“YOU FUCKING asshole!”
Andino looked up from the papers on his desk, and narrowly missed John’s oncoming fist by ducking. “Shit.”
It didn’t make a difference. John landed a punch to his cousin’s jaw on the second swing, anyway.
The hit connected hard enough to send Andino’s head flying to the side. John was already bracing for the impact that was sure to come back at him. Andino didn’t disappoint. His cousin pushed out of the chair faster than he could blink, and came at him.
John was quick enough to duck the first swing Andino aimed for his head, but forgot that his cousin was a south paw, and sneaky as fuck. Ducking like he did only gave Andino the chance to land a hard punch against John’s fucking kidney.
Jesus Christ.
That hurt.
Andino shoved John into the office door. John went right back for more. He shoved Andino hard, too, knocking his cousin into the chair, and desk. Not that it kept Andino down, or anything. He came right back for more, too.
So was their way.
Soon, the two cousins were pounding fists into one another on the floor of Andino’s office, while the employees in the kitchen worked on like nothing was happening. Just another day working for Andino Marcello, apparently.
This wasn’t the first time the two had gone to blows over something, and it likely wouldn’t be the last. Sometimes, this was just how they dealt with any kind of shit between them, but this time, it was different for John.
He was pissed.
Really fucking pissed off.
Where in previous fights he would make sure to keep his punches clean, and not hit Andino somewhere it would do lasting damage—like his face—John just didn’t care. He needed to get some of his goddamn anger out, and since Andino had been the cause of that anger in the first damn place, here they were.
It didn’t take long before Andino figured out John was not going to calm, or back down. He tried holding John down, but that didn’t do anything for either of them. Andino got his own hits thrown in, too, but John barely felt them at all.
Maybe after the third or so punch John landed to Andino’s head did the trick—he didn’t really know what it was—but his cousin figured out this was not like every other time they went to blows.
Either way, Andino pulled back, and rolled away from John. He laid to his back on the floor, and stared up at the ceiling. It took all the willpower John had not to roll over, and start fucking up the man again.
Outside the office, dishes clattered. Footsteps echoed just beyond their space as the employees continued to work.
It would be comical.
If it wasn’t so fucking sad.
“So fucking lucky Snaps wasn’t here today,” Andino snarled under his breath.
John let out a hard exhale, and scrubbed his now-sore hands down his face. “Where is he?”
“Haven took him to the spa.”
Side-eyeing his cousin, he said, “The fucking spa.”
“He likes it, okay. They rub him down, bathe him, and give him treats. It’s their thing—she takes him once a week.”
“He goes to the spa once a week. Are you serious? He’s a dog.”
“A dog that would have ripped your face off for this bullshit.”
Fair enough.
“Fuck,” Andino muttered, touching the spot above his eyebrow with his fingertips. “I think you cracked something in my face.”
“Not going to apologize for that.”
“What the fuck is wrong with you?”
John’s jaw clenched so hard, his goddamn molars ached. The anger that had damn near controlled him for the entire day before, and this morning, was still entirely present. Apparently, there was no getting rid of it.
He tried using one of Leonard’s techniques, which meant John had to make a conscious choice to put his reactive nature aside when something got to him. Whatever it might be—anger, or something similarly overwhelming. He needed to try and give it some time to settle, and then handle it appropriately.
Clearly, that had not worked.
Here he was.
“They change your fucking meds, or something?” Andino asked.
That hit a nerve.
John’s fist came out like lightening, and landed hard to Andino’s kidney. His cousin’s air came out in a sharp whoosh, and then a low fuck followed right behind. Sweet satisfaction curled through John.
“Don’t take cheap shots at me about being bipolar, or my meds. You fucking asshole.”
“All right, all right. I kind of deserved that one,” Andino grumbled through pants of air. “Jesus Christ, that hurt.”
“You deserved it a little more than kind of, prick,” John replied. “You’re putting her in a lot of fucking danger, Andino.”
“What, who?”
Oh, so now his cousin wanted to play dumb?
John wasn’t up for that.
“Siena.”
