All I Believe (28 page)

“I never would have predicted that Luca and I would end up here,” Andreo murmured.

“It’s all coming full circle,” I said. “Our families were the best of friends once. It’s taken a long time, but we found our way back together.”

“Just like you and your boy by the fountain,” Vincent said with a grin.

Andreo got up and said with a smirk, “Okay, I sense a group hug coming on, and that shit can’t happen. I’m going to go downstairs and learn what the hell a Flaming Titanic is. Jerry will probably be home from his gala in about two hours, give or take. That’s when we all pay him a visit, apparently with joined hands while singing Kumbaya.”

As he headed for the door, Luca said, “You can pretend you’re a cynic, but I know different. I saw that kiss, Andreo. There’s one particular Dombruso who got under your skin a long time ago. It’s pointless to deny it.”

“Not discussing this!” Andreo yelled as he walked a little faster.

Downstairs, a party was going on. Nana had filled her giant, crystal punchbowl with all kinds of liquor. Apparently it included Curacao, since the whole thing was vividly blue. A plastic cruise ship floated in the center of the punchbowl, amid pineapple rings that reminded me of life preservers. The boat was populated with a couple dozen tiny male action figures. I had to wonder where Nana got them, since they were naked and anatomically correct.

To add to the party atmosphere, music was blaring, and little old ladies with martini glasses were twerking all over four big members of the security team, who stood at attention like the guards at Buckingham Palace. Jessie grinned and waved at me when we came in. He was sitting cross-legged on the counter, out of reach of the amorous dog, who sat on the floor whining for him.

“Oh, there you boys are,” Nana exclaimed. “We were waiting for you before we sparked this bad boy up!”

Ollie handed her a butane lighter, and my grandmother flicked the switch and held it over the punchbowl. A fireball roared toward the ceiling, twice as big as the one she’d mustered back in Italy. The difference was, Nana’s house, unlike my cousin Fiona’s, was wired with a sprinkler system. Immediately a siren started to blare, and little sprinkler heads popped out of the kitchen ceiling and began hosing all of us down.

Somehow, Nana and her friends just took that as a bonus, and sent up a cheer before they went back to dancing in the rain. The little plastic ship had warped from the flames, which still burned on the alcohol’s surface despite the sprinklers, and listed in a half-circle before sinking bow-first into the punchbowl.

“Yup. That’s a Flaming Titanic,” my boyfriend said.

“Welcome to the family, Luca.”

He kissed my forehead and pulled me close. “Thanks. I’m damn glad to be here.”

Two hours later, we were dried off and dressed, well, like members of the mafia. Somehow, that was just what you did when you set out to intimidate someone. I’d put on my best dark suit, and Luca did, too. His brother had gone by his apartment in Rome and packed a bag for him, so he looked like his old self again. Andreo, Vincent, and Dante were always in dark, expensive suits, so they were good to go.

We ended up parking around the corner from Jerry’s house, so we wouldn’t tip him off to our arrival, and as the five of us walked down the sidewalk, Vincent muttered, “I feel like I’m in Reservoir Dogs.”

“Oh my God, such a good movie,” Andreo exclaimed.

“The best,” Vincent said. “Tarantino at his finest.”

“You wanna pipe down, Siskel and Ebert?” Dante grumbled. “We need to get our game faces on.”

Vincent’s phone beeped, and his brother sighed. “What?” Vincent said as he pulled it out of his jacket pocket and looked at the screen. “My son sent me a funny cat video. He loves these things.” He hit play and began to chuckle.

“That’s it,” Dante said. “You can’t be my second in command when we take the family back. You’ve completely gone soft.”

“Bite me, Dante,” Vincent said, then hit play on the video again and chuckled just as much as the first time.

When we rounded the corner onto Jerry’s street, I mumbled, “Oh shit.” People were coming from every direction and congregating in front of my cousin’s house. I was related to all of them. “Jerry must have known we were coming. He mobilized the family.”

“Actually,” Dante said, “I think they’re here because I told our cousin Carla to put out feelers and see who’s still on our side.”

A long, white stretch limo pulled up just as we reached the front of the house, painted with a rainbow and what, I’m sorry, just had to be a giant dong on the side. “Oh hell,” Dante muttered as Nana and everyone from her impromptu party started pouring out of the back of the limo, including the big security guards who were supposed to be keeping her at home. “What happened to not letting her leave?” Dante asked one of them, who still sported a face full of makeup.

“It’s not right to keep your grandmother locked up,” the man told him. “She got us to see the error of our ways, and then hired us to back you up when you go take down the dirty, rotten, back-stabbing fucker who’s trying to ruin your family. Her words, not mine.” The security guard colored a bit under his rouge.

Dante sighed and said, “Fine,” then went to work trying to keep Nana from charging Jerry’s house.

