Made for Sin

Made for Sin
is a work of fiction. Names, places, and incidents either are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

A Loveswept Ebook Original

Copyright © 2016 by Stacey Fackler

All rights reserved.

Published in the United States by Loveswept, an imprint of Random House, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York.

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OVESWEPT
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ebook ISBN 9780804181457

Cover design: Beverly Leung

Cover photographs: Viorel Sima/Shutterstock (couple), Artifan/Shutterstock (Las Vegas skyline)

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v4.1

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The home of Lazaro Doretti sat way back from the road, hidden by a stucco wall and a row of trees. The wall and trees, in turn, hid a couple of guard posts, with armed men watching the street and the wide green lawn. Two towers at opposite ends of the sprawling cream-colored mansion held more guards and guns and a direct line to a private “security company” that was more like an army. It was a hell of a setup, really, one the vast majority of people wouldn't be able to afford. One Lazaro Doretti wouldn't have been able to afford if he'd been the honest businessman he claimed to be.

Speare hit his brakes and rolled his window down at the wrought-iron gate, ready to identify himself to the video camera there, but the gate was already swinging open. Not unusual, really, but given what his mother had said, it probably wasn't a good sign.

He nudged his old Dart up the curving driveway and stopped right in front of the house's columned entrance. Statues of nymphs and satyrs—the usual pretentiousness, with some extra mysticism to reflect Lazaro's devotion to the Old Magics—flanked the double doors. Just like the two thickset men in pale bulletproof-vest-concealing suits did.

Speare nodded at them. “Hey, Artie. Sylvio.”

Sylvio gave him a curt nod in return—probably still pissed about losing a hundred bucks to him in a pickup poker game the week before—but Artie offered a subdued smile as he opened the door. “He's waiting for you in the kitchen. Hope you're hungry.”

“That bad, huh?”

Artie's smile faded. “Bad news. Bad news, man. He's cooking up a feast in there.”

Shit. That probably meant carting home a load of Tupperware before he hit the Strip later. Like he had time to waste on that, when he hadn't committed anything that could be considered a sin in—oh, no, he'd lied to his mother. It was only a venial sin, but it might give him an extra hour or two before the beast in his head started getting grumpy.

And that hadn't even been a beast-avoiding lie. He just hated telling his mother the truth. About anything. “What happened?”

Artie shook his head. “Oughta hear it from him. I ain't sure of the details. But it's bad news.”

“Probably that bastard Fallerstein,” Sylvio said. “I bet he's behind it.”

Fallerstein. If that was why Lazaro had called him…damn it, he'd told the old man before that he didn't want to get involved in his mob bullshit. Not involved like that, at least.

Artie and Sylvio didn't need to hear that, though. “Well, I guess I'll find out, huh?”

“I guess you will,” Artie said, patting him on the back as he crossed the threshold. “In the kitchen.”

Speare followed the scent of cooking through the cavernous rooms of Lazaro's inner sanctum. Once it had been full of old-school Vegas charm, like the Rat Pack had just walked out of it on their way to take a steam. That was before Lazaro's third wife had moved in and given it a horrific makeover. She'd hired some decorator who, she'd breathlessly informed Speare, “all the celebrities used,” but celebrity didn't mean taste. Or the guy had seen dollar signs and a chance to dump all the kickback crap he didn't want to store himself. Speare figured it was a mixture of both, but either way, the place was full of gold leaf and shiny flocked wallpaper and ruffled pink bordello curtains. Mirrors hung on almost every wall, too, amplifying the neon glare. Speare wasn't a guy who knew much about decorating, but he knew that place hurt his eyes.

The third Mrs. Doretti, though…she did not hurt his eyes. She was in the main living room—the house had three or four of them—when he passed through; she leaped up when he entered, displaying the best body money could buy clad in a tight hot-pink dress apparently designed for very wealthy prostitutes, and started mincing her way toward him in her five-inch heels. “Speare, honey. You came.”

As subtly as possible, he took a step back. “Hi, Cookie. He's in the kitchen?”

“Can't you smell it?” Her long gold fingernails flashed as she waved her hand in front of her nose. “It takes ages to get the garlic smell out of the curtains. And I'm having a party here later.”

He'd have to get out of there fast, then. “Oh? What time?”

“Three.” She gave him a coy look, batting artificial eyelashes beneath bangs of equally artificial platinum blond. Cookie was younger than all six of Lazaro's sons, and any day Speare expected to hear that she'd finally relented and agreed to try to give him the last one he was so desperate for—a seventh son, a mystical son. It hadn't happened yet, though. “It's a bridal shower, but you could come visit. A big, strong man like you might be just what the party needs. The girls'd be glad to see you.”

Yeah, he bet they would. Cookie's friends were brightly decorated predators, on the hunt for men with money or muscles or both, and he'd been in their sights before. He took another step back. “Sorry. I'm reading to the elderly at three.”

Her shrill laugh stabbed at his spine. “You, reading to old people? Why, did a judge order you to?”

“I'm reforming,” he said, edging away from her bright red smile and toward the arched doorway. “Turning over a new leaf.”

“That's what they all say.” Cookie sighed. “Only it's never true, is it?”

Lucky for her it wasn't, he thought, but didn't say it. It wouldn't have been nice, or fair. Instead he just gave her a little salute and headed into the kitchen.

