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I hadn’t seen Cristo in person for just as long.
He’d grown into a man. A typical Italian Mafia man.
Dark hair. Dark suit. Dark soul.
I hugged him. Pressed him against me. I almost felt something in what I believed was an empty cavity housing the remnants of my blackened and tarred heart.
Unrecognizable. Insubstantial. But still beating.
“I’m sorry your growth spurt ended when you were only ten,” I said.
He chuckled.
He was taller than me, not quite so muscular, but definitely not a boy anymore.
Vincenzo patted me on the shoulder. “Let’s go inside and talk. We’re on the clock here. And you two have time to cuddle later.”
We made our way inside. I couldn’t believe Vince was here, or Cristo. Still didn’t understand what the hell was really going on here.
Either Cristo or, more logically, my second brother Alessandro, should take over as the head of the family without much fuss.
Why didn’t he? Why would Cristo come all the way here?
We entered the dark airport hangar through the door carved into the bigger airport gates.
I took off my sunglasses, glad I didn’t need time for my eyes to adjust.
I hung back. Never a good idea to be first in the door—except as the point man—but Hawk blocked my way. “No weapons.”
I stared at him, then handed him my trusty 9mm, which he handed to one of the goons guarding the door from the inside.
Being unarmed wasn’t something I enjoyed—not that I needed a weapon to wreak havoc.
Vince greeted the other guys like old friends.
They obviously knew each other.
“So, he’s the one?” The small, wiry-looking guy’s eyes glittered with a healthy dose of skepticism, but he was still holding his son’s hand.
You can thank me later, asshole.
The brutish-looking, massive guy—sans the green glasses, sighed. I would bet money he was of Russian, or some other Eastern European, descent. “He’s a show-off and a pussy, like all Italian wannabe-mobsters.”
Bingo.
Vince laughed. “Well, just because we have style and charm, doesn’t mean we’re pussies. It just means we get laid a lot and don’t have to kidnap our women and force them to have sex with us, Zotov.”
Zotov narrowed his eyes. He looked like he was two seconds away from drawing his weapon—if he had one—and killing Vince.
“Can anybody tell me what the actual fuck is going on here?” I said, cutting the insults—or what was apparently considered friendly banter in this group—short.
Vince stared at me, then at Hawk. “You didn’t tell him?”
Hawk shrugged. “Not my place to tell anybody all the bosses of the biggest crime syndicates are meeting up regularly to discuss world domination, is it?”
The Irish mobster—at least I assumed he was Irish with all the freckles and red hair—chuckled. “Now that you did, can we get on with it? There’s actually urgent business I have to get back to.”
On second thought, he looked a little on the pale side, and the way he shuffled around indicated he was on pins and needles.
