I’ve been in Gunn’s office all day, trying to finish my spellbinding of the final quarts. My nerves are eating me alive, over everything that’s about to happen tonight, and worrying about my family and Alex. Everything will work out, I repeat like a prayer. This is all almost over.
I’m done around half past six. I’ve never wanted to see my family more than at this moment. My plan is for Ben and Ruby to stay upstairs, wait behind my locked bedroom door for me and Alex to execute our sting, for the Feds to come, before we get them out and leave this house of tricks behind.
So when Gunn comes in a little while later, I stand up from my chair. I try to remember that he has no idea what’s about to happen, that he’s in the dark, that Alex and I are the sorcerers behind this elaborate performance. So I say as confidently as I can, “I think it’s time I see my family, Mr. Gunn. The shipment is ready. And D Street should be arriving soon, so I better get on upstairs.” He doesn’t answer, just stares. “It’s important to me, before the deal goes down, to see them. As motivation, like you said.”
“How interesting,” Gunn finally answers, slowly, “that you listen to some things I have to say, but not others.” I know Gunn and his loaded meanings too well, and a chill starts to crawl up my spine.
He shuts his office door. And then he takes a step closer, rests his hand on his desk, and looks up at me with those searing eyes. “Do you know why I’m partnering with D Street, Joan?”
His question catches me by surprise, but he doesn’t wait for me to answer.
“My father, Danny Gunn, once ran the Shaws. His cousin was his right-hand man. This cousin was a hothead, a quick trigger, the antithesis of coolheaded Danny. They disagreed often, more often than not behind closed doors. Doors, of course, that as a small child, I was often behind as well.” Gunn uses a low, even, patient tone, like he’s telling me a story. “For example, McEvoy—he was my father’s right-hand man—never agreed with my father’s shaky peace with the Italian gang on the other side of town. McEvoy thought D Street constantly overstepped their bounds, and he started threatening violence when a group of Colletto’s thugs supposedly robbed a bank on the wrong side of gang lines,” he says. “Without consulting my father, McEvoy made an example out of a young D Street associate. Shot him down like a dog, right on 14th Street.” Gunn pauses. “Unfortunately, this young associate turned out to be the nephew of Boss Colletto.”
He shakes his head. “My father was livid, knew he had to punish McEvoy for acting out. But before he could, in retaliation for the Shaws’ murder of Colletto’s nephew, my father was killed in a street shootout orchestrated by D Street. McEvoy was unanimously voted in as boss, seeing as Danny’s son—yours truly—was a mere fifteen years old.”
Gunn turns to face me. “But instead of grooming me as a protégé, Boss McEvoy treated me like a threat. When I came of age, he gave me a figurehead title and a job running some half-rate shining room, which at the time was the lowest-earning operation the Shaws had a hand in,” he says. “And if things had gone just a bit differently, maybe I could have accepted my fate as low-level gofer, even been grateful for the chance McEvoy threw my way. Thing is, Joan, I knew all along that D Street hadn’t executed my father.”
This is the most Gunn has ever shared with me. And while I’ve got a clear sense of where the story’s going, I’m petrified over what it has to do with me.
“I was a young, slippery thing, never trusted McEvoy. I kept tabs on him—who he was meeting with, what he was scheming behind my father’s back. I tried to warn my father, but it was tough to get his ear.” Gunn looks at the floor. “Before his memorial service, I went to the morgue. I had to know for sure if my suspicions were right. The coroner confirmed my father’s head had been ripped open back to front. A near-range, personal kill. McEvoy’s kill, blamed on D Street, and he was left holding the keys to the Shaws.”
Gunn’s eyes get wider, brighter. “I acted like I knew nothing, of course. I put my head down, secretly planned my revenge. But do you know what that’s like, to live under the thumb of a man you despise? To live out each day in the shadow of someone who stole your life away?”
Immediately, I think of Mama and Uncle Jed. And I almost say, Of course I do. And maybe in another life, on another roll of fate’s dice, this story of Gunn’s would have bound us together, made us a formidable team.
But not in this one.
In this one, all I see is a shadow of a man. A ruthless, cunning killer.