Chapter 20

TWENTY

Angelo

On my way back to the old house, I dial my driver, Waldo, and instruct him to fetch the kids when the school comes out at four. The cleanup team has enough time to take care of the cellar before the kids arrive home. Then I call the man I put in charge of keeping an eye on Daisy and Laura's whereabouts.

"They boarded a private yacht for Bonifacio. I'm driving there as we speak. I should be there in an hour."

"Do we have eyes on the yacht?"

"Yes, sir. The drone pilot is on it."

"Good. Let me know where they stay and who they meet. I want every detail down to what they order for breakfast."

"Consider it done, sir."

I leave the car in the garage and make my way straight to the jetty. The skipper waits on the yacht. A storm is building on the sea, but I'm in too much of a rush to organize a plane. By the time I've secured a pilot and he's drawn up a flight plan, I could've already been in Marseille with the yacht.

Both the skipper and I are experienced at the helm. This won't be the first storm we navigate. We check the weather forecast before figuring out the best route. If we go south before cutting west, we'll avoid the worst of the storm.

The skipper takes the first shift. While he mans the bridge, I make a few phone calls in the lounge. It doesn't take long to find out where Hugo hangs out. After putting the necessary measures in place, I call my informant who infiltrated my uncle's team, but he's none the wiser. He tells me that Uncle Nico is careful, keeping a tight lid on his business.

When I hang up, I dial Uncle Nico.

"What's going on, Angelo?" he asks. "Toma just told me Lieutenant Lavigne paid your wife a visit." A small hesitation follows before he adds in a sly tone, "I hope she didn't betray you."

The glee in his voice rubs me up the wrong way. "Is Toma always reporting back to you?"

He coughs. "Of course not. We happened to talk this morning."

"Another one of your convenient coincidences," I muse.

"We talked about the wedding," he says, sounding wounded. "Are you accusing me of something?"

Not yet. "Any word from Marziale?"

"I think he got your message. There's been no more suspicious activity at the warehouses or the docks."

"Keep tabs on him. Let me know if anything changes."

"You didn't answer my question about the lieutenant."

"There's nothing to say."

"Toma said your men intercepted him."

"Did they?" My reply is curt. "He never set foot on my property."

"Ah."

Did I detect the slightest hint of disappointment in that expression of understanding?

"What about Sabella?" he asks.

My voice turns glacial. "What about her?" Like I told him, my wife is none of his fucking business.

"Did she go through with it?"

"With what?" I ask, gritting my teeth.

"With the deal. Did she give him information? Toma said they spoke outside."

Toma isn't privy to the fact that I used a drone. Since Toma's slip-up in mentioning that my niece showed up at the new house, I'm sharing information with my cousins on a need-to-know basis.

"The matter doesn't concern you," I say.

"We have a right to know, Angelo."

My uncle's persistent curiosity is getting on my nerves. "Discussing my wife is off-limits. I thought I made myself clear."

"If you don't want to tell me, I can only assume things went south. Did you interrogate Lavigne? Is that how you know what went down?"

"Why are you so interested in my wife's reply?"

"Aren't we part of the business?"

"Exactly," I bite out. "You're a part of the business. I'm at the head of it. Do you need a reminder?"

"Don't be so touchy, nephew. I have our best interests at heart." He pauses before adding with an air of gravity, "If she betrayed you, you know what must be done. Don't think with your dick, son. Use your head like your father taught you."

"Oh, don't worry. I'll do exactly as my father taught me."

"Good." Uncertainty rides on his words. "Do you need help with cleanup?"

He's fishing for information on what I did with Lavigne. I don't take the bait. "I'll let you know if I do."

"This better not lead back to you."

Yeah. People are going to wonder where the lieutenant is, but there's no proof he arrived at his destination. There's no evidence that he's been on my property. My men got rid of his rented car. It's lying at the bottom of a cliff a good few hundred meters under the sea.

"He's not a common criminal or an insignificant figure," Uncle Nico continues. "He's a high-ranking police official."

"Thanks for pointing that out." My tone is dry. "I wasn't aware."

"Be serious, Angelo. This is not an issue to joke about."

"I can guarantee you I never joke where my wife is concerned."

He sighs. "Just keep me posted. I want what's best for you."

That remains to be seen.

