I didn’t wait for an answer. I just slid out of the booth. It wasn’t until I reached for the keys to the Porsche that I realized I still had those two quarters between my fingers. I slipped them into my front pocket and drove back to Antonio.
I was a killer. For real and for sure. I couldn’t hang on Paulie’s working lungs and heart anymore. It was homicide because his death was inevitable. And still, I didn’t feel as bad as I thought I would.
Maybe I had been born for this. Maybe it was in my blood. Which gave me an idea. A disturbing idea, but one that might work. I pulled up to the safe house convinced it was our only option.
Antonio met me on the porch.
“You’re supposed to stay inside,” I said as I stepped up.
“It’s too nice a day,” he lied. It was clammy and cold.
“Do we know if Valentina’s still at the hospital?”
“She is.”
“I thought of something,” I said. “Remember what you told me about my family? Our history? Who we are?”
“Yes?”
“I think I can get us in. But I don’t know if it’ll come with a way out.”
thirty-nine.
theresa
o radio,” Antonio said, snapping it off. I’d heard his name and turned up the car stereo. It had started pouring on the way to Sequoia, and the pat pat pat on the roof and puh puh puh on the windows was going to drive me nuts. It was dusk already.
“They might be saying something we can use,” I objected but didn’t try to turn the radio back on.
What was it like to have your name all over the media in connection with something as evil as murder? I didn’t know. I only knew what it was like to be the actual murderer. I put my back to the passenger door and slipped out of my shoes. Antonio had driven, even though it was Otto’s car. We’d parked in the outdoor lot across the street from Sequoia and were waiting for Antonio’s only loyal friend to appear with the one person who could help us get in.
“Trust me,” he said, “I’ve done this before. Those reports aren’t doing anything but worrying you. Half of what they’re saying is lies, and the other half are things we already know.”
He was right. I’d been intimate with the media and what they fed to the public.
He took out his pack of cigarettes and shook out the last one. I reached for it, slipping it out before his lips got on it. He raised an eyebrow at me.
“Light me up, Capo.”
He clacked open his lighter and I dragged on it until it was lit. I handed the cigarette back to him while blew out the smoke. I hadn’t smoked since high school, when I wanted to impress Rachel, who was so cool she seemed other worldly.
Antonio took the cigarette, regarding me before putting it in his lips. I liked everything about the way he did it. The placement of the cigarette between his fingers, the shape of his lips as he pulled on it, and the snap as he removed it.
“How can you look so relaxed?” I asked, taking the smoke from him.
“I can ask you the same.”
“I’m worried about Otto.” I flicked the ashes in the tray.
“He can do more with eight fingers than most men can do with twelve.”
I cocked my head at him. He just looked out the window, touching his lower lip before it stretched into a grin. I jabbed his knee with my foot.
“You’re better than that joke.”
He put his hand on my foot and ran it up as far as my pants would allow. “No, I’m not. Do you think you can live with a man who makes jokes like that for the rest of your life?”
“I think there’s a regular comedian in there.” I handed him the cigarette, flame side up. “We just have to draw him out.”
“I wish I could laugh.” He shook his head a little, still smiling slightly. “I met your father a long time ago, while I was consigliere for Donna Maria. He was building something in our territory. There were union issues. He might remember me.”
“This should be a fun get-together then.” I wasn’t surprised my father had worked with the mob. I was pretty sure that wasn’t his first business deal with them, or his last.
“I’m wondering, should I ask him for your hand tonight? Or wait until we’re both in jail?”