For Nothing (8 page)

More disturbing than the scar however, was the fact that Rafael Rontego knew this man. This man was Sonne Pieri, the son of Sal Pieri. He was a smal time crew member who was al owed to scrape together a living because Joey Pieri, his uncle, peaceful y abdicated from the Buffalo Mafia’s top spot. The only thing that happened to him was the scar left on his face, a scar to remind him of his place.

More disturbing to Rontego was that this guy had been al owed to operate with the exclusive supervision of one man. That one man was Joe Falzone, the underboss for Don Ciancetta.

*

His black slacks and his jacket blended into the night. The few distinguishable features that stood out on Victor Garducci were his necklace and other gold paraphernalia. They glinted off the street lamps, no matter how dim, as he walked with purpose towards Wizeguyz Bil iards. This was the local meeting place of Joey Falzone and his crew.

The rumor about Victor Garducci was that he was a master at fixing bets. The easiest for him to fix were fights.

The way it worked for the mobsters was that they gave their money to Victor, who in turn put the money on the guy who was supposed to lose. He then got the winning pick to toss the fight in whatever round that Victor placed his cash, and then Victor round that Victor placed his cash, and then Victor returned to the gangsters with exponential amounts of cash. A safe investment for them and Victor got to keep his percentage off the top of the take.

Victor pushed most of his take up to Joe Falzone through a man named Frankie DeRisio. He was a member in Sal Pieri’s crew and Sal answered straight up to Falzone.

Victor’s cash went to Frankie, he took his cut, then the money went to Sal, who took his cut, and from there it went up to Falzone.

Though the mobsters were greedy, they were sort of fair in their own right and told Falzone what a good earner this new guy Vic was. In reality, Victor got his gambling cash straight from the FBI who he was working in concert with. He would just say that he ‘bought’ whatever fighter happened to lose and from there everything worked itself out.

His associates trusted that he kept the information confidential until after the fight. Most believed he did things covertly to keep his system of earning confidential so as to impede others from infringing upon his turf. To them, it wouldn’t be out of place, it would be logical protection of one’s livelihood.

Now, as Victor neared the entrance to Wizeguyz
,
his heart was pounding and it took every bit of skil to keep the persona of Alex from surfacing while he was anywhere near the Mafia stomping grounds.

He reached out a hand to open the door. His hand resting on the pale green door, Victor felt himself tremble. With a deep breath, the mobster steadied himself.

A moment later he was through the doors and into the smoke-fil ed room in front of him. In the back was a wooden rectangular bar with a robust and grey-haired bartender who polished the same beer mug over and over. He wore an apron over some jeans and an old, faded, green T-shirt that had the place’s logo stenciled on it.

Three pool tables in a row led outward from the bar towards the door. On the left of the pool tables were four booths and on the right were four freestanding tables. The chairs and booth benches had the same green colored cushions, worn with age.

Two men sat in the rear booth with their backs to the entrance. Two more men stood around the pool table. They were heated over whether or not the bet they made prior to the game was two dol ars a bal or five.

“Fuck you Jimmy, I’m tel ing you I ain’t gonna pay you no more than two a bal and that’s that,” said a smal man no more than five feet seven inches tal .

He weighed maybe a hundred forty and had brown hair that fel over one side of his forehead in a nasty cowlick. The other half slicked back paral el with his cheek bones that seemed sunken along with his green eyes. He held the pool cue with his right hand and planted in the floor at his side. His feet were set apart and his bluster was almost laughable against the other fel ow who Garducci recognized as Jimmy ‘Jacks’.

He got his name from a haul in Vegas where he took the house for almost thirty grand with four jacks. He kept the cards and ever since that time in Vegas has carried them around in his back pocket for luck.

He was a big man. Jacks stood over six feet tal and two hundred pounds. His dark hair was cropped short and his eyes were brown and hard but not mean looking. He spent a few years in the pen and his muscles showed it as he flexed them, more from habit than from threat, at the smal er man’s rant.

