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“Go to hell,” I spat. “And we didn’t decide anything—” A knock came at the door, interrupting me and I groaned. “Seriously, right now?”
“We have to deal with Hendrix, first,” Ty said to me and then yelled, “Come in.”
One of our guys, Vinny, who was usually posted up in Boston, came in with another guy who wasn’t one of ours. But he worked as an informant sometimes and was a useful person to know. “Hey, Boss. Brought Slink like you asked. Hey Daniel, how are ya?”
I greeted them with a nod, while glancing at my cousin. Jonny Dawes, a.k.a., Slinky, was a runner for an old gang that had gotten wiped out fifteen years back by my father, the Reaper. Jonny, somehow, had survived and had been offered a deal by Ty’s sadistic father. Slinky kept an eye on things and lurked around the other gangs, something that Ty hadn’t really continued, as it was hard not to look at Slinky and remember how fucking brutal our fathers were.
Slinky, strangely, didn’t seem to hold it against us. He just seemed grateful to be alive, in a way that sometimes grated. But he was in the know in a way that few dudes were.
“Need me to stay?” I asked.
“It’s below your pay grade,” Ty said. “Thanks for coming in Slink.”
For a moment, I hesitated, curious, but then I turned to go.
“Hey Ty,” I called back. “I’m gonna head out. I’ll come back for—I’ll be back later. But if I don’t see ya…” I gave a small salute and he flicked under his chin at me.
That caused Slink to laugh, and he flushed as everyone looked at him. “Sorry. Just—gotta love cousins, right?”
“Right,” Ty drawled. “Now talk to me about the rumblings around Winter Hill.”
With that, I left, but not before sneaking back to the kitchen to see if the ladies were still in there. Only Flora was left, cleaning up and she raised an eyebrow at me.
“Where’d they go?” I asked in Italian.
“The studio.” She paused in her cleaning up and gave me a look. “You should tell her how you feel. Not good to lock all that up, young Daniel.”
I winced. “It’s not like that, Flora. I had to make sure we could trust her.”
Flora rolled her eyes. “If that’s what you want to go with, okay. I need to clean.”
Even though I wanted to go check the studio, I forced myself to go back outside and into the cold air. But once I got in my car, I realized I had nowhere to go. I sat there for about ten minutes, my mind a blank when someone knocked on my window and I jumped.
“Yo, sorry, man,” I said when I rolled down the window and Vinny grinned at me. “I said your name like five times.”
“I was lost in thought, my bad,” I said and then glanced beyond him to Slinky. “You guys done?”
“Yeah,” Vinny said. “Boss needs me to go to the North Shore. You’re heading back to town, right? Mind givin’ Slink a lift?”
Several things went through my mind as I fought the urge to lie and say I had more important shit to do, or say that I needed to stay here.
“Sure,” I said even as my gut twisted. “Hop in, Slink.”
Slink gave me a grateful smile and hustled around, hopping in. I started the car, trying not to focus on the fact that I had to give Slinky a goddamn ride back to town. How the mighty had fallen.
But to my surprise, Slinky was courteous and affable the whole way back. We fell into a discussion about the Bruins, as we bothliked hockey, and then Slinky regaled me with a story about him, his brother, and cousins trying to search the Garden for the infamous monkey, which Slinky swore that he and his favorite cousin Gordie had seen one night.
“And then they actually found a goddamn monkey skeleton when they redid the Garden. I tell ya, I never wished Gordie was alive more.”
I was navigating a narrow street in Eastie and not paying attention when I asked, “Oh, he passed?”
“Yeah. Uh. While back. Here’s good, Danny.” He gave me a tight smile when I glanced over, and I realized what had happened to Gordie.
“Shit, I’m sorry,” I said as I pulled over. “I didn’t…”
What the hell did you even say?
“I know,” Slinky said, and he gripped my shoulder briefly. “Don’t worry about it. Can’t control family, right? Gordie wasn’t even supposed to join, but he was a stubborn bastard.” Slinky pulled on his mittens. “Besides, you weren’t even in America, yet, right? You were still in Italy. Ain’t your demon to carry, kid.”
