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“Someone will be up to do an STD screening. You’re on birth control?”
Her cheeks flush. “Yes.”
“Good. I never have sex without a condom. But you… You, I really want to feel. I’ll be back around seven.”
“You’re never here that early,” she says in a panic and begins to scramble out of bed.
“That’s because I’ve never had anyone waiting for me.” I turn to go, but glance over my shoulder before I do. “Did you bring more hair ties?”
“I believe so.”
“Good. I want your hair up when I return.” And with that last order, I leave.
6
GAVIN
Patrick is staring at the city from one of the two floor-to-ceiling windows in my corner office when I walk in. He’s a big man, slightly taller than my six feet four inches, but bulkier. Yet he still manages to pull off a tailored suit better than me. Perhaps because he grew up in this world, surrounded by ruthless business tycoons. I once asked him if he was born wearing a suit. He very dryly replied, “Yes.”
“I hate this fucking city. Everything’s manmade,” he complains.
Guess the business part is just on the outside today.
“When did you start feeling this way?” I give him a side-glance and sit behind my desk.
“I’ve always felt it.”
“Leave,” I tell him. “I’m sure I can manage.”
“Since you joined the Sinacore Alliance, you’ve been flighty.” Finally, he moves away from the window, and drops into the chair across from me. “Someone has to make sure this place is running smoothly in your absence.”
I focus my attention on him. “You’re awfully sour this morning. Who shit in your coffee?”
He sighs and wipes a heavily tattooed hand down his face. “Sheila and I had a fight last night. Says I spend so much goddamned time here, it’s like I’m married to the casinos instead of her.”
“You are the VP, Pat. The casinos are your life.”
As if I didn’t just speak, he continues, “So I promise her I’ll take next week off. Then I get here and the first thing I have to deal with is some asshole from the alliance demanding a meeting with you. Which means you’ll be absent again and you know we can’t both be off.”
No, we can’t both be off. Not with the threat of the Ferryman looming over me. All Gideon Black has to do to destroy me is destroy my lifework. The Red.
Frowning, I ask, “What alliance asshole?”
“Marco Tadesco.”
“He isn’t part of the alliance,” I say thoughtfully, wondering what the son of Giuseppe Tadesco wants from me.
Several months ago, Giuseppe Tadesco, Chicago’s Don, was found in a dirty hotel room in New Jersey, splayed out naked, his gut sliced from groin to sternum. A 2009 penny was placed over each of his eyes. Not long after, Bryan McKenzie, boss of the McKenzie gang in Boston, was found in the same manner.
Though the pennies were a mystery at first, Tony Sinacore, then godfather of the ruling family in New York, made the connection between the murders and a man named Stephen Black. He tried to call in the families he believed were in danger. But it wasn’t until after his death, when his younger brother, Luca, took over, that the families answered that call.
The men poised to take over some of the largest criminal organizations on the East Coast, Marco, along with Noah Esposito, Rowan Kane, Arran Maxton, Jorge Ruiz and myself came together at Briar House, Luca’s home in Todt Hill in New York.
We sat around the dining room table, with Luca at the head. “Have you heard of the Ferryman? He worked under Tadesco in Chicago for years, growing his power right under his nose. They called him the Ferryman because he was a smuggler. The mark he left on anyone he killed was?—”
“Pennies,” Noah Esposito finished for him.
Documents containing all of Luca’s research were set before us. They showed how Stephen eventually grew too powerful, infiltrating territories and incurring the wrath of the players he affected.