“Shit, John—”
Quick as a blink, John rolled over, got to his knees, and then stood from the floor. Andino stayed right where he was on his back, and looking up at John. In a way, it gave him the feeling that his cousin was the weaker between them for the moment.
In a sense.
It didn’t matter who was the weaker one between them. Either way, John still had shit to say, and he needed it to be heard. He needed Andino to fucking hear him, and get it. Really fucking get it. He wasn’t playing these stupid games anymore, and he didn’t want Siena to be playing them, either.
“Siena showed up at my place the night before last,” John said, “you know, after Kev Calabrese croaked at his birthday party. Somebody poisoned him, huh?”
Andino lifted a single brow. “Word made rounds, yeah. What about it?”
“That’s how you want to play this?”
“John, come on, now.”
“You had her do that job, Andi.”
Andino sucked air through his teeth, but his cold gaze never wavered from John for a second. “It needed to be done, and I couldn’t trust anyone else to do it. Who the hell else is that close to those brothers, John?”
“Any one of their fucking men, Andino!”
“Couldn’t turn one. Or rather, I couldn’t trust one to turn them. That’s not my goal in this—that’s not the job I need to be concerned about at the moment. I just need those goddamn brothers out of the fucking way. That’s it.”
John didn’t have the first clue what his cousin was talking about. “You’re trying to ruin that family, but you don’t want the task of controlling them once you’ve done that?”
Andino rolled his eyes. “She got it done. What else is there to say?”
“Stop putting her in these fucking positions, that’s what. At first it was just getting information from her which was dangerous enough considering how controlled she is by that family—now this?”
“Is it because you think Siena is too innocent to kill a man, or because you don’t want her dirtying up those pretty hands of hers?”
John forced himself not to kick Andino as hard as he could in the guy’s ribs. It took a hell of a lot more effort than he thought it would. “You’re purposefully being an asshole right now, and I don’t appreciate it.”
“Because you’re acting foolish, and letting your feelings cloud up what you should already know about a war like this. We do what we need to—use who we can use—and get it done. Finish it. We finish them. That’s all that matters.”
“Not to the sacrifice of her!”
“You assume she’ll be a sacrifice because she cannot handle herself, or something like that. Maybe that’s something you should handle with yourself, John, because Siena has her shit covered. She’s gold. She knows exactly what she’s doing.”
He heard Andino.
He still didn’t like it.
“Darren Calabrese is not a stupid fuck like you might think. Is he a little screwed up or distracted right now because Kev is dead? Sure, but that means nothing. If you don’t think they weren’t already suspicious that someone inside their circles were feeding us information, then you’re delusional, Andino.”
“I—”
“Darren, or somebody else who will let him know, is going to figure out what is going on. They will figure out that it is her. The more info from her you use, or the more you get her to do, the worse it will get for her. I won’t have you putting her in that kind of danger, Andi. I just won’t.”
“Are you going to fucking let me talk, or what?”
John fixed his jacket, and gave his cousin one last look. “I said what I had to say, actually.”
“Shame—you’re missing out on the bigger picture entirely.”
“Your picture isn’t my picture, Andino.”
After all, John’s bigger picture showcased Siena. It seemed like Andino’s only showcased ruining the Calabrese.
“Get the hell out,” Andino mumbled.
Fine by John.
• • •
“John,” Leonard barked.
John glanced away from the clock just long enough to give his therapist a look. “What?”
“You’re all over the place.”
“I noticed that, too.”
John’s father slipped through the living room of Leonard’s home. Lucian now made it his job to occasionally show up at John’s appointments. He tried to put his reasoning under the umbrella that Leonard was an old friend.
Frankly, John saw that guise for what it was.
“When was the last time you slept?” Leonard asked.
John sighed. “Last night.”
“How long?”
Good catch, Doc.
“Enough,” John replied.
“That’s not a good enough answer for me,” Leonard said. “Try again, and give me the truth.”
“Four hours.”
“One long stretch, or in total?”
“Total.”
Leonard nodded, and stood from his chair. Strolling to the window, he looked out at the clear September sky. “Tell me about work, John.”
