Phantom

September 10, 1944

“You know I don’t take kindly to not bein’ paid what I’m owed, don’tcha, Paulie?”

The rage simmering in Angelo Salvatore’s brown eyes has always had a profound effect. It should be photographed, destined to become a cursed image. If you meet that black stare, you’re doomed to a terrible fate.

“Of course, boss,” Paulie responds mechanically. He stands to my left, solid on his feet, despite being on the receiving end of a vicious glare.

I sit before Angelo’s desk, keeping my stare pinned just above his head where Mona Lisa is hanging. Alfonso sits to my right, puffing on a cigar and staring at the painting as well, appearing uninterested.

However, I know he’s hanging onto every word spoken.

“This Johnathan Parsons, he can’t seem to get his act together, can he? He owes us money, he pays it back, then finds himself in debt again. This is, what, the third time he gambled with Tommy and put himself in the hole?” Angelo looks to me for confirmation.

I tighten my lips and nod.

John has had to pay off the Salvatores twice before, plus interest. Just barely, he managed to scrape by from the money he makes from his business. But just last month, John got drunk and insisted on playing again, intent on making Tommy owe him money instead.

He lost miserably, and this time, he owes Tommy an amount of money he may never be able to pay back.

“Ronnie, how much is he in the hole for this time?” Angelo asks, twirling a pure-gold box cutter between his fingers, which are adorned in rubies, sapphires, and emeralds, all housed in the same expensive metal.

If anyone dared to gift him silver, he’d likely shoot them in the face.

My friend has expensive tastes.

“He’s down about fifteen large,” I answer.

Angelo pauses, the box cutter glinting in the overhead light. We lock stares, and the slightest snarl curls his upper lip. Then he’s swinging the blade toward Paulie. “Take care of it. Immediately.”

I move my gaze to above his head once more while Paulie asks, “Any particular method, boss?”

He waves a dismissive hand and sets down his box cutter with the other. “Don’t burn him yet. He’s got a wife and kid at home. Take the broad hostage until he pays his dues.”

My teeth clench, and decades of practice keep my fists from curling.

John Parsons has overstepped, and it’s not uncommon to threaten family members to get someone in line. And while being a don doesn’t come without violence, I trust Angelo to treat Genevieve Parsons well.

However, I simply will not tolerate my boss kidnapping my girl. Not unless I want to sign a death warrant and put a bullet through his skull.

“I expect his payment soon,” Angelo finishes, grabbing a cigar from the tin on his desk along with his cigar cutter. He holds up the tool. “Or I’ll be choppin’ off the tips of your wife’s fingers with this.”

Paulie doesn’t react. He’s only twenty-five years old, but he’s a damn-good enforcer, and ruthless too.

While he wasn’t born into the family, he’s worked for the Salvatores for years and became a made man at the ripe age of eighteen. When he was twenty-two, he was drafted into the military and fought in WWII until last year. He was too close to a mine when it detonated, resulting in his losing an arm and eventually being honorably discharged. He wears a prosthetic, but Paulie’s missing limb is not a weakness.

The kid is very dangerous, and thanks to the unimaginable horrors in the war, he is experienced in the art of masking emotions. Not much fazes him.

“Of course, boss,” he answers mildly.

I’m lucky enough not to have a family like Paulie or some of the other men that work for the Salvatore family.

When I was eight, my father died in battle during WWI at only twenty-six years old. Devastated, my mother wasted away in a bottle until she died when I was twenty. I never had siblings, and neither did my parents.

The only family I had was Angelo himself. He’s four years older, but we played in the same streets as kids, the two of us bonding over our Sicilian roots and parents that forced us to grow up far quicker than we should’ve. His father was the don of the Salvatore family and raised him in this life. As his best friend, I grew up in the family business alongside him.

Angelo served in the military as soon as he turned eighteen, and by the time he completed his service, I was being sworn in. I was only twenty-one when I lost vision in my left eye to a piece of shrapnel, rendering me unfit to serve. After they honorably discharged me, I came home to Angelo being the don of the Salvatore family, married to Carmella, and a father to a kid with a second on the way. He brought me in immediately, naming me his consigliere.

The Salvatores are all I’ve had since my father passed.

Otherwise, I’m alone.

Something that Angelo has tried to correct, consistently berating me for ending the Capello bloodline with me. But I’ve made peace with that.

He wants me to marry and have kids of my own. Or as I see it, marry and produce collateral for rival families to use against me. Angelo named me the godfather of all four of his sons, and that was enough for me. I helped raise those boys as if they were my own. I wanted nothing more than that.

Since the moment I realized I was going to be a made man, I chose to be alone. The only life anyone can threaten is my own, and sometimes, that’s not enough to scare a man whose insides are slowly rotting away. I have no death wish, but some days, I have no will to live, either.

Now, one little bird is going to ruin that for me.

Not only is Genevieve my sole reason for living but she’s also the piece of shrapnel that I can’t seem to remove. She’s a weakness, and one day, she just might be the death of me.

Angelo waves a hand and mutters, “Out of my face, Paulie. And I don’t want to see you again until you return with the money John Parsons owes me and a smile on that ugly mug.”

The enforcer is out of Angelo’s office in two seconds, leaving the three of us alone.

Alfonso speaks first. “John was playing against a Baldelli two nights ago, I hear. Managed to swindle him out of a grand, then lost it to Moe last night. Word is that Baldelli feels Moe reached in his pockets and stole the money himself. This John guy is causin’ more trouble than he’s worth.”

“He’s worth the cost of the bullet that I’ll lodge in his skull, the deadbeat,” Angelo retorts.

“Then what of his family?” I cut in. “His child?”

Angelo is a family man, and this is a cold way to remind him that John is not alone in life. His threat to Paulie’s wife is a threat he’ll make good on, but not one he’ll enjoy. Leaving a woman and a child alone without a man to provide for them is not something he’d get a kick out of, either.

“What would you have me do, Ronnie?” Angelo asks, annoyance in his tone as he splays out his hands to his sides. “The man clearly doesn’t give a damn about his family—and that alone is a reason to pop him.”

“All I ask is you give him a chance,” I reason. “A dead man can’t pay you back, and his wife and kid don’t deserve more trouble.”

Angelo grunts, then puffs on his cigar, looking thoughtfully at the Proserpine painting on the opposite wall. He paid an obscene amount of money for it, and I’m convinced he holds it in as high a regard as his own wife.

“I may be a godly man, Ronnie, but I am not a patient one. His wife better pray he loves her enough to get his act together.”

I’ve never been a godly man, yet I pray he does, too.