The smal er man was Tom Coughlin. He wasn’t even a WOP, but the Italians kept him around because he helped bring them the Irish in the numbers racket, that and he was a scrapper.

Garducci once witnessed the smal fel ow beat down two men that owed him twenty bucks for a late payment. Twenty bucks and he came away with two bruised fists and two hundred dol ars richer.

“I’m tel ing you Tom, it was five dol ars a bal , and if you....”

Victor decided now was as good a time as any. He walked further in and as the door slammed shut behind him he announced his arrival, demanding attention.

“Hey you two grease bal s, you see Sal around here anywhere?”

“Holy Shit, if it ain’t Vic back from New Mexico! We heard you was coming back. You better be debt free though, we don’t want some filthy Mexican crew breathing down our necks for your spendthrift ass!”

spendthrift ass!”

Jimmy Jacks gave a warm smile and greeted Vic, but Garducci saw that Tom was annoyed. The conversation about who owed whom what was now at an end, and that meant one of them got away with three dol ars a bal . Jacks took a quick look at Tom as he hurried toward Victor and smiled at him when he noticed that Tom wasn’t talking economics anymore. He came forward and gave him a firm shake of the hand.

“How you doing Jimmy?” Garducci needed to make smal talk, seem as calm as possible. Soon enough the questions would come.

“I’m alright, you know how it goes, winning some, losing some.”

“Tom.” Victor leaned over and clasped the man on the hand.

“Fuck Vic, you better talk to Sal when he gets back. He was happy you was coming home. Shit has been edgy here you know.”

Tom looked troubled and Victor figured that he would hear an earful from Sal when he got back.

“Sal pissed I had to leave so quick?” Garducci needed to know from what viewpoint to assess the situation in which he thrust himself.

“Nah,” Jimmy interrupted as he rubbed a blue block of chalk along the tip of his cue. “Other things are about to happen. Some shit going on upstairs.

It’s between the higher ups and no one knows what crews are siding where. We know where mine and Sal’s crews stand and we know where the Ciancetta’s stand and they ain’t on the same side of the aisle if you get my drift. We stand with Old Man Falzone. “

“Fuck Jimmy, quit talking so much. Vic, the other guys wil fil you in over there. Sal should be back soon and then we wil know what’s what.” Tom shot a glance at Jimmy; he was more guarded then his counterpart. He always was the more intel igent of the two.

“Who’s sitting over there?” Garducci didn’t want to go into any situation without realizing what awaited him.

“Just Aldo and Muro,” Tom said with a mischievous grin as he threw his cue on the table and walked through the restroom door on the right of the room.

Jimmy glanced at Victor with his lips pursed in a thin line across his face. The presence of those two men was not lost on Jimmy nor was it lost on Victor. Though Victor was not positive of the hierarchy, Alex Vaughn was. These two men were Falzone’s left and right hands.

Aldo was ancient. He was a thin and bald man with a white goatee. His smal stature hid the enormity of his true power. He was by al accounts a genius and had never been arrested in connection with any crime. He knew people who knew people and he could read pretty much any of them with a good degree of certainty. Aldo Marano was Falzone’s brain.

If he was the brain, then Muro was the brawn of Falzone’s enterprise. He was thick and smel ed of cheap cologne. He always wore a suit and it made his already broad shoulders seem enormous. His gray hair was speckled with remnants of his primary black, and waved backwards in an unkempt slick.

Muro Lucano had been arrested three times, al for murder or being involved in the conspiracy to commit murder. Each time the jury acquitted him. Many were surprised, but not Victor. It seems that everyone has his price.

Victor walked toward the rear booth. There was an ashtray on the table and it was fil ed with half-smoked butts. Also on the table were several empty shot glasses and the men were murmuring to themselves with apparent unease. The men must have been sitting there a while. As Victor Garducci approached the table, they didn’t notice his arrival.

