The private plane touched down in Seattle later that day, and Tommy, Grace, and little Destiny were waiting to meet it.  The baby, TJ, was still at home with the nannies, with heightened security.  But after what happened last night, and even though he took care of the attacker, Tommy was taking no chances.  He stood in the middle, holding Destiny with one hand, and Grace with the other hand, and his security teams were out in force.

“Will Lucky come too, Daddy?” Destiny asked him.

“Would you like that?” Tommy asked her.

“Yes.  Very much!”

“Then he’s coming too.”

Grace smiled as Destiny looked up at Tommy as if he was some kind of magical man who only had to say it to make it so.  He was her hero, and Grace would have it no other way.

And when the steps of the private plane touched down, and Sal, carrying Lucky, and Gemma, walked off of the plane, Destiny began to jump up and down.  “Uncle Sal!  Aunt Gemma!  Lucky!  Lucky’s here too, Daddy, just like you said!”

Then, before her parents realized what was happening, Destiny tore away from Tommy’s hand and ran toward the plane.  Tommy’s bodyguards, four men strong, began running on either side of her, and looking around, with their hands ready to pull out their weapons if necessary, talking into their wrists at the security details further away.

Grace shook her head.  “Your men treat Des as if she’s the heir to the British throne,” she said, and Tommy laughed.  Then Grace added: “Thank God!”

Tommy agreed.  “They look out for her, that’s for sure.  And they’d better,” he added.

Gemma took Lucky from Sal, and Sal began running down the steps himself when he saw his little niece, and hoisted her up into his big arms at the bottom step.  “There’s my princess!” he said.

When Gemma and Lucky made it down the steps, too, she gave Destiny a kiss on the cheeks as Sal held her.  “Hey, baby, how are you?” she asked.

“I’m great now that Lucky’s here!” Destiny responded.

“Only Lucky, hun?” Sal asked her.  “Forget about your aunt and uncle, hun?”

“No, sir,” Destiny said, already looking away from Sal and at Little Lucky.  “I like you and Aunt Gemma, too.”

“But you just like Lucky more?” Sal asked.

“Yes, sir,” Destiny said honestly, and Sal and Gemma laughed.

As soon as Sal put Destiny down, she moved over by Lucky.  Lucky was dressed in a little sailor suit and looked simply divine to Destiny.  “Hey, cousin,” she said with a grin on her pretty face.

But Lucky kind of backed up from her.  She was a little too aggressive for his masculine tastes.  He carried a toy robot in one of his hands, and was staring nervously at her.

She attempted to take him in her arms from his mother’s arms, which caused him to frown and look at her as if she was crazy, but he was too big.  “I want to pick him up,” she said to his parents.

“I don’t think so, sweetheart,” Sal said, as he placed Lucky in his arms again.  Destiny opted to hold Gemma’s hand, instead.

When Sal and his family, and Destiny, made it up to Tommy and Grace, the two women and children hugged and chatted, but the two brothers hugged vigorously.  And for a long time.

Tommy closed his eyes tight as he held onto Sal.  He and his brother had a bond that was unlike any either one of them had with any other human being.  It stretched back to their childhood, when Sal was badly mistreated and Tommy had to defend him.  And later in life, when Tommy was badly abused by their father, and Sal had to defend him.  Their mother had abandoned them.  Their father was a monster of the first degree.  They only really had each other from the time of their births.  And that kind of bond, in their eyes, was unbreakable.

And although Tommy was older, and Sal took his cues from Tommy, it was the reverse for Tommy.  He took his cues from Sal.

When they stopped embracing, Tommy looked at his kid brother.  “You lost a little weight,” he said.

Sal smiled.  Even Gemma hadn’t noticed.  “A pound or two, but yeah,” he said.

Tommy squeezed Sal’s biceps.  “Still got those muscles, however.”

“Where you think they’re going?  Weaklings don’t run organizations like mine.”

