Antony (18 page)

Chapter Nineteen

Like Antony’s initiation, young Giovanni’s took forever.

When it was time for the boss to step back into the light to cut the man, make him speak the rules and his oath, Antony was the one who emerged into the circle. Confused murmurs passed through the warehouse. Antony continued walking forward until he was standing toe to toe with a smirking Giovanni.

I’ll get you the button, kid
.

Antony had made him that promise long ago. He was going to fulfill that promise quite literally tonight.

“Your hand?” Antony asked.

Giovanni held out his hand, palm up. Antony was still waiting for any made man in the warehouse to realize something was seriously wrong, find the light switch, and expose what had happened. No one did.

“There is no need for a gun, Giovanni. No need for a bullet to show you what will happen if you can’t speak and finish your oath truthfully and completely,” Antony said quietly. “You know what will happen.”

“You’ll kill me.”

“I will.” Antony pulled a pocketknife from his pocket, the one his father had given him all those years ago. It was still the favorite of his collection. He cut a long, three-inch slice across Giovanni’s palm, but he didn’t remove the knife. “Hold on to this, Gio. Let your cut bleed around the blade. Let the pain remind you of the scar you’ll keep from this night forward and what it all means. It’s significant—this thing of ours, it’s so important that sometimes we forget why it is and what makes it like it is. What’s more important is ensuring it remains ours. I expect you to do that as well.”

Giovanni nodded, but he stayed quiet, holding tight to the knife as he’d been instructed. He didn’t flinch and Antony knew it had to hurt like hell.

“The rules,” Antony said. “Tell me them.”

Calmly, in a clear voice and sure of his wants, Giovanni recited Cosa Nostra’s most fundamental rules. Antony had broken one of them tonight.

Never take the life of another made man.

He didn’t regret it.

He couldn’t.

“Do you come into this thing of ours willingly?” Antony asked.

“Yes,” Giovanni replied.

“The oath, then.”

Antony listened as words were spoken, ones he knew by heart, ones he knew the rest of the men in the warehouse did, too. A solid, grounding feeling had settled over his heart, calming his nerves finally.

“Turn on the lights,” Antony demanded when Giovanni finished.

As the warehouse lit up, Antony didn’t move a single muscle. Two bangs—gunshots—echoed through the warehouse. He didn’t need to turn to know what happened.

Paulie had done his job. Both Vinnie’s new underboss and consigliere had been killed.

It was the mafia way, after all.

Angry, confused shouts ricocheted through the warehouse. The men could see Vinnie’s body. They could see Paulie with guns aimed and waiting. It didn’t take a genius to figure out what had happened.

Tonight, the warehouse would go, burned to the ground. In the morning, Vinnie’s body would be discovered as would the corpses of his men.

Before the men of the Catrolli crime family left, they would understand two things.

One, they had a new boss.

And two, Catrolli didn’t exist.

Only Marcello.

Antony didn’t look away from Giovanni.

“Welcome to
la famiglia
.”

“Thank you, Boss.”

• • •

Sitting on the couch, Antony stared at the wall as daylight filtered through the large windows of his home. After he had arrived back at the Marcello mansion, he’d found a place to sit and he didn’t move.

Mostly, he needed to think.

Nothing would be the same, not that anything had since Johnathan’s murder. Now, it was going to be entirely different in another way. Antony wasn’t simply made, he was the boss. Being the Don had never been in his goals. It hadn’t ever crossed his mind until he didn’t have a choice.

Killing Vinnie meant making sure he wouldn’t face consequences afterward. The only way to do that was to hold the highest spot. So, Antony took it.

The sounds of feet pattering through the hallway toward the kitchen drew Antony’s attention in that direction. Pushing up from the couch, Antony made his way to where coffee was brewing. Cecelia hummed behind the kitchen counter, unknowing of what her husband had done the night before.

Her life would be different now, too.

Antony suspected she could handle it. Being a boss’s wife, a mafia queen. Cecelia Marcello was made for that.

Knowing her husband killed her father would be something else entirely.

“Cecelia,” Antony said quietly.

She didn’t hear him.

“Cecelia.”

His wife turned on her heel, surprise widening her pretty green eyes. It quickly turned to worry.

“Antony?”

“I’m sorry I didn’t call last night,
Tesoro
.”

Cecelia waved a hand in the air. “It’s okay. The boys kept me busy.”

They always did.

“What happened to your cheek?” Cecelia asked, leaning over the island counter to cup her husband’s face. Soothingly, her thumb rolled over his nasty scratch.

“Nothing important.”

“Well, it looks like it hurts, Antony.”

“I’m fine.”

“Is that blood on your shirt?” Cecelia asked.

Antony sighed, glancing down at the ruddy stain on his chest. “Yes, it is. The boys sleeping?”

“They played hard last night,” she said in explanation.

“I bet. You’re going to have to have a couple of enforcers trail you around for a little while, okay?”

“Why?” she asked.

Antony shrugged. “Just because.”

Because she was a boss’s wife. She would always be a target. Because cleaning up his Cosa Nostra meant cleaning up the other Cosa Nostra families in New York. If that meant the Grovatti family was wiped out in the process, so be it.

There were too many reasons to name.

“I need you safe,” Antony said quietly, figuring that was the best thing to say. “I love you, so I need you to be safe, Cecelia.”

“How long?” Cecelia asked.