He's uttering a meaningless warning about being careful when another call comes in. It's from my contact at forensics.

I end the first call and accept the second. "What did you find out?"

"A lot actually, thanks to the fact that we didn't have to dig deep. It went a lot quicker than I expected. Although, it was a motherfucker to get the remains through that narrow cave opening and to carry those bags out of the gorge on foot."

"Spare me the dramatics. Just give me the facts."

"And here I was hoping for a sympathetic ear. I still have blisters on my feet. The gash in my hip from squeezing through the gap in that rock needed stitches."

"You owe me. Suck it up."

"So cruel," he says with dramatic humor before he finally turns serious. "Right. You've got yourself an interesting case. I have dental record matches. The male was Lisandru Albertini, forty-two years old. The female was his wife, Maria Albertini. Thirty-eight."

My cousin and her husband.

"Both were shot in the back of the head, execution style. There were no signs of disintegrated clothes or threads of fabric. They were buried naked. The chemical analysis shows they've been dead for approximately two months. I'll have to do more tests to nail the exact date of their deaths."

Fuck. It's what I expected, but for the sake of the kids, I hoped it would be different. "What about the shotgun I gave you? Is that the gun that was used?"

"I was coming to that," he says with mild irritation. "Be quiet and try not to interrupt. According to the firing-pin matching and breech-face markings, the shell casings we found on the site were fired from that shotgun. They were shot at close range. No other injuries. No signs of struggling. Classic case of homicide."

I pinch the bridge of my nose, considering the information. Why would the old man kill his own granddaughter and his grandson-in-law? The only plausible explanation is that they discovered his treasure and decided to dip their hands in his crate. I can't think of another reason that would motivate him to make orphans of his great-grandchildren and saddle him with their care.

"What do you want me do?" Fred asks.

"Report it. I need death certificates."

"What do I say about the discovery?"

"You can say I found the grave. I'm away on business, but when I get back, I'll make a statement."

He sighs. "I hope you can pull those strings you said you can, because I really like my job here."

"Don't worry about it. I'll handle it."

"Okey dokey. If you say so."

I'm about to hang up when he says, "Oh, and Angelo? Now we're quits. No more favors."

I chuckle as I end the call. He'll jump when I tell him to.

The wind has picked up. Heavy clouds hang dark in the sky. A moment later, rain pelts the windowpanes of the cabin. The swell rises to a few meters, bobbing the boat like a cork on the choppy surface. Being used to rough seas, the violent water doesn't faze me. I get some work done before relieving the skipper at the helm so that he can take a much-needed break. Navigating through a storm is physically and mentally exhausting.

For the next three hours, I focus on nothing but the battle with the violent elements of nature. By the time the lights of Marseille come into view, we've outrun the storm.

The café where Hugo dines is in the port district. The men I pay to keep my business tidy in France are waiting when we dock. A few flank me while the rest go ahead to do reconnaissance. A man standing guard at the top of the cobblestone street nods when I arrive, letting me know the coast is clear.

I make my way down the alley and open the door with the cabaret-style letters spelling the name on the glass. It's too warm inside. Smells of paprika, onions, and fried fish hang in the air. The chatter is loud. All the tables in the small space are occupied. The clientele are men. They're mostly dock workers who come in for a hearty, affordable meal after a long day of labor. They're the tough kind, the people Hugo hangs out with because many of them do illegal business on the side, and cops like Hugo collect their kickbacks in exchange for turning a blind eye.

My men enter behind me. The diners look up. The room goes quiet. Hugo stills in the middle of shoving fish stew into his mouth. His ruddy cheeks pale as recognition sparks in his eyes. He squirms in his chair when two of my men take up a position next to him.

The owner catches the gaze of a burly woman who puts a bowl of steaming fish soup in front of a customer and tilts his head toward the back. She scurries away and disappears through the kitchen door. The owner is next. He knows who I am. Everyone in the city does.

One by one, the customers abandon their meals and file through the door. When Hugo makes to get up, my man pushes him down with a hand on his shoulder. Another man locks the door.

Hugo swallows as I sit down opposite him.

There's nothing I hate more than wasting time. As I already lost too many precious hours by coming from Corsica to meet this fucker not once but twice, I cut to the chase. "You lied to me."

His choice of defense is ignorance. "What are you talking about?"

