The Spia Family Presses On

TWENTY-THREE

Who’s Your Daddy?

I spent the morning going over a plan with Nick and his team. I didn’t ask too many questions about who these guys were, and no one offered to tell me, so we kept the conversation limited to the sting. At certain points during our rehearsal I felt certain that a camera crew would show up from behind a sliding wall and someone would tell me I needed to go over my lines one more time.

That didn’t happen and right around two o’clock that afternoon Lisa dropped me off in back of my mom’s house while Nick and his team were hidden somewhere out on the road. I didn’t exactly know where, but Nick assured me that as long as I stuck to the plan, everything would be fine.

That right there was enough to make me queasy.

I had one last thing I needed to check in my mom’s house before I walked over to Federico’s house and I was hoping it would still be there.

The back door was once again unlocked. I was happy about that considering all my keys were in my purse locked inside my pickup behind Jimmy’s bar.

According to Nick, Uncle Benny had bonded Mom out of jail only a couple hours ago. Nick had warned her to keep her theories to herself and to play along with me. Over the last few days I’d learned that Mom was exceptionally good at game playing, so I wasn’t too worried about any slip-ups.

Afternoon sun poured in through the front windows of my mom’s living room as I made my way up the stairs and into what would have been Dickey’s bedroom.

As soon as I walked into his room, I knew my hope of finding his suitcase was unrealistic. The bed was neatly made, the windows and French doors were locked up tight, and the suitcase had disappeared. A good gangster cleans up his mess.

Still, I had to check the closet, which was empty except for a few plastic hangers. I did a quick check under the bed, but it had recently been swept clean of all dust bunnies. But there was something nagging at me. Something I’d seen before that I was certain I would find if I just looked harder.

I swept through the closet one more time. Nothing. I opened drawers. Empty. I ripped the bedding off the bed. Again, I came up empty handed. On my second, more extensive look under the bed I spotted a piece of white paper stuck up against the white woodwork. I hunkered down on all fours, dropped to my belly, and stretched out under the bed, grabbing the paper. When I stood up again and took a closer look someone had written Jade’s name on one side and when I flipped it over, those tiny hairs on the back of my neck stood up again.

It was the same little girl in the picture in my mom’s safety deposit box, only this time she was sitting on somebody’s lap. A woman’s lap, a woman who looked a lot like Carla DeCarlo. They were both smiling those great big happy smiles, like they’d just eaten an entire double-dip ice cream cone and were thinking about seconds. What was even more remarkable was how much those smiles were identical.

That’s when I knew I was staring down at a picture of Jade Batista and her mother, Carla DeCarlo.

The motive flashed before me the instant I remembered what Federico had said the night of the party, that “olives never lie. They’re always pure.”

Carla DeCarlo had lied about her virginity.

Fifteen minutes later, I was standing on Federico’s front stoop wearing a borrowed Betsy Johnson outfit complete with skinny chocolate jeans, a bright pink ruffled mini skirt, a tight long-sleeved knit shirt complete with decorative roses, and two different jacket type things over the whole ensemble. My legs and feet were covered in over-the-knee suede boots, and I carried an Italian Capisa bag, which was fitted with a small transmitter, so Nick could keep track of me. I also wore some kind of tiny microphone wire thing inside my bra, which allowed him to hear everything.

I wasn’t so sure the microphone was a good idea considering there was no telling what my family might say at any given moment that could land one of them back in the slammer for a past dastardly deed. Nevertheless, I was trying to trap Federico and I was hoping I could get him to do most of the talking.

Lisa had dressed me for action. She said the boots had a heel that could go through bone if I stepped hard enough, plus she dropped pepper spray in my purse and slid a pocket knife down my left boot, just in case. It lodged next to my heel and with each step it reminded me that I was about to turn on a man I’d loved and admired for most of my life.

It just confirmed what Federico had taught me since I was a little girl: never trust anyone, no matter who they are.

I swung open the door on Federico’s bungalow, slapped on a happy face and said, “Room for one more?”

My mom, Benny, Aunt Hetty, Aunt Babe, Giuseppe, and Federico sat around a large oval table cluttered with cards, change, small bowls of green olives, and short glasses of red wine. Cousin Maryann sat on the sofa in the adjoining room fiddling with her accordion, while Zia Yolanda dozed next to her. The kitchen and living area was all one great big room, with a bedroom and bathroom off the kitchen.

