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CHAPTER 19 - MARCUS
My knuckles are white with rage, but this is when I have to be calm and cool, as the leader. Gianni was my bottled rage incarnate. When he saw Appy, if I hadn’t have stopped him, he would've rushed out to my uncle and killed him immediately.
It took four guys to hold him down while he calmed down. Anger and blind rage clouds thinking, Gianni was a bull in a china shop because he couldn't get past it. As the head of the family I couldn't allow the anger to cloud my judgment. I couldn't believe my Uncle would do this just days after coming to me and promising his loyalty. My men were in agreement that we needed to go after him, that if war was what he wanted, they would go to the mattresses against him.
“No. Not yet.” I told them. Looking around the room, these guys were the nastiest, ugliest killers I’d ever seen. “Where's Sal?”
He was in the back, but walked up to me, I wasn’t sure if there was guilt in his face, or if I imagined it. “What were you and Carmine discussing the other day?”
“Nothing boss, certainly nothing like this. He never said a word about going after you. I believed him.”
So did I. Sal had plenty of reasons to be disloyal, but he was here, which meant he was either stupid or not a part of it.
Never assume malice when stupidity will suffice, I told myself as I looked at him. But don’t rule out malice either.
“We'll set up a meeting with my uncle first. If he denies it, or he doesn't have a good explanation, then we go to war, but not before.”
Gianni bucked again from the chair, but two men held him down. “The man who hit mama is dead, if you don't give me the man, or if your Uncle Carmine doesn't, I won't care what you do to me.”
The men looked at me, wanting to know what I'd say to that sort of challenge. I told him and everyone in the room. “If my uncle doesn't give him to you, I'll kill him myself. You'll come with me as long as you can control yourself. If you can't control your emotions in a crisis none of us can trust you, and you're no good to any of us.” I walked over to him and bent down to look him in the face, to show him I meant my threat. “Capisce?”
He snarled and looked away. I motioned the men to let him go from the chair. “Stand up and look me in the eye and tell me.”
He stood up, simmering with rage, and looked me in the eye. I stared and did not blink. He looked away when he saw the chained up rage in my face, and heard the trembling words that came out of my mouth, “They took my woman. Kidnapped her. But I can control myself. Can you control yourself? Tell me.”
“A capisco,” her muttered and left the room. He was a powder keg. It would be too much for me to worry about him blowing up, and keeping myself under control. But if I blew up, I knew I could count on one man at least following me to my death and inflicting as much pain as possible before it happened.
“Set up a meeting. Today, tonight, immediately. Leave me for now.”
I drove into the desert in the afternoon alone, the red sun setting on the horizon made the sand shimmer like blood-stained glass. If I didn't come back, the only person happy would be Sal. There would be bloodshed and a war for sure. But all I thought about was Anna. My only thought was for her safety, her safe return.
I couldn't believe my uncle would be this disloyal and betray family. Worse, he kidnapped Anna, a civilian. That was a sacred rule, people who chose this life were fair game, but the people around us, they did not choose, they were untouchable. Only an animal would break that sacred trust and go after a wife or a girlfriend or a child.
But then there was the story from when Carmine was young. He joined the priesthood, something about a woman and his best friend, and a murder-suicide. It was only talked about in whispers and gossip. But whatever had happened he had broken his vows of loyalty with God, and his friend before this. Maybe it wasn’t so inconceivable.
My safety was being guaranteed by Carmine’s son. The 19 year old college kid. He didn’t know it, but he was the guarantee. My men grabbed him from the college and took him to a strip club. As long as I was safe, he would be drinking and spending my money, having a grand old time. But if I didn’t return safe and sound, with Anna by the next day, then he’d be taken to the back room, not the champagne room, but the other back room and the fun would stop for him.
The meeting was in the desert, on the outskirts of Vegas, at a quiet restaurant. A family place where people kept their mouths shut, and knew enough not to eavesdrop.
As I walked up to the table, my Uncle was not there. Only Giacomo, “Jackie”, and two thugs with him. He wore a dark suit and pink shirt with white cuffs and collar. The sort of thing only a douchebag wears. He had a habit of playing with the cufflinks, as if they were toys, as if he had never worn them before.
“Where's my Uncle?” I asked.
“I speak for him, he couldn't be here.”
“Bullshit, he's in charge, not you, he calls the shots, not you.”
“Maybe,” he grinned a toothless grin. I wished I had Gianni behind me. It was stupid to come alone.
I sat. Before that smarmy asshole could say another word I said, “Two things. One, who is the man who hit Gianni's mother, because he's going to kill him. Two, who laid a hand on Anna, because I'm going to kill him.”
“That's no way to start a negotiation. With demands.”
“I'm the head of the family, I don't negotiate.”
“There is no head yet, that's to be decided. But neither you or your Uncle will be around to decide.”
Now I knew what this was. A betrayal, but not by Carmine, by Jackie.
“You will return Anna safe and sound.”
“I will? Who is Anna?”
“The woman, my Anna.”
“Oh yes. She’ll be fine. You, not so much.”
I lashed out at him, the rage boiled over and I lunged across the table, to wring his neck, but the two big uglies grabbed me before I got far enough.
“My men took Carmine’s son, if you return me he won’t be harmed.”
“Why would I care?” His men started beating me, but I didn’t cry out, I didn’t beg, I took it all. Before everything went black I managed to ask the only question worth asking. “Why?”
“Ask your brother.”
The last thing I saw was him twirling his pink cuff links.