I narrow my eyes. "Stop fucking wasting my time. My wife never cut a deal."

He raises his palms. "Hey, I only told you what Lavigne said."

He tries to act brave, but the trickle of sweat rolling down his temple gives him away.

I take the gun from my waistband and get comfortable in my seat as I point the barrel between his legs under the table. "Have you seen how much a man bleeds when you shoot off his nuts?"

The little color that's left on his face vanishes. "Make me a deal."

I caress the trigger, feeling the familiar curve of the metal and the perfect fit against my finger. "You're not in a position to negotiate."

"Fine." He grabs a paper napkin and wipes his brow. "Give me your guarantee that I'll walk out of here."

I smile. "If you don't talk, you'll crawl out of here without your dick. The only thing I guarantee is that you'll either bleed out like a pig or never fuck again."

He cuts a jittery gaze around the room. Trapped. The realization reflects in the nervous twitch of his beady eyes.

"Fine," he says again as if he has a choice. "I was going to come to you anyway. You and I, we can help each other. You need a man like me. I can get you any inside info you need."

"Go on," I drawl, letting him hope.

"Here's the spiel." He pushes away his bowl and leans his elbows on the table. "Your uncle paid me to say your wife made a deal."

Cold rage unfurls in my gut, but on the surface, I keep my cool. "You never befriended Lavigne."

"Never met the man in my life."

I tighten my grip on the shaft. "Why?"

"We cut our own deal, your uncle and me. He said your wife was a traitor who needed to be flushed out. Said she made you weak. He said you weren't the man your father used to be. So the plan was to pin her as a snitch, let you get rid of her, and then, when you were distracted with the nasty affair of dissolving her in acid or letting the vultures pick the meat off her bones or whatever the fuck you do with the bodies, he was going to take you out."

"Take me out," I say with a chuckle.

"He was going to make it look like a police raid."

"With your help of course."

He shivers in the stifling heat of the room. "He'd take over the business, and I'd get a promotion for nailing you."

"Let me guess. Then, as a high-ranking officer, you let him run his business in Marseille in peace, and in exchange for smoothing his way, you get your cut."

"Ten percent," he says, bouncing his leg and glancing at the gun in the holster of the man who stands on his left. "For you, I'll settle for five. Considering that the intel is priceless, that's quite an offer."

The only information I'm interested in hearing from his double-crossing, untrustworthy mouth is, "Which uncle?"

I already know the answer, but I steel myself.

"Nico."

I nod, letting that settle and taking a moment to digest the bitter taste of betrayal. It's the one line our kind never crosses. We never stab family in the back. No matter what. Blood is sacred. It's a law my father lived by like believers adhere to the ten commandments. It's a value he drilled into me. It's the foundation on which he raised me. It's the glue that makes us stand together and keeps us strong.

Yet my uncle disregarded that law. In a single act, he eradicated every value we ever stood for.

It doesn't hit as hard as it should. I suppose, deep inside, I already knew even though I didn't want to believe it. I only came here for confirmation.

My quiet voice gives no sign of the violence churning underneath a fa?ade of calm. "Did Enzo know?"

"What do you think?" The bastard is cocky now, mistakenly believing I'm as fickle as my uncles, as easily tempted to choose money and power over loyalty. "They're your family. You should know those two are inseparable. Whatever they do, they do together."

I digest that information with the same cold anger. That can only mean Toma and Gianni are in on the deal. They all plotted against me. They conspired to stab me in the back even as they bent the knee and kissed my hand.

Do my uncles honestly think they can replace me? Do they believe my weak cousins make better candidates for running the business my father built, a business I took over at the age of twenty and turned into an empire in the span of three years?

Fucking idiots.

Traitors.

Hugo leans back and throws an arm over the back of his chair. "Thank me now and pay me later."

I take in his toothy grin and the certainty of victory that burns with a feverish light in the nondescript blue of his eyes. Presumption is a grave mistake. His error is thinking that because I'm heading the biggest crime syndicate in my country, he and I are the same. They never get it. It's not about the money or the power. Those commodities are only the means to an end, the currency that buys the real product.

It's about survival.

It's about being the strongest or dying.

He's the weakest of the weak, the lowliest on the bottom of the pile.

"Payment is now," I say as I push the gun between his legs and pull the trigger.