sure how we were supposed to work more closely. I also didn’t understand why I had to shadow the manager of the hotel and casino when I was their money launderer.
For most of the day, Dante didn’t speak more than a few words to me. Only when he had to explain his job or introduce me to the personnel. We spent half of the afternoon dealing with the casino business.
They had one more card counter after lunch. Dante said they would handle it the old-fashioned way.
Broken legs.
Around three o’clock, we switched over to the hotel side of the Portofino. Dante spoke to the managers and signed off on new bedding and other mundane things that required his approval. Everyone in the hotel knew him, but none of them spoke without him asking a question first.
I could see the fear in their eyes.
They knew who he was.
A made man.
Dangerous.
Most people lowered their heads or flashed closed-mouth smiles. At least a handful of the men we encountered looked familiar, and I assumed they were family associates. It made sense they would install their guys in security and managerial positions. This way, their employees would never step out of line.
I was dead tired and regretting wearing heels by six o’clock. And, of course, Dante didn’t seem to be ready to slow down. He was like a machine, moving from one place to the next.
After a day of shadowing Dante, I was beginning to understand him better. He didn’t have to speak much for me to see how much weight was on his shoulders. His brothers had it easy compared to him. I also didn’t understand why he needed to manage the casino and hotel. Each side of the business was a full-time job.
No wonder he never slept.
