The Enforcer (Untamed Hearts Book 3) (27 page)

Bobby grinned, showing off even white teeth because he really was strikingly handsome, just so small and rentable to men who liked them young. “Okay, Daddy.”

“Have you eaten today?” Tino asked in concern.

“The roll,” Bobby reminded him.

“The roll.” Tino sighed and wrapped an arm around Bobby’s neck. He leaned down to kiss the top of his head. “The fucking roll.”

“Can I have a few extra?” Bobby asked him as they walked around the corner of the warehouse. “I’ll owe you.”

“I’ll give ’em to you.”

“I love you, Tino.” Bobby said it like he meant it. “Really, you matter. To me you matter.”

“Okay.” Tino pulled a pen out of his pocket and pushed up the sleeve of his jacket. He hashed out five lines on the inside of his wrist to keep track of how many he had to pay for later. “I’ll give you five. Save ’em. You’re not seeing me until next week. If you parachute them all tonight, I’ll never do it again.”

“I’ll only take two tonight,” Bobby promised him.

Tino rolled his eyes. He had a strange sort of impatience for people who didn’t ration out their drugs and use them right. Tino had run out of his initial stash of pain pills a long time ago, but Dr. Acciai was always good for another prescription, especially because Tino made them last.

Since Dr. Acciai was the one of the doctors who took care of Tino in the don’s basement after Tino’s father almost beat him to death, the doctor never asked why. He knew why, and Tino usually had a few marks on his back to show him if he needed to see.

Tino considered using ecstasy like Bobby did, but he was pretty sure women weren’t going to appreciate him being mindless for pleasure and sweating all over them. These weren’t party girls like Nova spent time with.

Pain pills worked much better.

They made him euphoric enough that it all sort of felt okay, but kept him clear enough that he could do what he had to do.

With Mary, he had to take two.

’Cause, yeah, there just wasn’t enough synthetic euphoria in one pill.

Nova held out Tino’s backpack to him when he walked up to the warehouse with Bobby in tow. Nova had been talking to the bouncers, both Moretti muscle provided by the Borgata.

Again, as far as drug dealing went, Tino didn’t have it so bad. They liked to have someone young selling. What party girl wanted to buy ecstasy off some thirty-year-old creeper? It seemed to go a lot faster coming out of Tino’s hands, but at least his father had the place guarded.

Chances were they’d make sure Tino and Nova got away, ’cause that was what button men did. They took the fall. They took the bullet. They were the walls to protect the family, even secondhand Lost Boys from the family like Tino and Nova.

Tino opened the bag as the music from inside drifted out to the street.

He handed Bobby one bottle of water, one glow stick that had the ecstasy taped to the side, and then dug a large plastic bag out of the bottom and fished for four more individually bagged pills.

“Are you giving those to him?” Nova barked at him.

“That is my issue.” Tino lifted his head and glared at his brother. “I’ll cover the cost.”

“You give them to him every week. I’m your captain, motherfucker. You come up short, and it’s my ass.” Nova acted like it was a personal affront. “Or maybe he’s paying you in different ways.”

“Maybe he is.” Tino reached in his backpack and grabbed Nova’s poppers and handed them to him.

Bobby laughed at Nova. “You do poppers?”

“They make the roll more intense,” Nova explained without shame. “Don’t get your hopes up.”

“They make your dick soft,” Bobby reminded him.

“Bobby.” Nova got in his face and quirked a dark eyebrow. “Nothing makes my dick soft. I could go all night if I wanted to.”

“Is that true?” Bobby asked in surprise.

“Unfortunately.” Nova shoved the poppers into his back pocket. Then he took out a money clip with way too much cash in it, considering where they were, but someone would have to be certifiable to rob him. Nova was the don’s favorite pet genius, and everyone knew it. He pulled out a hundred-dollar bill and reached over to shove it in Tino’s pocket, obviously deciding to contribute to the cost of Bobby’s ecstasy. Then he helped himself to a glow stick. “Grazie.”

“Don’t take the glow sticks. Take one of these.” Tino held out the bag of extras. “I only have a hundred glow sticks.”

Nova took one of the loose pills too, but he kept the glow stick.

“You’re gonna do two and the poppers?” Tino asked in disbelief.

“Yes, I am.”

Speaking of someone who wasted drugs.

“Fuck if I’m giving you three,” Tino growled at his brother. “I’m serious. Make ’em last, Casanova.”

