Wrong (Spada Crime Family #2) (21 page)

Once we get out onto the steps, though, he starts talking, though he keeps his voice fairly low.

“I hear you won the vote. Congratulations.”

I give a curt nod. “Not that my reign has lasted very long, now that you’re back among us.” I offer a smile to let him know I don’t hold any ill will toward him. From plenty of other guys in the organization, that could have been taken as a threat.

He returns my smile with a wry one of his own. “We need to talk about that. I think there’s going to be trouble with De Luca.”

“There’s already trouble with De Luca. He was not well pleased with the vote.”

“It’s not just that. He’s been…unstable for a while now. Very problematic. Even well before you—”

I hear the sharp noise, but for a split second I don’t connect it with the fact that Spada’s stopped talking. I open my mouth and start to ask him for more details about De Luca, but suddenly he staggers against me.

I grab at him. He’s a big man, and he puts me off my balance. Then I register that the noise I heard was gunfire. Mostly because I hear it again. This time bits of concrete spray as the bullet strikes the stairs next to us.

“Shit! Shit! Leo!”

Leo’s already moving, catching Spada on the other side. Neither of us can quite hold him—he’s dead weight, and I’m afraid that’s completely literal, because he’s not giving us any help at all. I have an awkward hold on him, and so does Leo, but Spada slips away from both of us, falling face first down the rest of the stairs. All I can do is watch as his head bounces off the concrete, leaving dark-red stains behind. Not that it matters. The bullet killed him long before the concrete crushed his skull.

He lands finally in a clump of dark suit and blood at the foot of the steps, on the sidewalk. Leo and I are both just staring, unable to process what just happened. Leo moves first, running down the rest of the steps to kneel next to Spada’s body. He shoves his fingers under the blood-splattered collar. I follow him down, a little slower. Passersby have started to gather, staring, while others just book it past the scene as fast as they can. A couple have their phones out, and I’m sure the cops are on the way.

Leo looks up at me as I join him on the sidewalk. His face is stricken, more with shock than anything else. “He’s dead.”

“Shit.” I just stand there. What the fuck am I supposed to do?

Leo’s fist clenches, his other hand holding Spada by the shoulder almost gently. “It was fucking De Luca. I know it was.”

Of course it was. Spada’s last few words hit home—De Luca’s unstable. Which was Spada’s nice way of saying Sal’s losing his motherfucking mind. Or has lost it already. I’m pretty sure the latter is more accurate.

“What do we do?” I’m surprised at how calm my voice sounds. I wipe my hands on my jacket as if they’ve got blood on them. They don’t. I’m not sure how I missed the spray from the bullet; Leo’s got a spatter down the front of his shirt, across his tie.

“You go,” Leo says. “Get to Spada’s place and keep things locked down. I’ll deal with the cops.” He digs in a jacket pocket and comes out with a handful of keys. “Here. That’ll get you inside.”

I nod. “Do I need to call anyone? Let people know what happened?”

Leo shakes his head. “Let me do that. It’ll go down a little easier.”

“Okay.” I close my hand around the keys so tight, the teeth bite into my palm. “This wasn’t me,” I say, even though I know he understands that.

The look Leo gives me now is half pity, half resignation. “I know that. This isn’t the way you work. Why do you think you got voted in?”

No, it’s not the way I work. Or at least it never used to be. De Luca’s dragged me into some dark places over the last few weeks, places I’m not particularly proud of. But no—sniping the boss in cold blood, from a distance, is not my style. If it’d been me, I would have done it looking right into his eyes.

“Just go,” Leo says again. Then, quietly, as an afterthought, he adds, “boss.”

“Keep me posted,” I tell him, and he nods. I head for the car.

#

There are a few cars outside the Spada mansion, a few people milling in the driveway, and I wonder if they’ve heard what happened or if they’re just waiting for Spada to come home. It appears to be the latter; a couple of Spada’s lieutenants meet me as I’m heading for the front door.

“Where’s Leo?” one of them asks. “Did the boss make bail?”

My mouth goes tight against my teeth. “Get inside. Get everybody else inside, too.”

The man doesn’t ask questions—he just does what I told him to. Good. That’s the way it should be. I get the house open and head for the conference room where we usually meet.