While that was happening, I took a deep breath, then stepped forward to address the crowd. I said somewhat loudly, “Thanks for coming. I’m sure you’ve all been hearing plenty about what’s been going on in the family lately, some of it truth, some of it rumor. Here are the facts: I fell in love with one of Sal Natori’s sons. That’s it. Two people found love, and for that, Jerry thinks we should pay. He took a hit out on my boyfriend and his brother, whose only crime was being born into a family we erroneously considered our enemy.”

A murmur went through the crowd and I tried to gauge their reaction. Dante stepped forward and put his hand on my shoulder, then said, “Sal Natori paid with his life for what he did to my parents and sister. That should have been the end of it. Luca and Andreo had nothing to do with their father’s actions. They were kids when Sal Natori crossed that line, just like I was.”

The crowd started talking, but fell silent when Dante said loudly, “I’m here for two reasons: to stand with Nico and Luca, and to come out of retirement and take back control of this family. Jerry has shown me he’s not the right man to lead us. How is going after Sal Natori’s sons any different than Sal coming after my sister and brothers and me that night two decades ago?”

From somewhere in the crowd, my cousin Carla said, “Damn, he’s right.” There was a murmur of agreement.

“We’re going in there to get Jerry’s resignation, and to get him to call off that hit,” Dante said, gesturing at the house. “When this is all said and done, I won’t hold a grudge against him, and I hope none of you do, either. He was trying to protect our family. He just went about it in the wrong way. I don’t want to see the family splintered because of this, so we all need to find a way to move past it.”

“Good speech,” Nana yelled. “Now get in there and kick his ass if he won’t listen to reason!”

Andreo handed his brother the briefcase and said, “Go get him.”

Luca took a deep breath and nodded, then started to stride toward the house with all of us right behind him. But a moment later, the crowd parted and Jerry walked toward us, dressed in a tuxedo and an elegant wool overcoat. He looked troubled as he said, “I didn’t even think about it. I didn’t think about the fact that going after his sons was just like Sal Natori going after my uncle Paulie’s kids, but it is, isn’t it? I crossed the same line. It makes no difference that they’re grown men and not children. I wanted to make them pay for the crimes of their father.” Jerry ran a hand over his face and said, “Shit. I totally fucked up.”

“Damn right you did!” Nana yelled.

“So, all of a sudden you’re willing to listen to reason?” Dante said.

Jerry turned to him and said, “I was so pissed off at you for disrespecting me. Frankly I’m still pissed that you lied about who these two were at first. But Jesus, when I heard you say that about going after Sal’s kids, I felt like a fuckin’ monster. How could I not have seen that?”

“We were taught to hate all Natoris equally and without question. No good ever comes from prejudice like that,” Dante said.

Jerry came up to my boyfriend and extended his hand. “I’m Jerry Dombruso,” he said, “and I owe you a huge fuckin’ apology.”

Luca shook his hand, his eyes wary. “Luca Caruso. This is my brother, Andreo Natori.” Andreo and Jerry shook hands as well.

Jerry turned to me and said, “Nick, I’m sorry.”

“A good way to prove it would be to call off the hit,” I said.

“Yeah, shit,” Jerry said, pulling out his phone. “Come into the house, let’s have a drink while I get this fixed. Jesus, I need a double after all this.” He turned and started to walk to his front door, the crowd parting for him again.

“Well damn, that was anticlimactic,” Nana griped.

“Good,” Dante said. “This family doesn’t need any more drama. Sorry about putting you under house arrest, Nana, but now that you’re free and so many of your friends are with you, why don’t you go celebrate? They’re hosting a wet brief contest at that new gay bar in the Mission, didn’t you say something about wanting to check that out?”

“Oh hell, that’s tonight,” she exclaimed as she rushed back to the limo. “Come on, peeps, we gotta be somewhere!”

Her entourage piled back into the vehicle, and as Jessie pulled away from the curb and the crowd dispersed, Dante gestured at Jerry’s house and told Luca and me, “Come on, let’s go have that drink.”

I asked, “Do you really believe this is over, just like that?”

Dante said, “Jerry’s a smart man. I’ll bet he got a notification that all his accounts were empty, and when he tried to get at the family funds and couldn’t, he figured out I was the one behind it. He saw the tide was turning, we’d gained the upper hand. Pushing back would have left him penniless, so he went this route to get back in my good graces.”

“Do you think he really called off the hit?” I asked, picking up Luca’s hand as we walked toward the house.

“I’ll make sure of it.”

“How?”

“I’m going to keep control of Jerry’s assets,” Dante said, “he’s going to be on a tight allowance until he proves we can trust him. Calling off Connie is the first step in rebuilding that trust.”

