Mac didn’t know, and he had no idea how to answer her.
There were still so many things left hanging up in the air. His actions leading up to finding his wife—like his choice to go after Enzo’s son—were just some of the many things he would have to handle over the coming months. The attention of officials was yet another problem that only seemed to be closing in around la famiglia, though Mac seriously hoped that would be lessened by the fact at least one of the people that had been talking to police was now dead in a ditch.
Tyler, that was.
But how much information could the officials be getting from an unmade kid with an underboss for a father?
“Don’t worry about it,” Mac found himself saying.
He’d said it only to soothe his wife’s worries.
Certainly not because he meant it.
Melina could see right through it. “Are we going to be okay at the end of all this?”
That, Mac did have an answer for.
One he was sure was the truth because he would make it happen, no matter what.
“Yeah, doll, we’re going to be just fine.”
Mac had thought—wrongly so—that his greatest battle in Cosa Nostra would be overcoming the shame his father had left stained on their family’s name.
That wasn’t the hardest battle at all.
No, the hardest was watching the strong foundation of a Cosa Nostra family, built so firmly upon a base of loyalty, rules, and trust, begin to show its cracks. Because once the cracks began to show themselves, it wouldn’t take long for the walls to come down.
Mac watched a month go by, and then another and another. He felt his wife’s stomach grow under his palm until he could feel the gentle kicks of a baby that wouldn’t quite cooperate during ultrasounds to see the gender. He waited the seasons changing out, wanting warmer weather and less cold.
But what he didn’t see, what didn’t happen, was la famiglia coming back together.
So much distrust and anger had been woven into the strands of the Pivetti crime family. Each and every time another made man in the family was pulled in by FBI, the attention of the family was on that man, accusations flying and suspicions rising.
Why hadn’t the officials stopped yet?
Why were they still digging for things no one was offering?
No one seemed to have an answer for that.
Disgruntled Capos left crews hanging and unable to work together. Meetings called by Luca in an effort to straighten out the men usually ended in shouting matches that damn near came to blows every single time.
It was all bad.
Mac thought about the last few months as he walked into Luca’s office, a late night call that was once again, meant only for the purpose of smoothing out issues between men.
It seemed like if one problem was solved, three more popped up.
Luca was struggling with his men.
Mac and Enzo happened to be two of them, unfortunately.
The moment Mac walked into the office, he found the underboss in the corner, a glass of whiskey in his hand and hate coloring up his features.
“Good to see you finally showed up,” Enzo said.
Mac refused to rise to the man’s bait.
Because that’s all it was.
Enzo couldn’t retaliate against Mac for the killing of his teenaged son, if only because it was justified in the eyes of Cosa Nostra. Permission had been given by the boss, and Tyler had not been a made man. But that didn’t mean Enzo accepted those rules, or for that matter, the very fact that his best friend—Luca—had allowed the killing.
Apparently, Mac’s wife could be replaced.
Tyler could not be.
Mac didn’t think the two should have been seen as interchangeable souls. Both meant something to the people who loved them, and while he wished things could have been different for Enzo’s son, it was what it was.
And Mac would put another bullet between the kid’s eyes if he had to.
But that moment was over.
“I’m not late,” Mac said, strolling past another Capo to take a seat against the far wall. It left his back protected, and his gaze on the whole room. With the amount of unhappiness in the family, Mac trusted none of these people. Except for maybe the boss. Giving Luca his attention, he said, “Evening, boss.”
Luca, sitting on the edge of his desk, nodded at Mac. “You are cutting it close.”
“Late night cravings,” Mac said to explain away his tardiness.
At the mention of his pregnant wife, Enzo’s anger turned to disgust and he looked away. Not in time to hide it, however.
More bait, Mac knew.
He wouldn’t rise to it.
Enzo only wanted a reason to come at Mac, to have his retaliation, and nothing more.
Refusing to even give Enzo more of his attention, Mac swept the large office with his gaze, taking in the men that couldn’t be bothered to talk to one another, and barely even looked at one another.
He was never more aware of how awful an effect the official’s attention and the events that led up to it were affecting the men.