John glanced at his father.
Lucian only shrugged as he sipped from a glass of bourbon.
“It’s busy,” John said.
“Dangerous, I think,” Leonard countered. “I watch the news. I keep up with things. Seems the Marcello organization is in a major feud with the Calabrese faction at the moment. Three deaths this last week alone between the two.”
“Two were theirs—Capos.”
“A foot solider for us,” Lucian put in. “Replaceable.”
“Your woman—Siena.”
John stiffened on the couch “What about her?”
“She comes from their side, doesn’t she?”
“Yes.”
“How often do you see her? Or even, when was the last time?”
John cleared his throat, and just as quickly as his father had slipped into the room, Lucian left it the same way he had come in. When privacy mattered in John’s sessions, and his father was there, Lucian knew when it was time to step the hell away.
He appreciated it.
“The beginning of the month.”
“Almost two weeks, then,” Leonard supplied.
“Yeah.”
“I suppose you’re concerned about her.”
“It’s a lot more than just her, but yes, I focus on her a lot, too.”
Leonard turned to face John with a pensive expression. “You’re going too much, and not taking enough time for up here.”
The therapist tapped his temple.
John got what the man was saying.
“I don’t really have a choice at the moment, all things considered.”
“You’re going to put yourself back into a hypomanic phase, John.”
“I have it under control.”
Leonard stared hard at John.
It made him edgy.
“What?” John asked, irritated.
“Choose stability.”
“I am.”
“How structured have your days been since you left the facility, John?”
Well, that one, he had to stop and think about. It was not an easy answer because at the moment, his entire life just felt like one giant ball of chaos. One thing after another thing, after another thing. It never ended.
“I’m structured in the areas that need to be handled,” John chose to say.
“Your bipolar. Managing it, you mean.”
John nodded. “That’s what’s important, right?”
“Take that away, though, John. Remove your twice weekly appointments, your strict regimes for diet and exercise, and the other routines you have in place to manage your disorder. Is that the only thing keeping you on track right now?”
“Somedays, it’s the only thing keeping me sane at the moment, yeah.”
“You’re playing a dangerous game with that.”
“Not sure how to correct it right now, either.”
Leonard tapped his watch with one finger, but never took his gaze away from John. “You allow me to do that for you. Sometimes, a break is good for you. I’m the one who—regardless of what is happening in your life—makes you take a moment to step back, objectify things around you, and relax.”
“I don’t find our sessions very relaxing.”
Hard.
Sometimes irritating.
Often, invasive.
Leonard smirked. “Then explain to me why you’ve just spent the last fifteen minutes in a far calmer, less jittery place than you were when you walked in.”
Shit.
“Well …”
“It’s fine to say that this is your safe place, John. We all have one, you know? Mine tends to be high in the sky, amongst the clouds.”
“You’re not my only safe place,” John said. “I have others.”
“Who?”
“My cousin, for one.”
“Andino.”
John’s lip curled back at Andino’s name. Clearly, he was still sore over their fight a few days before. Leonard didn’t miss it.
“Is there trouble with your cousin?”
“I think he’s causing problems to further his own agenda, and I’m not very fond of the way he’s going about it.”
“And so, you’re too irritated with him to let your emotional guard down.”
“You make me sound pathetic.”
Leonard chuckled. “Far from it. I could not imagine what it must feel like to be you, John. To be constantly stuck in a high-intensity emotional headspace twenty-four-seven. To feel things much faster, and more extremely, than those around me. And yet, you do it every day, and handle yourself all the while. That’s admirable, not pathetic.”
Well, then.
“Mmm, your woman, too, I suppose,” Leonard added after a moment.
John scrubbed a hand down his unshaven jaw—making a mental note to shave. “What about her?”
“She’s a safe place for you, too.”
“More so than anyone else.”
Understatement.
“So you do have places you can go where you do not have to be on edge at every waking second,” the man said.
“She’s not around very much at the moment, so no, I’m stuck with—”
“Me,” Leonard interrupted with a grin.
Again, the man tapped his watch. John didn’t know what he was getting at.
