That’s Miles’s boy.
Letty could not help but laugh as she watched Miles reach the top step. He turned around, almost as if he knew she was watching him, and waved to her with a smile. She honked the horn before pulling off down the long Sycamore-lined driveway. Turning right from the Capadonno compound, Letty pulled onto Vandemeer Parkway and left the stressful mood behind her. Vandemeer Parkway is a major thoroughfare through Carrion. Though the town is surrounded by forest on all four sides, the town is brick and mortar. It has a big city feel with the sidewalks lining each street, row homes and plenty of corner stores and little boutiques. The tallest building in town is all of three stories tall, and it’s the clock tower at City Hall. Letty lived on the opposite side of town from the Capadonno compound, but tonight she was not heading straight home. She wanted to pay her father a visit.
He lives alone now, after my mother passed away last June, and he’s terrible at taking care of himself. His idea of a square meal is a cigarette, a beer, and a bag of potato chips.
Walking into the corner row house at 201 Mulberry Terrace, Letty found her father, Juan, laid out on the couch, half asleep watching the hockey game.
“Hey Dad…” Letty called out, almost screaming over the noise of the game.
“Hey! Where’s my grandson?” he asked, just barely poking his head up from his pillow.
“Sitter’s. I’m just getting off work,” Letty explained as she sat down beside him on the couch. Her father’s eyes zoned in on her legs which were bouncing up and down from anxiety.
“What’s wrong?” Letty’s father asked her.
“Nothing,” she insisted, giving him a wide-eyed look. “I’m fine.”
Juan continued to eye Letty up and down. Letty forced her legs to stop bouncing, but that didn’t keep her father from thinking she needs a hero.
“No you’re not! What happened?”
“Dad, really… I’m fine.”
“Did that greaseball do somethin’? I told you I don’t like you working for him!”
“Calm your nerves, tough guy! The money I earn from Mr. Capadonno helped pay off this house so…” Letty explained.
“Then what’s up? I can see it all over your face. Something has you thinking…” Juan insisted.
The man can read my body language like a book.
“Heaven forbid I think…” Letty said with a laugh.
“No, no, no! You’re not escaping this conversation!”
Letty sighed as she looked at her old man.
Jesus, he’s persistent.
Finally, she relented, “Miles was released from prison today.”
Juan looked up at Letty with a shocked look upon his face.
“Did he bother you? I’ll ring his scrawny neck!”
Rolling her eyes, Letty replied, “No, Dad… and Miles isn’t scrawny. He’s huge.”
“Fat?”
Letty laughed. “No, Dad. He’s built like a brick shit house.”
“Nothing else to do in the can except hit the weights, I guess.”
“I guess. He was never a little guy, though…” Letty explained.
“I don’t care how big he is! I’ll knock ’em down to size!”
“Down, killer!”
Letty’s father rolled his eyes as he grumbled at the TV.
“Oh well, I just figured I’d stop in to see if you needed anything,” Letty explained. “Did you eat?”
Letty looked at the coffee table that had a half empty beer and an ashtray full of cigarette butts.
Juan shook his head as he replied, “No. I wasn’t hungry. I grabbed a beer and watched the game.”
Rolling her eyes once again, Letty spat back, “You need to eat!”
“There’s nothing in. I have to go to the market. Maybe I’ll just order some take-out. Do ya want something?” Juan offered.
“No! You keep Lucky Panda in business! Tell me what you want, and I’ll come back and make it for you.”
“You don’t have to go to all that trouble, Letty!”
“Shut up! It’s no trouble, now what do you want?”
As she waited for him to make up his mind, her cell phone rang. At first, Letty wondered if it was Miles, but then she realized that he didn’t have her number. As she pulled her cell phone from her pocket, Michael Capadonno’s photo popped up on the screen.
“Why is he calling?” Letty said out loud with a look of confusion on her face.
“Who?” Juan barked. “Miles?”
Giving her father a look of contempt, she said, “No! Michael…”
Letty’s father screwed up his nose as he said in an angry voice, “The Butcher.”
Sighing heavily, Letty picked up the phone.
He’s one person’s phone calls you don’t let drop to voicemail.
“Hello?” Letty asked in her most cheerful voice.
“Bellissima… are you okay, pretty girl?” Michael asked Letty in a charming tone of voice. “I just told off my idiot son for scaring you like that.”
“Oh, no, Michael. I wasn’t scared. Just surprised,” Letty explained.