With a clear of his throat, both men jumped and turned glares upon the interruption. When they noticed it was Victor, they glanced at each other then back at Vic.

“The boys told me you wanted to see me

'bout something.” Victor felt his hand tremble and slipped it behind his back.

They sat there for a long moment, which to Garducci seemed like an eon. Aldo asked him to have a seat.

“Sit down my boy. It has been a while. Too long. Many things have happened since we saw you last. Your friend Sal is conducting business. He is overdue. Hopeful y, he wil be back soon.” Hopeful y. That seemed like an odd choice of words. Aldo never used a word without a purpose to words. Aldo never used a word without a purpose to it.

“Hopeful y, Mr. Marano? Why hopeful y? He should be back soon shouldn’t he?” Victor sensed some serious implications here.

“He gets to have al the fun this night,” Muro said as he squished the end of another cigarette on to the glass of the tray in front of him.

“His business is dangerous, but we have confidence in him.” Aldo said the words with a calm and matter-of-fact air, but his tone indicated that he was very worried that things were awry.

“I don’t understand Mr. Marano. What’s going on? Why have you asked to talk with me about al of this?”

Victor was confused. They were being very open with him al of a sudden. He didn’t want them to tel him anything that could be considered ‘too much’

later.

“Wel , Sal vouched for you. Now you must do a favor for him, for us.” Aldo was eyeing him now, gauging his reactions.

“Anything Mr. Marano. What do you need?” Victor was worried. His cover wouldn’t last al that long and he didn’t have a lot of time to get back in the good graces of everybody one at a time.

“Real simple Vic. Sal was supposed to col ect some money from a client of ours. We don’t know if he made it there to col ect since he is running so far behind.”

Muro was talking to him but at the same time his eyes kept shifting to Aldo. Garducci’s sixth sense was buzzing now and he felt like something was out of sorts. He couldn’t put his finger on it.

Aldo looked at Victor and slid a folded piece of paper across the table to him.

“Al we want you to do is check on this address. If you see Sal’s car parked down the block from here, and you pass by the address, see if you notice anything out of the ordinary. Then come back to us and let us know what you see.”

Victor Garducci grabbed the piece of paper and slipped it into his pocket.

“Sure thing. I’l get right on it.”

With that, Victor Garducci stood up and started to leave. As he exited the building, he looked back over his shoulder. He noticed that both men were watching him as he left and both Tom and Jimmy were pretending to play pool once again.

Victor walked out the doors and stood outside breathing in the crisp cool air around him.

From under this overhang, the snow and hail danced in front of him. After contemplating the situation for a moment, Victor decided to do as the old men directed.

He figured that if something were indeed going on, at least his loyalty in this situation would endear him enough to get by on the next few days.

Al he needed was enough time to get over to Inhaled Imports and see who was in the habit of buying Sobranies.

He walked with a brisk gait into the freezing night toward the address now in his hand.

This is for you Jack
, he thought. The chil of the night air crawled up his spine and he pul ed his jacket in tight around him. Victor Garducci, aka Alex Vaughn, felt total and complete isolation amidst a sea of uncertainty.

“Oh Sonne boy, wake up Sonne boy.”

Rafael was standing over Sonne and his face was expressionless. Rontego moved his captive to a smal metal foldout chair in the kitchen. There was tile in the kitchen; the blood would be easier to clean up later.

Sonne remembered what transpired before the blackness overtook him and now he was starring wide-eyed at the assassin, trying to mumble something. The duct tape that covered his mouth and stuck to the hairs of his mustache with cruel stubbornness would al ow nothing but muffled incoherency.

Rafael Rontego noticed that he had Sonne’s ful attention. He walked over to his stereo, taking his time, and with a glance at his captive, turned the knob to ‘on’. There was a brief moment of static that irritated the already frayed nerves of Sonne Pieri, as his eyes became even wider.