I barely have time to get my composure back before everybody I saw in the parking lot is heading into the conference room. It seems like the entire organization is there, but that’s just my nerves. It’s only about a dozen people, fifteen tops. Some are my guys; the rest are Spada’s inner circle. Thank God none of Sal’s men are here. Everyone looks disconcerted, confused. Maybe even a little scared.

“What’s going on?” This is Mitch, and he speaks a bit more sharply than I’d like. I’ll give him a break this time.

I lift a hand. “Everybody sit down and get quiet.”

They do so immediately, taking their places and falling silent in a matter of seconds. I take a deep breath. I’m finally starting to feel the adrenaline—delayed reaction from what happened on the police station steps. My hands are shaking. I clench my fists to make them stop.

“Spada’s dead.” No point beating around the bush. “Somebody shot him while Leo and I were escorting him out of the police station.”

I expect an outburst, people asking questions, demanding to know what happened. But no. Everyone’s dead silent, faces going pale, eyes wide.

“We didn’t see who it was, although I think we all know who’s most likely to have done something like this.” There are a few nods, and I see a couple of people lean over to the guy next to them and mouth, “De Luca.” Good. Everybody’s pretty much on the same page. Although what we’re going to do with Sal’s men, I don’t know. I really don’t want to have to eliminate all of them. If it comes to that, though…

“Right now, I’m acting boss, and that’ll stay the same until further notice. I’ve got Leo’s full endorsement.” At least I hope I do. He hasn’t done or said anything to make me think I don’t, though, and under the circumstances I need all the support I can muster. A glance across Spada’s inner circle—former inner circle—shows me several nods, nobody offering any hostile looks. Good. Hopefully I’ll be able to count on them. Because things aren’t likely to get any better any time soon. This is a huge blow to the organization, and it’s going to take some time and effort to ride it out.

“As far as—” I stop. Leo’s just opened the door. All heads turn to face him. He hasn’t changed clothes; Spada’s blood still decorates his shirt, his tie, and the underside of his chin. He looks wrecked.

“Paramedics declared him DOA,” he announces. “Angelino, you’ve got my full support.”

I nod. Good. I don’t know what I would have done if he’d come in and said he didn’t support me, especially after I said he did. I probably would have gone down in a hail of bullets.

“Thank you,” I tell him. “Now, we need everybody here. I don’t want anybody out of the loop. Everybody start making phone calls—it’ll be faster that way.”

There are nods around the table, and the whole group disperses, going to different corners of the room, some leaving the room altogether to find a quiet place to talk. I go to Spada’s office, Leo trailing me.

“You want me to call De Luca?” he asks.

“I want everybody here,” I tell him. “Do it.”

Not that I want De Luca anywhere near me. But he needs to be here if he’s going to continue to be part of this organization. If he can’t toe the line and accept the change in leadership then I need to know. Because I’m going to have to deal with him.

Leo heads into the hallway to make his phone calls while I sit behind Spada’s desk. I start to call one of the two or three of my own guys who aren’t here but stop halfway through the first number. I call Sarah instead.

“Hey,” she answers. “Everything okay?”

“Not really. Look…I don’t want to go into it right now, but I need to deal with some shit. Family business. I might not be home for a few hours.”

“Okay…” I can tell she wants to ask again what’s going on, but she doesn’t. Good girl. Still…

“Sarah… Set all the alarms, okay? Just in case.”

“Sure, Nick.”

Reluctantly I hang up the phone. Maybe I should have told her more. Maybe she’d be safer if she knew what was going on. But right now I think it’s best to keep everything limited to this room, at least as much as possible. She’ll find out soon enough.

#

I make my phone calls, and within a half hour, almost everyone in the organization has made it in. Except, of course, for Sal, and about half of Sal’s men. The others are here, apparently ready to accept whatever orders come out of this meeting. As long as they’re here, and as long as they’re willing to accept the new leadership, I won’t have a problem with them. It’s the others—the ones who haven’t shown up—who I expect to have to do something about.

Especially Sal. I know what it’s going to come down to with him, and I can’t say I’m looking forward to it.