“We’ll add an extra hour onto the two sessions a week you already do, and add a third session on Wednesdays to break up your week.”
John groaned under his breath. “I don’t have time—”
“You will make time because you need to.”
Fuck.
Leonard waved a finger at the doorway where Lucian had disappeared. “Go let your father know you’ll both be here for a bit longer.”
“Wait, you mean we start the extra hour today?” John asked.
“I did not stutter,” Leonard murmured.
John found his father sitting on the front steps of Leonard’s quiet Brooklyn home. Lucian alternated between sipping his bourbon, and smoking a cigarette. He offered the pack to his son, and John took one out.
Maybe a smoke would calm his nerves.
Who fucking knew?
John didn’t smoke very often, now. Just whenever the urge struck, or he needed a bit of stress relief. That first drag off the cigarette burned his lungs like nothing else, but also felt like calm swimming through his veins.
“Are you done for the day?” Lucian asked.
“Not entirely. Another hour, or so.”
“Okay.”
John glanced over at his father, but found Lucian didn’t seem the least bit bothered that he couldn’t leave. In fact, Lucian seemed perfectly content to sit right where he was, and wait for his son.
“Thanks, Papa.”
Lucian looked up from his seat. “For what, John?”
“This.”
You.
Lucian seemed to understand, and only gave his son a nod in recognition. John was coming to learn that maybe he had more than a couple of safe places—in many ways, his father was becoming one, too.
“I didn’t mean to overhear,” Lucian said, “but I heard what you said regarding Andino.”
John’s irritation flashed through his gut.
Hot and poisoned.
Damn.
He wished he could let that go.
“He’s putting Siena in danger again and again,” John said. “And for what? Nothing.”
“Not nothing, son, to—”
“Take over the Calabrese. He’ll absorb the Calabrese Capos, streets, and their crews into the Marcellos, which will only make his organization bigger when he finally takes over Dante’s position officially. So, that compared to Siena’s life? Nothing, Papa. That’s what.”
Lucan looked over at John, and his familiar hazel gaze flashed with something John didn’t recognize. “He’s not explained this to you at all, has he?”
“Explained what?”
“You’ve got this all wrong, John.”
“Again, wh—”
John’s question was cut off by the sight of a black sedan with tinted windows slowing down in front of the drive leading up to Leonard’s home. He saw the driver’s side front and rear windows roll down a few inches, and gun metal glinted in the light.
“Shit,” John hissed.
He grabbed his father, and took them both to the ground with enough force that he was worried he might have broken something.
Bullets rained down.
Relentless.
Violent.
Deafening.
John kept his father covered.
Fucking Calabrese.
More people were going to have to die for this.
Shame.
• • •
John scrubbed a hand down his face in frustration as more people flooded into the hospital room. Jordyn snapped at anyone who came too close to her husband while the nurse gave Lucian his first small dose of morphine.
Getting two ribs broken could be painful, after all.
“Give me the run down,” Dante said, moving in beside his brother’s bed.
Sweet Jesus.
If there was anyone’s glare who could rival the Devil’s, it was John’s mother. Even his uncle couldn’t help himself but take a quick step back when Jordyn leveled it on him. John held his chuckle back, but barely.
“Jordyn, it’s—”
“Not fine, Lucian!”
John’s father passed his two brothers a look, and gestured one finger toward the door. “And take my son with you when you go. Let Ma through when she gets here.”
Italian men and their mothers …
It could not be a joke when it was the truth.
Dante waved a hand, and John followed behind him and his other uncle. Giovanni looked John up and down, and nodded to himself.
“What?” John asked once the door was closed behind them. “That look—what the fuck was that for?”
Dante cocked a brow, but said nothing.
Gio shook his head, and glanced away. “Nothing. I was thinking, at least one of you made it out unscathed, I guess.”
“I’m the one that broke his ribs,” John pointed out. “I took him to the ground too—”
“You did fine,” Dante interjected firm and fast. “You did right.”
John quieted at that, and nodded. “Where’s Andino?”
“Trying to settle people into safe places tonight,” Dante explained. “He wanted to come, but I know the two of you are having some issues at the moment. Better for him to be elsewhere.”
