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Just goes to show, everyone’s on the take in this game.
As we drove by, my eyes immediately moved to the darkness beyond where our destiny awaited. “Speaking of our time, whose bright fucking idea was it to hold this little tête-à-tête on the docks? And at fucking midnight? Do we have Scorsese and Hitchcock’s ghost on the payroll now or something? It’s so unoriginal we might as well be selling tickets. Why not just turn up in a limo doing Marlon Brando impressions, and promise to make him an offer he can’t refuse?”
“Well, no one ever accused the Russians of being creative,” Turk agreed, pulling a monogrammed silver flask from his jacket pocket, unscrewing the lid, and chucking back a quick swig. “Besides, this isn’t about originality, little brother. This is about making us feel safe. The docks are neutral ground, which makes it that much harder for either side to set up any surprises.” He offered me the flask.
I waved it away.
“Yeah? That’s what we thought last time,” I said and fixed Turk with a deadly serious look. “You know what the definition for someone who keeps falling for the same trick but expects a different result every time is?”
“What? Insane?” he grinned, mocking me as he returned the flask to his pocket.
“No, a stupid fucking cunt.” I forced a grim smile.
Turk’s smile dropped, clearly having had enough of my bitching. “Oh, would you give it a rest already! You’re making my ass ache.”
I stiffened inwardly at the rebuke, unused to hearing that sharp tone directed my way. It was another thing that he and Pa had in common. They had the voice of commanders, able to turn from joking to furious in a moment, to quell a foe or raise a storm with just a few syllables.
“You’re supposed to be my head of security, act like it,” Turk continued, turning his attention back to his window. “Just focus on getting us through this in one piece and leave the thinking to me.”
I nodded. “You’re the boss, but…” I hesitated at a sharp look from him. I’d rarely experienced the sharper side of him myself. When he spoke to me, it was always like my big brother. He rarely snapped at me like I was a stray dog. All the others did, but never him. And yet, I knew I needed to carry on. My job was to keep him safe. How could I do that by letting him walk blindly into an obvious trap? I just needed to pick my words carefully. Turk didn’t tell people twice. Not if they wanted to live, anyway. “But this just doesn’t feel right.”
Actually, it stank worse than a blocked New Delhi sewer drain in the middle of a heat wave. Unfortunately, I rather doubt the colourful, if not exactly exaggerated, turn of phrase would do me any favours.
“Well, get over it,” he growled, yet even as he said it Turk couldn’t look me in the eye. Not even when he added, “trust me.”
I did. That went without question. There was no man I trusted more. He’d found me, pulled me out of the gutter and taken me home, vouched for me, protected me. I owed him everything, but I just couldn’t shake the feeling we were about to walk into a serious cluster fuck.
Did he feel it too? That gut feeling you develop fighting through the scum and shit, the tingling on the back of the neck warning you something wasn’t right. Or was there more? Did he know something I didn’t?
I nodded all the same, just for show.
He turned back in his seat so his eyes were front and centre, and sure enough, we were pulling up to the gates of the Brooklyn Navy Yard.
The wrought iron bars stood open and unguarded, the security box just to the side empty as we drove through. A body lay in the cubicle, white and stiff on the floor in a pool of blood that wept out from a red smile that yawned wide beneath his jugular. That was the Bratva custom.
Cash could buy a man’s silence for a time, but blood was always a certain insurance against careless gossip.
But bodies were messy things, and innocent civilians left such a stain on the floor. They were more difficult to clean up, and then there was always the chance he would have a family who would look for him wanting answers. How many unsolved crimes were there in this city? How many families were waiting for answers? Sooner or later, the count would be too high for the world to ignore and a politician would decide public opinion would do more for his career than dirty bribes under the table.
Then no price would buy his complicity and he would need to be made an example of.
And then the public would have another martyr, another rallying symbol for anyone with more balls than sense, like my parents.
Then it would just be a matter of time.
Ours was a dirty world, but there had to be balance.
Without balance, it was just a waiting game for that one missing person, the one that had been warned to stay away but didn’t or was just in the wrong place at the wrong time, became one too many. Then the wheel would break, the ladder we were all fighting each other to climb would shatter, and it would all come crashing down on top of us.
So long as scum like the Bratva could do as they wished, our days would forever be numbered. One day, they would need to be taught a lesson, but Turk was right. Tonight, we couldn’t win a war with them and the rest of the families.
The war had left our regime decimated. And even while we were playing for peace, the other families were greedily plundering much of what remained of the Scavo’s forces. There would be more blood to come before long.
So tonight, we would be obedient.
Tonight, we were humble.
But our day would come…