I’m going through Spada’s desk drawers, thinking about how to start taking over the organization, when there’s a knock at my door. I look up. One of Sal’s men is standing there, face white. He looks like he wants to turn tail and run as fast as he can away from me. I don’t blame him.

“Sir?” he says. “May I have a minute?”

“Of course.”

I try not to seem edgy as I watch him cross the room, but I’m not sure what to expect. He hesitantly takes a seat in the chair in front of the desk. I dig for a second for his name. It’s Victor.

“Look,” he starts, “I’ve got nothing but respect for you and this organization. That’s why I’m here. Because Sal’s lost his mind, and you need to know about it.”

“What’s going on?” This is exactly what I need to know. The more I can find out about where Sal’s head is and what he’s likely to do, the better off I’ll be. The safer Sarah will be.

But Victor seems hesitant. “Look, I had nothing to do with any of this. You got to believe me on that.”

“I get that, Vic. Now tell me what Sal’s up to. I need to know.”

“He’s got hits out on you, man. You and your wife.”

“How many?” The hair on the back of my neck is creeping up.

“Maybe three? Four? He wants you dead.”

My teeth clench. I’m not surprised at this news, but it makes me angry. And angry isn’t going to help anything right now. I need to stay calm. “What else?”

“He told us all he was head of the family now. You don’t have any claim. You—I don’t know—manipulated Spada or something, and that’s why you won the vote. Anybody who doesn’t fall in line, he’s going to rub out. He doesn’t care who it is.”

“So you decided to rat him out?” I’m glad he did, but I need to know why.

Vic looks at me with pleading in his eyes. “He’s crazy. I swear he’s lost his mind. I don’t think he cares who he needs to kill—he could wipe out the whole family and not blink.”

“He kills everybody, he’s not going to have any family left to lead.” I can’t get my head around Sal’s mindset right now. As far as I can tell, he’s hit some kind of psychotic break. Which makes him more dangerous than ever. Because the worst thing about crazy is that you can’t predict what it’ll do next.

“Where is he right now?”

“I don’t know. He dragged us all into a meeting really early this morning and he was ranting and raving… He told us he was going to take care of you and then he was going to put us in power. All of us. He told us to wait, and we’d know when he made his move. Then when I got back home I heard about Spada.”

“It was him? He did Spada?”

“Pretty sure, yeah.” He’s scrubbing his hands together, getting more and more agitated. “I don’t know where he went. But he’s after you, man. You and your wife. I’ve never seen him like this. Never.”

His agitation is starting to rub off on me. I’m suddenly worried about Sarah. But she’s safe. She’s at home behind my state-of-the-art alarm system. Nobody can get to her.

All my men are here, though. I don’t have anybody I can send to watch over her. And I can’t go—there’s still too much for me to take care of here.

She’ll be fine. You know she’ll be fine. You told her to stay put.
And she
will
stay put, because she’s got the baby to think of.

Still, I can’t help thinking that I’m going to get her to an actual safe house as soon as I can. Because as long as De Luca is out there, Sarah’s in danger, and that’s not acceptable.

“Get Leo,” I tell Vic. “We need to get this sorted out so I can get home.”

Chapter Thirteen

Sarah

Honest to God, by now I should be used to having Nick be gone, off doing mysterious “work” things that I don’t—or can’t—know anything about. But something about his phone call put me on edge. Maybe it was his voice. I don’t know. What I do know is that something is very, very wrong.

I try to put it out of my mind. I’ve been trying to teach myself how to knit so I can make some clothes for the baby, so I grab my knitting bag and settle into my favorite armchair.

I’m having a hard time making sense out of the instructions—they seem needlessly complicated—and I’m not having much luck keeping all the yarn loops on the needles. But, dammit, I’m going to figure this out and my baby’s going to have some hand-knitted booties.

Then the phone rings, and I jump, and half the stitches come off the needle. “Fuck,” I say, and pick up the phone.

“Is this Sarah Angelino?” The voice on the other end is a woman’s, and she sounds frightened, or upset at the very least. It takes me a second to register that, yes, I
am
Sarah Angelino, not Sarah Corelli.

“This is she.”

“It’s…your husband…”

Instantly I’m on high alert, adrenaline sending a coppery taste into the back of my mouth. “What’s happened? Is he all right?”