Nova didn’t acknowledge him. He just opened the door and exposed Tino, even though Nova knew he wasn’t ready.

“Tino!”

“Fuck.” Tino growled and reached in his bag for another bottle of water. “Give this to my brother.” He handed it to Bobby. “Go now.”

Bobby pushed his way in even as everyone else came out to meet Tino.

“Don’t touch my bag. The first motherfucker who touches my bag gets thrown out,” Tino growled at the crowd and pointed to the door. “Inside. Go. No one gets anything on the street!”

That turned everyone around real fast, because what good was a rave without the treats? He followed them in, and there were three Lost Girls standing to the side, bouncing up and down, arms out expectantly.

Real Lost Girls.

Not the kind Nova fucked—the ones from bad homes with parents who didn’t care like they should.

These Lost Girls didn’t have parents.

Or if they did, they were winners like Frankie, who sold their daughters on the back pages to highline dealers like the Brambinos. Or the Russian mafia. Or the yakuza.

The Morettis were actually unique in staying out of the flesh market. They thought they were better than that, but Tino’s opinion was a bit different. He was disgusted with them for ignoring the problem. It was something too dirty to pay attention to, so they turned a blind eye like the rest of the world. They had absolutely no idea about the inner workings of the underground sex market. They didn’t want to know the details. Just being aware it existed was bad enough.

Even Aldo didn’t know what the band on Tino’s wrist meant.

Which had shocked Tino at first, but he had learned to spot the ones who knew and the ones who didn’t, and he was sure the don had no idea. Just like Nova and Carlo had no idea.

Tino picked up Meilei, who was owned by the yakuza. She worked in Midtown at a place that covered as a nail salon.

She was sixteen.

And she was one of the oldest ones there.

“Protect my backpack,” he said as he tossed Meilei over his shoulder. She giggled and spread out her arms wide over the backpack as a crowd followed him. Tino found a place in the corner that was high enough to let him see the crowd and low enough to be accessible. He set Meilei next to him on the slab of raised concrete, designating her as his helper. Then he shouted to the group of people pushing in too close. “Three feet back. Form a line. Pretty girls first!” He found them in the crowd and pointed them out. “One, two, three. Melissa! Carla! Come on!” The Lost Girls came to the front of the line, and Tino had to practically scream over the music, but he’d learned how to make himself heard. “Pretty boys too!” Tino found one in the back and pointed at him, even though he didn’t know him. “Up here.”

He was beginning to suspect why his brother thought he was gay.

And he was starting to realize how much he didn’t give a shit.

There were a lot of Lost Kids here tonight, part of the magical mafia circle of dysfunction. Use them for money, make their lives so entirely horrible they needed an escape to keep breathing, and then make money off the drugs they bought.

But weren’t the Morettis special for not dealing in skin?

They just sold them the drugs instead.

Fuck that.

“How much?” Melissa asked as she bounced up to him first and then added, “You matter, Tino.”

“Thank you.” He grabbed a glow stick out of his bag. “Free for a hug.”

She jumped up and wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed his cheek. Against his ear she whispered, “I’ll do something extra for two.”

He wrapped an arm around her back, stealing a second hug and saying, “You matter, Melissa. Two for two hugs. Don’t take ’em both tonight, though.”

“I save mine for work,” she said as she jumped down. “I don’t need a glow stick.”

He handed the plastic baggie of extras to Meilei, because she was trustworthy. “Give her three.”

Then he marked three lines on his arm.

He and Meilei handed out too many pills to too many Lost Kids, and Nova was going to shit if he saw how much Tino had to put in.

So he fixed the problem.

“Why the fuck do they always get it free?” a regular barked at Tino once his turn was up. “That’s bullshit.”

“’Cause I fucking feel like it,” Tino growled back at him and then looked at the twenty in the asshole’s hand. “It’s thirty, motherfucker.”

“What?” he shouted. “That’s bullshit!”

“Then don’t fucking buy it.” Tino snapped his fingers at the next person in the crowd in a very Don Moretti manner. “Next.”

“Fine!” The first guy dug into his pocket, not realizing he was now contributing to the Lost Kids’ drugs-to-survive fund. “This crew is whack. This is the last time I’m coming.”