“Are you still going to go through with assuming control of the family?” Andreo asked as he fell into step with us.

“I have to. Jerry can’t be left in charge. I’ll make him a good offer though, third in command after Vincent, assuming my brother still wants the job,” Dante said.

“Sure, but do you really want to keep Jerry in a position of power?” Vincent asked.

His brother told him, “You know the old adage, keep your friends close and your enemies closer. I have no idea which one Jerry is, I guess time will tell. But either way, I want him where I can keep an eye on him.”

Luca turned to Andreo and said as he handed him the briefcase, “All your hard work was for nothing, cutting off the money was enough.”

Andreo passed the briefcase to Dante and said, “You never know where you stand with a man like Jerry, so we might want to hang on to this. If he finds a way around his financial situation, he might start to get ideas.”

“That,” Dante said, “is an excellent suggestion.”

*****

During our two-hour ‘sit-down’, as Andreo called it, Jerry had seemed contrite, and plied us with expensive Scotch while apologizing repeatedly. Dante meanwhile told him very calmly about the restructuring of the family, and how he’d be retaining control of Jerry’s finances, just to make sure everyone remained on the same page. Since the entire family had shown up in support of Dante, Jerry knew where he stood. Refusing to give up control wasn’t an option.

After we left Jerry’s house, Dante was in a particularly upbeat mood. He called his husband and Vincent’s, and all of us met up with Nana and her cohorts at the bar. “God bless America,” Andreo said as he ran his gaze up and down the muscle men in tighty whities who were onstage for the wet brief contest.

Luca started to look tired after about an hour, so we said goodnight to everyone and went outside to hail a cab. The fall night was brisk and foggy, and I gathered Luca into my arms to keep him warm as we waited for a taxi. “Do you think it’s really over?” he asked as he rested his forehead against mine and wrapped his hands around my waist. “Dante basically just went in and chopped your cousin’s balls off. Is Jerry really just going to let him get away with that?”

“I don’t think he has a choice.”

“He could still carry out that hit, just out of spite.”

“He could, but I don’t think he will. Maybe I should make a call, just to be sure.”

I pulled out my phone, found a number in my contacts, and dialed it. When the call connected I said, “You’re a total fucking asshole, Connie.”

“Ah, Darling Nicky.” I winced at the nickname. My brother had tortured me with it mercilessly when he’d discovered that Prince song during our childhood. “I’ve been expecting your call for
days
. I was beginning to think you didn’t love me anymore.”

“Oh, I don’t.”

“Now don’t be that way. I still love you, even if you did just call me at this ungodly hour! Do you realize what time it is in Rome?”

“You’re in Rome?’

“Did I not just say that?”

“In that case it’s nine a.m. there.”

“Yes! Like I said, ungodly!”

I fought back a sigh and said, “Did Jerry call you earlier tonight?”

“Why yes. Twice, actually. Once to tell me not to shoot your love muffin or his brother the antichrist, and again a couple hours later to tell me about the new world order. Or, the old world order, I suppose. Anyway, he told me Dante’s back in charge, and that he’s holding Jerry’s purse strings. I never liked old Jer, I’m glad he’s getting what’s coming to him.”

“If you never liked him, why’d you agree to do his dirty work?”

“Hey, a job’s a job,” my brother said.

“Asshole.”

He clicked his tongue and said, “You’re so foulmouthed these days! Must be the company you’re keeping.”

I frowned and asked, “Why are you in Rome?”

“Jer hired me to do a job, remember?”

“Andreo was there for a week. He even went by his brother’s apartment at one point to pack some clothes for him. Either you totally suck as a hitman, or you knew he was in town but couldn’t make yourself kill him.”

“Or maybe your future brother-in-law Fred Flintstone is stealthier than you’re giving him credit for.” I had to grin a little. That wasn’t the most off-base nickname for Andreo. A cab pulled onto the street just then, and I stuck my arm out.

As it came to a stop in front of us and Luca and I got in, I said, “Do you swear to me Jerry called off the hit?”

“Scout’s honor.”

“You were never a scout.”

“Fine, then assassin’s honor.”

“I can’t believe this is what you did with your life,” I said.

“So judgmental!”

I sighed at that as Luca gave the cab driver Nana’s address. After a moment I asked, “Are you really coming home for Christmas?”

“What?”

“You said something about that in Tahiti, after you got done pointing a gun at me.”

“Actually, I was pointing it at your snookie wookie. You just got in the way,” Connie said. “He’s a grade-A hottie, incidentally. You’ve done well for yourself.”

“What, no digs about him being a Natori?”

“Like I give a shit who his daddy was.”

“So you really were going to kill him just for the money.”

Connie sighed dramatically. “Oh. My. God. You’re the most judgmental person on Earth, Nicky!”