As soon as I entered, everyone welcomed me, except for Federico who seemed to be momentarily put off. There was a subtle change in his eyes, one most people in the room wouldn’t have caught, but I did.

“Well, it’s about time,” my mom said as she got up from her chair at the table. “Everyone was getting worried. Where were you?”

I gave her a tight hug.

“Sorry about that,” I said. “I hadn’t planned on staying out all night. It sort of . . . just happened.” I did my best to color my voice with regret, but I knew Federico could detect the touch of sarcasm.

“It’s okay. We all fall off the wagon every now and then,” Mom said when we pulled apart. She couldn’t have played her part better if I had scripted it.

“Yeah,” I said while staring at Federico who stared back at me, deadpan. “A girl can only go so long without a drink, right Federico?” I turned to the others. “He helped me fall. Good thing he was there or I might have fallen right under that damn wagon, hey Uncle Federico?”

No reaction.

There was a knock at the door. Hetty answered and Uncle Ray and Val came in along with Jimmy, who was looking rather glum.

“Mia, you’re here,” Val squealed. “When your mom phoned saying you were missing, we hurried right over like she asked.”

Apparently, my mom had her own plan of how this was going down.

“I thought Federico brought you home. At least that’s what he told me when the two of you took off last night,” Jimmy said, then he went over and sat next to his sister on the arm of the sofa.

“Nah, we were having way too much fun for either one of us to go home. Right, Uncle Federico?” I kept staring at him and he kept staring right back at me, now with a somewhat startled look on his face, as if he was trying to figure out what could be coming at him next.

“You had us all worried, doll. Federico was going to call the cops if we didn’t hear from you in the next few hours,” Aunt Babe said, right before she hugged me. “He told us you deserted him at one of the bars last night. That you left him some kind of note, but he was still worried. We all were.”

That got me reeling. I decided to change up the plan. I wasn’t much into playing passive, waiting for the cavalry to save the day. This was my family, and we had rules, and one of them was we had a zero tolerance for guys like Federico and I intended to keep it that way.

“I’m sorry. I was busy nursing one mother of a hangover.” I laughed. “Woke up in a Dumpster behind Jimmy’s bar. Can you believe it? Wahoo! That must have been one hell of a party, right?” I stared at Federico who was beginning to lose his cool.

“You slept in a Dumpster?” Maryann wanted to know.

“Sure did. And if it wasn’t for an old mattress breaking my fall I might be dead right now.”

Zia Yolanda groaned and opened her eyes.

“What are you talking about, dear?” Mom asked, eyes squinting in some desperate attempt to furrow her forehead.

There was another knock on the door. “Let me get this,” I said.

Lisa and Jade stood in the doorway. “Is this where the party is?” Jade asked, all full of sunshine. I gave Lisa a quick nod to reassure her that everything was going well.

I hadn’t expected Jade to show up at this little gala, but I had a feeling Lisa had something to do with her appearance.

“Come right in ladies. We’re all one big happy family,” I told them.

The tiny bungalow was suddenly very crowded with everyone picking out their own turf.

Federico walked over to me carrying a glass of red wine. He offered it to me. “No thanks,” I told him.

“Hair of the dog,” he said, and held it right under my nose. One quick whiff told me it was Leo’s Pinot.

“Well, let’s see, hair of the dog would have to be whatever drug you slipped in my drink last night,” I said in a clear, loud voice so everyone could hear me. “And I’m not in the mood for that right now, but thanks for the offer.”

The house suddenly went quiet. Only the sound of Bisnonno Luigiano’s cuckoo clock marked off the time in seconds. Even Federico owned one of the many clocks, although by the sound of the jittered ticking the clock needed a few repairs.

Federico’s forehead creased. “Don’t get cute. You know it was all those shots of tequila you put down.”

“Nope. I don’t remember any tequila. Do you remember any tequila, Jimmy?”

He shook his head. “You only drank Coke while you were in my bar.”

I stared at Federico. “Like I said, I didn’t drink any tequila last night.”

