Anton walked out of his house and got into the waiting limo. “Hello Grandfather.”

“Anty, Anty. Good to see you.” He put a hand on Anton’s shoulder and squeezed.

“What’s this meeting about?” Anton clicked his seatbelt into place and glanced at the bodyguard sitting a few seats away.

Anton’s grandfather often met with him for various reasons, or they had meetings with a few of the DeCalvo Shipping employees, but this was different. He’d said it was a special, very important meeting. No one else was in the limo aside from the bodyguard his grandfather never left home without. After the night Anton had, he was not in the mood to deal with his grandfather.

“I want you to understand something,” Grandfather said, looking Anton directly in the eye. “The time is coming when the business will be yours to run. I’m getting old. I want to retire. Leave the tough decisions to you. You’re ready. Almost. There are some things you still to learn.”

“Okay…” Anton had been learning the ins and outs of the business for years. Besides knowing all the details of what each department did, he didn’t think there was much he didn’t know. “Do you want me to spend more time with accounting, learning how to cover things up in the books?”

“No, no, nothing like that. You know enough of that.”

“What then?”

“You need to learn how to be tough. Like me. Ruthless in your decisions. Making the hard calls when no one else will. Acting first, acting faster, thinking faster. This is what you have to learn.”

“Right. Like how to kill men with families and not care at all?” Anton tossed the paper at his grandfather. “Doesn’t it bother you to know what you did to those men and their wives? They have kids. They’re brothers. Or were. Now the family is missing two sons. You’ve ruined their lives.”

His grandfather’s eyes turned to steel. “Stop the car.”

The car pulled over and came to a stop. Anton’s heart raced. He had to remember that his grandfather was cold and tough. He might kill his grandson without much hesitation if that’s what he thought needed to be done.

Grandfather looked at this bodyguard. “Give us a minute.”

That was a bad sign. But Anton was right. Those men’s families had been ruined. And it was their fault.

The bodyguard exited and stood beside the limo’s door with his arms crossed. He was probably used to this sort of thing.

Anton didn’t shy away now. He met his grandfather’s gaze with an equally hard stare.

“You listen to me now.” His grandfather grabbed the collar of his shirt and pulled his face close enough to be sprinkled with spit as his grandfather spoke. “Do you have any idea what those men did to me? To our business? To our family?”

“I would guess they screwed you over somehow. Stole something? Cheated you?”

“These men killed our own. What about their families, huh? Did Benito and Sergio think about the impact on my family—on our family—when they killed my poor Christopher?”

“Who?”

Grandfather tugged harder on his collar. “A man you should aspire to be like. Someone as cold and hard as it takes. You gotta be ruthless to survive this business.”

“Except Christopher didn’t manage to survive, did he?”

Grandfather’s other hand came up slapped Anton hard across the cheek. “You think it’s cute to disrespect the dead?”

Anton swallowed and ignored the sting in his cheek. “You don’t respect my father.”

“This isn’t about him. Those men killed a member of our family. They killed him to cover up another crime in which they were accused of assaulting two of our men on the job. They are dangerous men, and they were killed to protect our family. To protect you, the ungrateful brat you are. If you don’t wise up and stop being weak, you’ll end up dead.”

Anton hadn’t known what the men did. He had to admit that if they’d already attacked two of the family and killed another, there was no way they could be allowed to live. He should have asked before he made assumptions. His grandfather had done the right thing for the family.

Finally, Grandfather released his grip on Anton’s collar. “You can either toughen up on your own, or I’ll force you to get tough. If I were you, I’d figure out how to accomplish it on my own.”

The bodyguard was allowed back in and they continued on their drive, stopping by several docks before heading to the office.

Alone in his office, Anton couldn’t keep his mind quiet. He was still dealing with the Hannah and Melody situation from last night and this morning, and now this. How could he prove that he had what it takes to run the family business? He could imagine what things his grandfather would do if he was forced to toughen Anton up. It wouldn’t be gentle or kind, that much he was sure of.

But he couldn’t help wishing things were different. What if he had a nice, normal job like banker or lawyer? Why couldn’t he be the CEO of a real, legal company? Could it even be considered real success if his money came by illegal and sometimes unethical means? What good was any of it if he couldn’t have a life?

When he pictured Hannah and Melody, he saw them happy and having fun in their apartment. They probably baked cookies together and watched wholesome family movies. What would it be like to be part of that? To be just a man coming home from work to his wife and child. To get up and put in his time in the office, not having to decide whether someone’s actions deserved death or just a good beating. Not having to become skilled at lying and hiding things on paper. Not having to worry about the FBI or the police coming after him.

Shipping was a legitimate enough business. They did plenty of legal work. Mostly, it was used to cover the illegal work, and, of course, there was more money in shipping smuggled items than there was in shipping new cell phones. But if they cut out the illegal stuff, they could expand the legal stuff. They had all the connections made already. It wouldn’t take much to turn a nice profit through only legal means.

Anton had managed to work himself into such a frenzy, that he went to his grandfather’s office.

“I’ve been thinking about what you said this morning,” Anton explained. “I have an idea.”

Grandfather laced his fingers and sat back in his chair behind his desk. “I’m all ears.”

“We could do this differently. If you look at last year’s numbers, you’ll see that we do a lot of legal business. I think, in time, we could slowly cut out the illegal contracts and move into a completely legal sector. I don’t think it would mean much money lost, but we would save a lot if we didn’t have to pay for bodyguards and hits and things like that.”

“You want to go legal? Buddy up to the FBI?”

“No, not that. But legal, yes.”

His grandfather burst into laughter. “And here I thought you had a real idea for once. I should have known not to expect much from you. Go make yourself useful.” He spun his chair so he faced away.

“Grandfather, please. We don’t have to resort to all this killing just for a few dollars. It’s not worth it.”

His grandfather spun his chair back. “That sounds a lot like what your father said. And look how he ended up. Poor and dead. But at least he was legal about it.” He shook his head. “He was a fool and you’re a bigger fool if you think you can follow in his footsteps. Forget what I said this morning. You’re nowhere near ready to take over running things.”

“I am. I’m just trying to make changes that will benefit everyone.”

“No one benefits from crime going unchecked on the streets. You think I’m a careless killer? I take out those who kill. Those who harm others. I keep the streets safe when the authorities don’t have a clue what’s going on. I think you need to make a serious decision here, Anton.”

Anton gulped at the use of his full first name.

“You’re either in all the way or you’re out. What’s it going to be?”

“I’m in. I’ve always been in. But I—”

“Then there’s nothing else to discuss. I want you to go down to the west dock and talk to a guy by the name of Pete Burns. He has some business for us. I want you to be the one making these connections from now on.”

Anton stood. “Yes sir. I’ll go right now.”

He walked out of the office and took a car down to the dock. Hannah didn’t want him anyway. He couldn’t afford to spend time daydreaming of her and some life that was impossible to have. He had work to do.