“I hear you,” Tommy said with a smile.

Sal looked Tommy up and down, too.  As usual, not a hair was out of place, and his slacks and cardigan sweater made him look like a male model rather than a very efficient, and very vicious badass.  Sal grinned.  “You look your usual splendor,” he said.

“What you know about splendor?” Tommy teased.

“Not a damn thing,” Sal said.  “But it fits you.”

Tommy laughed.  “I guess something needs to,” he said, and they all piled into the SUV.

Tommy and Sal, however, sat in the far back, as Grace and Gemma and the children sat in the middle of the SUV caught up in their own conversations.

But Sal had Robby on his mind.  “He came to me,” he told Tommy as the SUV, flanked by a convoy of SUVs, made their way to Tommy and Grace’s estate.

“Who came to you?” Tommy asked his brother.

“Robby Yale.”

Tommy hesitated.  Was this what he thought it was about?  Had Robby finally come out of the closet?  “He came to you about what?” he asked.

“You aren’t going to believe this,” Sal said, “but he’s gay.”  Sal said this and looked at Tommy, to see if he had prejudices in that direction as he knew most of the men in his organization did.

But Tommy barely even reacted.  Which surprised Sal.  Tommy came out of the same household Sal came out of.  And it was a household filled with racism and prejudices about everybody except Italians.  And gays got it especially hard from their old man.  He hated them.  But that was just their old man, who had plenty of homosexual escapades, being his usual hypocritical self.  “You heard what I said?” Sal asked his brother.

“I heard you, yes,” responded Tommy.

“That don’t bother you then?”

“Why would it bother me?”

Then Sal had a thought.  “You knew too?” he asked.

“I suspected it, yes,” Tommy said.

“What the fuck?  Gemma suspected it.  You suspected it.  I guess Reno’s gonna tell me next that he suspected it too.  When my dumb ass didn’t have a clue!”

Then Sal looked at Tommy.  “How did you do it, Tommy?”

Tommy didn’t understand what Sal meant.  He looked at him.  “Do what?” he asked.

“How did you get out of Pop’s household unscathed like this?  You were no racist.  You loved black women too much to ever be accused of racism.  You were no bitter white guy because you got along with everybody.  And you were no homophobe either, when Pops was all of that and more! But you got out unscathed.  How the hell does that happen?”

“Not by osmosis, Sal,” Tommy said.  “It happens because I refuse to let Dad’s taint taint me.  All of his racism and homophobia was his deal.  It was never mine.  And I didn’t make it mine.”

“More than I can say for myself,” Sal said.  “It wasn’t until I met Gemma did I realize how fucking sick I was.”

Then he exhaled and looked at Tommy.  “I’ve got an underboss who’s gay.  If this shit gets out, I’ll be a fucking laughingstock in the underworld.  You know how it goes with those guys.”

Sal didn’t realize he was admitting that he was, indeed, a mob boss.  It was supposed to be his little secret.  A secret that everybody in the family knew.  “So what did you do?” Tommy asked.  “You fired him?”

Sal looked out of the window as the SUV drove on.  “No,” he said.  “That wouldn’t be right.  If it becomes a disruption, and we get distracted to a point where men could lose their lives, then I’ll have to revisit it.  But for now?  No.  He earned that job.  He’s keeping it.”

Tommy smiled and patted Sal on the back.  “Good man,” he said.

Then Tommy paused, and looked at Sal.  “I heard what happened to Hawk,” he said.

Sal frowned and looked at his brother.  “You heard?  That shit just happened!  You heard from who?”

“Uncle Mick,” Tommy said.

Sal couldn’t believe it.  “Uncle Mick?  How did his ass know about that?”

“His ass knows everything about everything that goes on in our lives.  You know that.”

“I know it,” Sal said, “but I still don’t know how his ass does it!  It’s like that fucker has radar in the sky, or some shit like that!”