“Maybe not while you were at La Bella, but you sure threw them back after we left.”

“Oh, you mean when you took me upstairs to Jimmy’s apartment looking for clues, trying to help me prove that Jimmy killed Dickey? Funny, I don’t remember drinking anything up there, just a lot of kicking and scratching, but no drinking. You’d already slipped the drug into my Coke. No need for more.”

Jimmy said, “What? Me? I didn’t kill Dickey. Why the hell would I? I got no grudge with Dickey. The man saved my sister’s life. She loved him like a father. Why would I want to knock him off? She’d never forgive me if she ever found out. Besides, I’m clean, and I intend to stay that way.”

Federico put the wine down on the table, ignored what Jimmy just said and walked in closer to me. “You don’t know what you’re talking about. I never took you up to his apartment.”

I took a step closer to him, feeling bold with my other, more non-murdering family present. “Yeah you did, and you tied me up, taped my mouth shut, and shoved me out of his second-story window, you miserable lying bastard.”

Zia Yolanda wailed. My mother gasped.

Benny swore. Ray punched the table.

Giuseppe stood up.

Federico pulled out a handgun and pointed it at me.

The rest of the men in my family, including Giuseppe, pulled out their own handguns and pointed them at Federico.

Who knew?

“It’s over,” Uncle Ray said. “Put your weapon down, and your hands over your head.”

“We are all itching to shoot something, and it might as well be you, you piece of excrement,” Uncle Benny said.

That’s when Jade charged in front of everybody and shot Federico in the foot.

He let out a mournful yell, fell to the floor and dropped his weapon. “You shot me,” he said, looking up at her, tears filling his eyes.

“Yeah, and I’ll do it again if you don’t confess to killing my mother, you murdering rat,” Jade demanded, pointing her automatic at his head.

There was a collective intake of air.

“Are you serious?” Benny asked. “Your mother was Carla DeCarlo?” He stared at her for a moment.

“Yes, dear,” my mother offered.

“You know, now that you mention it, you look just like her. Especially around the eyes. I should have seen it,” Benny said.

“Talk,” Jade warned, now aiming the gun at Federico’s left knee.

Somehow I got the idea this wasn’t the first time Jade held a weapon. She had the look of a woman who’d spent many hours at a shooting range.

“Okay, yes, I killed Carla. She told me she was a virgin. That she was pure.” He laughed. “What a crock . . . lies. They were all lies.”

There was another gunshot, but this one seemed to only graze his upper left arm as blood streaked across the sleeve of his tan sweater. “And that’s for Dickey, you miserable dog,” Maryann grumbled as she walked closer to Federico, holding her own weapon, looking as if she would have no problem pulling the trigger again. Only this time it would be fatal.

“Okay, okay. All of you, back off. I’ll come clean. Don’t shoot me anymore,” Federico whined. “I had no choice. Dickey figured it out. He figured out that I’d killed Carla. Besides, he had my ring. That bitch gave him my ring after I told her how much it meant to me, just because I slapped her. But I didn’t do anything that she didn’t deserve.”

Jade shot the floor right next to his other foot, grazing his shoe.

“Okay. Stop.” Federico held his hands up, as if his hands could stop a bullet. “I shouldn’t have slapped her. But she had that mouth. Always talking back. No respect. And the lies. She told me she was a virgin. That she was pure like our olives, and then I find out she has a kid. Lies on top of more lies.”

“How did you know she gave your ring to Dickey?” I asked.

He hesitated, and Jade pointed the gun at his knee again. He said, “I was there. I saw her kissing Dickey, and then giving him my ring. My dad meant that ring for me, not my cheating brother who never cared one lick about the old man. And not Dickey. It was mine. I gave it to Carla to show my love for her, but she didn’t care. She didn’t care about anyone. That day in the street, in Italy, when the old man was dying he was going to hand that ring to me, but my brother got in the way. He was always getting in the way. It was my ring. Mine.”

Giuseppe stepped forward, his weapon locked on Federico’s head. He spoke in Italian. “I want that ring even if I have to kill you to get it. Your brother wants what’s rightfully his.”

Federico, hand shaking, pulled the ring out from under his sweater, hanging from a chain, my chain. Giuseppe reached down and ripped it off his neck. Federico winced.