“We’re really fucking sad over that.” Tino yanked the cash out of his hand and pointed at Meilei to give him a pill out of the bag. “Motherfuckers with attitudes don’t get glowsticks.”

The great thing about being the only guy with candy was he could charge whatever the hell he wanted. Frankie would probably take a belt to him if he knew Tino was selling it for more than he said, but what the fuck did he care? Frankie always found a reason, and Nova had the balls to say it was his ass?

Jesus.

Maybe Tino needed to start blowing brain cells on ecstasy and poppers. It felt like Nova hadn’t been part of reality for a really long time now. Just caught up with fucking party girls and rolling his ass off when he wasn’t jumping for Frankie or barking for the don.

Somewhere along the way, Nova had cracked under the pressure. He gave up doing anything but surviving and taking the pleasure where he could. Indulgently. Greedily. As selfishly as life robbed him of happiness, he yanked it back whenever he got the chance.

Like a Lost Boy.

Eventually the crowd of buyers wound down to a few every couple of minutes. Tino was still tired, but it was too early for an energy shot. So he stretched out on the concrete slab like the king of party treats, with his head in Meilei’s lap and his legs draped over Carla’s thighs.

Like Tino, Carla was one of the luckier Lost Kids.

Working off her parents’ green cards, she wasn’t alone in the world. She didn’t live in some dingy apartment with twelve other sex slaves like Bobby or Meilei. She had a family, but Tino had to wonder what her relationship was like with them.

She’d been coming out more and more, and he got the impression bitterness was setting in. She was probably starting to resent that her pain and humiliation were paying their debts. Tino should know; he had days when he was very, very angry at Romeo for going to prison.

It wasn’t Romeo’s fault, but Tino still got angry at him. Romeo didn’t have to punch that cop. He could’ve kept his shit together instead.

Tino had days when he was pissed off at Nova too. It wasn’t Nova’s fault everyone wanted to own his brain, but Tino would be lying to himself if he didn’t admit it wasn’t easy to be his brother.

But he still loved them both…very much.

Which left him feeling extremely fucked-up most of the time.

Tino pulled the bag of extras out of his backpack that he had hidden behind him and looked at it. He handed out fistfuls of the stuff to every Lost Kid in there and never took one for himself.

He was currently a very shitty Lost Boy, and he was starting to be jealous of Nova, who went after the title like the overachiever he was.

The music picked up with a quicker beat, because the DJ was awesome. He matched the pulse of the music to the pulse of the crowd as they started rolling. Each song got a little faster, a little more sexual, making people want to dance a little closer together, and even without the drugs, the vibe was catching.

Sexy.

And it was warm in that warehouse.

The sweat already dampened his temples, and it made him want to pull his shirt over his head and show off what Mary made so much cash from.

“You wanna split one with me?” he asked Carla, because he knew Meilei was one of the few clean Lost Girls who rarely used drugs. “Just once?”

“
Sí.
” Carla nodded. “I’ll roll with you.”

“I’ll roll with you too,” Meilei offered as she caressed his hair. “For you, I’ll roll. Two is more fun than one, right? You deserve a nice night. You never have fun. We’ll make it fun for you.”

“Oh yeah?” Tino raised his eyebrows, realizing she was talking about more than rolling.

Carla and Meilei wore bands on both their arms, meaning they serviced men
and
women. He mulled it over, knowing he had to get Nova and whatever party girl he picked up for the night back to the old apartment. He looked out in the crowd, finding Nova easily. Tino wasn’t sure why, but the crowd tended to part a little for Nova. Like he had this energy throbbing off him that forced people to respect his space.

Nova already had his shirt off. He was dancing between two girls who were on him like a second skin. Tino recognized them. Nova had been with them more than once. The girls were a couple, roommates with benefits, but they liked Nova
a lot
, and they weren’t under any sort of misconception about what he could offer them. College girls who fucked him on Saturday and called him on Monday for help with their classes, and Nova always took their calls. He always stopped and sat down and talked about whatever the fuck they were having a hard time passing.

It was an honest and convenient arrangement, and it seemed to work for everyone since the girls had their faces buried in the curves of Nova’s neck, licking at his sweaty skin, probably making the roll extra good, which was what Nova lived for. Tino didn’t totally blame Nova for being half-naked, because Tino wanted to do the same thing
without
the ecstasy. He really hoped Nova shoved his shirt in his back pocket, because Tino wasn’t taking the subway with Nova like that.