Tommy laughed.  “He might!” he said, and Sal laughed, too.

 

And at the house, the adults settled with drinks in the living area, while the children settled, with the nannies, in the game room.  And the small talk was over.

“What do we know so far?” Sal, who sat in the flanking chair, leaned forward.  Gemma sat on the arm of his chair.  Tommy and Grace sat together on the sofa.

“We know that Chainsaw Makinroe has been making noise about our family for some time now,” Tommy said.

“What kind of noise?” Sal asked.

“Nothing specific that my men could come up with,” Tommy said.  “But he kept our names on his lips in mixed company.  He never showed his hand enough for anybody to warn us, or even to think much of it.  He just seemed like a jealous man blowing off a little steam.  But the clues, looking back, were being dropped.”

“What beef he would have with us?” Sal asked.  “He’s big in the underworld, I’ll give him that.  But his ass too smalltime to think he’s in our league.  What’s his problem?”

“That’s where it all breaks down,” Tommy said.  “That’s what nobody knows.  Why would he hire that chick to harm Grace to begin with, and why in the world would he snatch one of your people?  It makes no sense!

“But we’ve got to get to the bottom of it,” Sal said.  “That much is true.”

“Had you ever seen the woman before, Grace?” Gemma asked her.

“No, never,” Grace said.  “Even the mayor was quoted today saying he’d never seen her before either.  The help staff had been contracted out, and the contractor that hired her said she had impeccable credentials.”

“Assassins always do,” Tommy said.  “That’s how they get in that door.”

Henry, Tommy’s longtime house manager, came into the room.  “Excuse me, sir,” he said, “but the front gate just buzzed.  A gentleman is here requesting to see you, and to see Mr. Sal.  He’s an attorney.”

Sal frowned.  “A lawyer?  What the fuck a lawyer want to see us for?”

Tommy was confused, too.  “Did he say what it was about, Henry?”

“Yes, sir.  He says it’s about your grandfather, sir.”

Sal and Tommy looked at each other.  Gemma and Grace looked at them, too.  “Your grandfather?” Grace asked.

“He says the gentleman in question is on your father’s side,” Henry added.  “Because I asked, sir.”

This was confusing as hell to Tommy and Sal.  What in the world was going on?  A grandfather?  They had no clue about their father’s father.  “Send him in,” Tommy ordered.

“Yes, sir,” Henry said, and left the room again.

“What you suppose this is about?” Sal asked Tommy.  “I thought Dad’s old man was dead.  At least that was the way he made it out to be.”

“I know,” Tommy said.  “One day he told us his father was dead.  Another time he said he didn’t know if his father was dead or alive.  Then another time he said he didn’t even know who his father was!  I gave up caring when he kept telling so many different stories.”

“That was probably exactly what he wanted you to do,” Gemma said.

“What do you mean?” Sal asked her.

“He muddled the water because he probably wanted you guys to stop asking questions.”

Tommy nodded.  “I agree,” he said, as he leaned back in his seat.  “I just don’t want any bullshit.”

“Wow,” Sal said, shaking his head.  “Our grandfather is alive, and he sent a lawyer.”

“What do you think that usually means, Gem?” Grace asked her, since Gemma was an attorney herself.  “When a lawyer is summoned?”

Tommy and Sal, also curious, looked too.

“It usually means that the grandfather is on his death bed, and may want to ask forgiveness or let you know you’re in his will.  Or he may not be dying at all.  It could be any number of probate matters.  Or none at all.  It’s wide open, really.”

“In other words,” Sal said, “we won’t know until we know.”

Gemma smiled.  “Unfortunately, yes,” she said.

Sal ran his hands through his hair.  Grace looked at Tommy.  She was worried most of all.  Tommy told her about the abuse he endured by his own father.  Could his father’s father be just as horrible?  She took Tommy’s hand, which he welcomed, and leaned back too.

And they waited, with bated breath, for this attorney to come through.