“Wait,” Jade protested. “My father’s alive?”

“Your father?” I asked.

“Yes, dear,” my mother said. “Jade’s father. She’s your half-sister, sweetheart.”

Aunt Val, who was standing behind my mom, smiled and nodded And just as Nick and his team burst through the front door, the cuckoo chirped a shaky hour as Dickey’s pinky finger plopped out and landed right next to Federico’s bleeding foot.

It took several hours for the dust to settle once Nick and his team arrived. Curious thing, I thought for sure my entire family would be carted off to jail on gun charges, but it seemed that Nick wasn’t interested in their guns. He was barely interested in Federico, but he did do enough snooping to find a cell phone, probably Dickey’s, hidden in the back of the cuckoo clock, which explained Jade’s mysterious phone call from honey-bear after he was already dead.

The usual allotment of law enforcement arrived to take care of arresting Federico, ask all the questions and close off Federico’s house. By the time they appeared on the scene, all weaponry, along with one recently imported mobster had miraculously vanished.

Within a couple hours of the arrest, Spia’s Olive Press was up and running at full tilt. There were so many people milling around the shops and bakery that my relatives couldn’t ring up the sales fast enough. There’s nothing like a good murder to bring in business. It was all anybody could talk about, and my family seemed to be lapping up the sudden notoriety. We were the talk of the valley, and the Spia clan was loving it. Nothing brightens an ex-mobster’s day better than cold hard cash.

As far as the orchard went, Maryann offered to take over the role as groundskeeper. She’d been taking classes at UC Berkley and working with Federico for the past two years. Everyone seemed to already know this, but me, of course.

Leo came by my mess of an apartment as soon as we were open again, and made an offer any girl in her right mind would have taken, but sanity didn’t run in my family. “Let’s get out of here. Just you and me. Right now, before family obligations make us do the right thing. We could go to New York, stay at a great hotel, catch some plays, eat at all those great little restaurants in the Village . . . or not.” He smiled and a rush of heat swept through me. I knew if I went, we’d see very little of New York and a whole lot of each other. The mental visual of Leo lying naked in bed was difficult for me to resist, however . . .

“As tempting as that is, I’m going to have to take a rain check. I’m just not ready, and besides, I have somewhere else I need to be.”

“Lisa told me, but you two can go to Maui anytime. This is our chance to see if . . .”

I cut him off with a kiss, slowly pulled away, grabbed my small carry-on bag and headed for the door. “I’m sorry, but I have to go.”

“Call me?” he said.

“Every day,” I told him and walked out my front door, down the steps and hopped in Lisa’s BMW.

What I probably needed more than anything else at the moment was admission to the nearest psychiatric ward for massive amounts of therapy. Considering that my own uncle had tried to kill me I was a prime candidate for years of antidepressants. The thought of all those fine drugs was enough to make me want to bake and fry an entire seven course feast.

“You sure you want to do this?” Lisa asked as I slipped into the passenger seat.

“Absolutely.” I turned and to Jade who sat in the back seat. “Are you sure you want to do this?”

“Like, I’ve been waiting my entire life, ya know?”

“Then let’s do it,” Lisa said as she headed out of the parking lot.

Here’s the thing: What the three of us really wanted to do was fly to Maui, just like Leo thought, and laze on the warm sand, chilling for about a month. Unfortunately, Adonis-Giuseppe had ruined that fantasy.

The man was on his way to Italy to return my dad’s ring, and there was no way he was going to do that without us.





Coming in March 2013

The Spia Family Branches Out



Mia’s much anticipated arrival in Italy is met with yet another murder. A woman’s body is found in her room, and it’s quickly apparent this botched hit was meant for Mia. Discovering why she has a target on her back leads Mia to more dead bodies and soon she and her best friend Lisa Lin find themselves enmeshed in a feud between three mob families all vying for an ancient olive grove. And to make matters worse, her once missing father has plans to marry her off to the oldest son of a mob boss.

Now there’s an arranged wedding in her future, several dead bodies in her past, and an ancient olive grove with disappearing trees. If Mia thought the murder in Sonoma was complicated by family, it’s nothing compared to the quagmire she finds herself trapped in while visiting with Papa in Italy.