Honesty was the best policy.

“Forever.”

Cecelia stilled, the cup of coffee she was lifting to her mouth freezing. “I beg your pardon?”

The kitchen phone started ringing, interrupting their conversation. It might as well have been the story of their life. Someone was always butting in. Someone always would. Antony wanted to prepare his wife for what that call would be about. He figured it might be better if he didn’t.

Checking the clock on the wall, Antony noted the time. Liliana liked to take her morning walk at the same time every day. She would have found her husband’s body at the end of their driveway thirty minutes or so ago.

This time, he knew what the call was about.

It was Cecelia who didn’t.

“Answer the phone,
Tesoro
,” Antony said.

“Antony?”

“Answer it.”

With a furrowed brow, Cecelia picked up the cordless phone and answered the call.

“Marcello home, Cecelia speaking.”

Instantly, blood drained from his wife’s pretty face. Antony could hear the frantic, desperate cries of his mother-in-law on the other end of the call, her words barely intelligible through her sobbing. Antony didn’t move or look away from Cecelia.

It didn’t take his wife long at all to put two and two together. She took in the sight of his scratch again, his dirty clothes and the bloodstain. She was probably noticing how tired he seemed and remembering his remarks about the bodyguards.

She knew.

“Ma,” Cecelia said, her voice faint and hoarse.

Liliana hysterics continued.

Cecelia’s gaze flitted over Antony’s stony features. Pain flickered in her eyes. Tears welled, threatening to fall. It was his only regret. Hurting Cecelia was a hard burden to carry. She hadn’t liked her father, sure, but Vinnie was still hers. He’d made her. Or, half of her, anyway.

Antony pulled out a folded up slip of paper, opened it, and placed it on the counter in full view of his wife’s gaze. It was little Luciano’s birth certificate. He still couldn’t find the boy. He didn’t know where to look or where Lina might have hidden him.

Cecelia didn’t touch the paper, but she looked it over. Without a word, Cecelia hung the phone up on her still crying mother.

“My father,” Cecelia said, shaking her head.

The tears finally started to fall.

“I’m sorry.”

“You … did you?”

“Yes,” Antony murmured.

“God, why?”

Antony tapped the birth certificate with one finger. “For him.”

“But—”

“Vinnie killed his mother, too. John’s mistress. He killed her. This little boy is out there somewhere, Cecelia. John’s boy is out there.”

“Luciano.”

“Like Lucky,” Antony said. “The old school mobster Lucky.”

“Lucky,” his wife echoed.

“Pray this little boy can own his name until I find him.”

Cecelia’s gaze snapped up to meet Antony’s. “Find him?”

“I need to bring this boy home, Cecelia. I owe it John and I needed to make it safe. So yeah, Vinnie had to go.”

His wife looked as though she was going to be sick.

It was a hard thing to realize your husband was a monster.

Antony didn’t fault Cecelia for her feelings.

“Find him,” his wife repeated.

“That’s what I said.”

“No, Antony, find this little boy.”

• • •

Antony’s patience was worn terribly thin as he stayed quiet in the corner, observing family and friends mourning over the man he killed only three weeks before. The officials had refused to release the body for the longest time, but eventually, they just didn’t have a choice. With nothing to go on, Vinnie’s corpse was released to his family with the permission for a burial.

Cecelia opened their home to family and friends after the funeral services. He supposed this was all a part of the show, after all. They needed to keep up appearances.

He suspected most knew, or if not, they had a damn good inkling it was him who took Vinnie’s life.

Antony offered Paulie a nod as the man rested to the wall beside his old friend.

“How’re you doing?” Paulie asked.

“Better,” Antony admitted.

“Cecelia?”

“Talking to me.”

Paulie chuckled. “That’s more than last week.”

“Dante made her feel guilty, I think. He asked why she was mad at me, so she lied and told him she wasn’t. She’s been talking to me for the boys’ sake ever since.”

“She’ll—”

“Be pissed for a long time,” Antony interjected with a shrug. “And rightfully so.”

“It’ll get better.”

“When?”

“A while,” Paulie responded.

“How’re the men?” Antony asked.

Paulie cocked a brow, glancing pointedly around the room. “Take a look, Boss.”

“
Hmm
, but you’re closer to them right now than I am. It’s your job as my consigliere to know these things, right?”

“They’re … compliant.”

Antony nodded. “Let’s keep them that way.”

“And Kate?” Paulie asked.

Well, Antony still hadn’t decided on that one.

“Cecelia would never forgive me. She hates her, I know she does, but … I don’t know, it’s family, Paulie.”

“I get that,” his friend said softly.

Antony glanced across the room, finding Kate immediately.

The bitch was staring right at him.

“But, she knows, too,” Antony added.

Smiling and hoping Kate took the silent threat as a promise, Antony made the sign of a gun with his fingers and pointed it right at Kate, pulling the trigger. She flinched.

It was only just a matter of time.

“She knows.”

• • •

“Forgive me father, for I have sinned,” Antony murmured.

Father Peter’s quiet, rhythmic breathing soothed Antony in a way he couldn’t understand. Church had always been his safe haven, the place to calm his inner turmoil. From the other side of the confessional, Father Peter stayed silent until Antony was ready to continue.

“It’s been”—Antony cringed—“a long time since my last confession.”

“Ten years,” Father Peter said.

Antony laughed bleakly. “Has it been that long?”