“He could have come.”
Dante gave John a hard look. “Andino knows when to step back for someone else.”
Fine.
John was not going to argue the point further. He didn’t think it would get him anywhere. Looking back at his father’s room, he saw one of his sisters slip inside.
Cella.
She still wouldn’t look at him.
She never talked to him.
John shook it off, and went back to the conversation at hand. “The run down?”
“Yeah, give it to me.”
“They caught us on the porch. Did a quick drive-by. Black sedan. Didn’t even get the make or model as I wanted to get Dad down. By the time I looked up again, they were gone. I mean, we know who ordered it, right. There’s no question there.”
“Definitely no question,” Dante agreed. “We still have to figure out what to do about these fucking foolish idiots.”
“Maybe stop fucking around with them like Andino has been doing, and challenge them head-on. If it’s a proper street war they want, then—”
“There is a method to Andino’s madness,” Giovanni said, stepping into the conversation only to defend his son. Or so it seemed. “Don’t shit on his way of doing things just because you have a different opinion about how it could be done.”
“Had I started something like this,” John shot back, “I would have fucking finished it shortly after, too.”
Dante cleared his throat, and moved subtly in between the nephew and uncle. “All right, that’s enough. Take a fucking breath, and lower your damn voices. We’re not here to give the hospital staff a show, huh?”
“Sorry,” Gio muttered behind Dante.
John still gave his uncle a look that spoke volumes without him needing to say anything at all. “I stand by it, though.”
“You can’t be that fucking entitled, John.” Giovanni shook his head, and smirked in that irritating way of his. “You think the rest of us are putting our asses on the line for this plan because Andino thinks it’s a good idea? Are you really that selfish in your own head that you can’t see he’s—”
Dante turned around, and shoved Gio on his shoulder. Pointing a single finger to the hallway leading out of the hospital wing, he said, “Go wait for Papa and Ma, Gio.”
“Dante—”
“Go, I said.”
Andino might have been the boss in waiting.
Dante was still the boss.
Giovanni moved past Dante, but pointed a finger at John as he went by. “Clean up your fucking shit, John. You think going on like that is going to suit a man in your position once this is over? I don’t think so.”
John’s brow furrowed. “What in the hell was that supposed to—”
“Excuse me?”
Dante spun around on his heel at the quiet voice. John found a young nurse standing there with a yellow bubble mailer in her hands. She offered it out, but neither of the men moved to take the item from her.
“What?” Dante barked.
The woman shrunk a bit.
“This was dropped off at the nurse’s station in the next wing, and we were directed that it be delivered to a Johnathan Marcello. Apparently, his father is being treated in this wing. It must have been a mix up.”
Dante passed John a look.
John reached for the mailer. It was only once the woman was gone that he turned to his uncle, concern writing heavily along his brow. “Open it, or no?”
“She was holding it pretty firmly, and she moved from one wing to another with it. I don’t think there’s anything explosive in it, otherwise it would have went boom already.”
“Nice.”
Dante shrugged. “Here.”
John took the knife his uncle offered. “Thanks.”
“Open it from the back end, just in case.”
He did just that.
Papers and photographs spilled out.
John’s throat closed up at the images staring back at him, and the information now freely available to anyone with the right contacts, and deep enough pockets.
Information about him.
His disorder. On record admissions to a mental facility. Somehow, a fucking patient record. Photographs of him on the grounds of the facility.
It was everything that stabbed John right to his core.
Everything he didn’t want people to know.
His one weak spot.
Crazy.
The word was scrawled across several photos.
Disgrace.
Another word written in thick, red ink.
Why was he so calm all of the sudden?
It wasn’t even the calm that scared him.
No, it was the darkness seeping into his mind at seeing his disorder exposed and mocked like this. It was knowing his family would be ridiculed for the things he had done, and how they protected and shielded him.
How much more could they take?
Was he really worth this kind of shit?
“Who else do you think got a package like this?” John asked.
“Let’s hope not very many,” Dante replied.
John doubted that would be the case.