Artie hadn't been kidding about the amount of cooking going on in there. The six-burner stove—one of Lazaro's pride-and-joys—was covered with pots and pans; lights were on in both ovens. “Jesus, Uncle Laz. It looks like the prep kitchen for a Knights of Columbus banquet in here.”

Lazaro Doretti turned away from whatever he was stirring and lifted his arms, inviting an embrace. “Lazaro,” he said—using Speare's middle name as always—in a somber, subdued tone. “You've come.”

“Mom said you needed me.” Speare bent down to hug the old man who might be his father—who
was
his father, if his mother was to be believed. Certainly that was why his own middle name was Lazaro. And certainly the old man insisted on calling him by it, and there was nothing Speare could do or say to stop him. “What's up?”

“Ah, darling Vera. How is she?” Like he hadn't just talked to her that morning.

“She's fine.”

“Good, good. Hell of a woman, your mother. Hell of a woman. Best legs in the city, to this day.” Laz busied himself at the stove for a minute; when he turned he held a plateful of what Speare was pretty sure must have been all the meat in Vegas at that moment. “Here. A few things. See if you like them.”

Speare took a seat at the island-cum-breakfast-bar opposite the old man and eyed the heap of food. God, whatever news it was must have been devastating; there was a pig's trotter on that plate, and what looked like rabbit, along with an enormous square of lasagna and some stuffed calamari. All of the meats had different sauces. It would take a glutton an hour to get through all of that.

Well, he had an hour, and while gluttony was generally one of his least favorite deadly sins, it was still a deadly sin. He took the plate and accepted the fork being brandished at him. “Thanks. I'm sure I will.”

Laz somehow managed to still look serious while beaming at him, exposing the Borgnine-esque gap in his front teeth. “Of course you will. You're a good boy, Lazaro. You've always been a good boy.”

Jesus. Speare tensed. What exactly did the old man want him to do? The “good boy” bullshit came out only when the task requested was particularly nasty.

The oven beeped; Laz donned oven mitts of the same muted red as the various accessories dotting the room—he'd refused to allow Cookie to redecorate his kitchen, which had been designed with the help of the second Mrs. Doretti, a fan of French Colonial—and removed a sheet pan of what Speare recognized as choux pastry. His sinking feeling increased.

Laz caught him looking. “For croquembouche.”

“Uh-huh. What's going on?” He would have continued, but he'd unthinkingly popped a forkful of lasagna into his mouth and had to stop for a minute to savor it.

Laz's teeth showed even more; he resembled some sort of beatific food gnome, with his balding head and bulbous nose. “Good?”

Speare told the truth. “You're an artist.”

The compliment made the old man's eyes light up. “One day, Lazaro. One day I'll open a restaurant.” The smile disappeared. “Maybe sooner than I wanted. You know what happened this morning, my boy? You've heard?”

Speare shook his head, unable to talk around the mouthful of stewed rabbit making his taste buds do some kind of rumba.

Laz stood there for a moment, obviously gathering the words. “This morning,” he finally said, in a low, tight voice. “This morning they found Theodore Bryant in a dumpster. They found him in a dumpster, with his arm gone. His right arm.”

Jesus. The world went quiet for a second, while Speare absorbed that news. Theodore Bryant. One of Lazaro Doretti's biggest muscle men—more than that, even. An ex-boxer whose right hook had finally led him to be banned from the sport—they could overlook one death in the ring, but three had been pushing it—and who could shoot the eye out of a squirrel from a hundred yards. Or, probably could have, at least. As far as Speare knew, Bryant hadn't felt any need to shoot squirrels. There were plenty of humans he could shoot.

How could that guy be dead?

Finally he found his voice. “I'm sorry, Uncle Laz. God rest him. May his soul awaken in the Realm of Silver.”

Laz crossed himself, then crossed his fists over his chest and dipped his head, acknowledging both statements. “Thank you. He was loyal. A great loss.”

Here it came. “So do you know who did it?”

“Who do you think?” While he spoke, Laz began tearing at a fresh-baked loaf of bread on the countertop, tearing with violence, as if it had somehow offended him. “Fallerstein. Who else? Who else would want to hurt me like that?”

Speare could think of a lot of people who might want to hurt the man who controlled half the supply services in Vegas, but he kept his mouth shut. Or rather, he kept his mouth full of rabbit in some velvety sauce with mustard and herbs, with calamari that still tasted of the sea, with a bite of that same warm bread.

“Nobody,” Laz went on. He brandished a chunk of bread like a knife, his face reddening. “Nobody else wants to hurt me, because nobody else is a dumb fuck. They know what happens to men who think they can hurt me. They know that men who try to hurt me end up feeding vultures. The hard way.”

“Fallerstein knows it, too.” Speare kept his voice as noncommittal, as calm, as possible. No point upsetting Laz further. “Are you sure it's even related to business? Maybe he just slept with the wrong woman and got caught.”

“And her man took his arm? His right arm, his powerful arm? Took it above the shoulder—his whole arm, you understand? Not just part of it.”

That did sound weird, but still. “I know it isn't likely. I'm just saying we don't know it's Fallerstein. We can't be sure.”

“But we will be,” Laz said, smiling again. “We will be, because you're going to prove it, right? You're going to find out who did this, and you'll tell me, and the scavengers can eat his intestines while he watches from the deepest world below hell.”