Filed to story: Submitting to My Bestie’s Daddy Read Online >>???
I leaned my head back against my chair and closed my eyes with a sigh. I’d been trying to focus on work, but the numbers on my papers kept swimming back and forth. Finally, I had to just let myself think about the specter that had been haunting my thoughts–Salvatore.
A week had passed since the dinner, and we didn’t know anything new. All my plans came crashing down around my shoulders when Alessandro charged into the breach before Sal got anywhere near as drunk as we needed him. Then, after Olivia stormed out, her hackles were up, and I couldn’t ask anything that might risk showing my hand. The only thing worse than her being mad at me for something I told her was her being mad for something I didn’t.
My phone rang, the ringtone I kept for my high-ranking men, and I plucked it off my desk, answering with my eyes still closed.
“What?” I groaned, hoping I sounded irritated with whoever called and not exhausted.
“Gio,” Alessandro said. His voice was low and urgent.
I sat up and opened my eyes.
“What?” I repeated, this time actually interested in the answer.
I could almost hear his grin over the line. “I have news. Meet me at San Fredo’s for lunch?”
I checked my watch. It was nearly three, but Olivia and Dahlia had taken Elio out for shopping and cupcakes, so I wouldn’t have to worry about them for another few hours yet. But I had to be certain. I wouldn’t leave my office for just anything.
“Sal?” I asked.
“Who else?” Alessandro crowed.
“San Fredo’s. 3:15.” I hung up the phone.
I had to leave immediately to make it to the little bistro on the south side of town, but I allowed myself a moment. So, I hadn’t gotten anything out of the dinner. I didn’t give much away either. He already knew where we lived, and a basic round of surveillance would’ve informed him about Tallon, Alessandro, and Dahlia. But perhaps it had lured him into a sense of security because he finally, finally slipped up.
I swallowed. Olivia would kill me if she heard me say anything like that. In truth, I didn’t like hoping her father was a bad guy. But that didn’t shake my bone-deep faith that he was, and I knew Alessandro wouldn’t have been so pleased on the phone if he hadn’t found something to prove it.
I heaved up from my desk. All I needed to do now was find out what Alessandro’s news was. I would figure out how to deal with my wife later.
A quick, quiet SUV ride later, I walked into San Fredo’s.
“Giovani!” the owner, Tony, called. “How are you thinner every time I see you?”
I allowed myself to be swept into the older Italian man’s hug. Tony was a retired member of the Valentino family, and the only reason Alessandro would’ve chosen this place was if he had information to say—or show—that absolutely could not fall on other ears.
I chuckled ruefully. “I guess I don’t come here enough.”
Tony cuffed me on the shoulder, and a couple of patrons I recognized as family men winced. No one else was allowed to touch me like that. But I knew Tony from before I was a made man, and I couldn’t have stopped him from treating me like that any more than I could’ve flown.
“Damn right you don’t,” he said. “Damn fucking right. Get your ass down here and I’ll fatten you up.” He jerked a thumb over his shoulder, and I saw Alessandro at a poorly lit table in the back corner where I did most of my business. “Your friend’s in the back.”
“I’ll do better,” I promised as I headed for my table.
Tony’s mutterings chased me all the way to Alessandro, who smirked at me until I shot him the sort of glare that let him know I would not find his jokes funny.
He cleared his throat and looked at the folder on the table. “So—”
I put a hand up. “If I don’t order, he’s taking my head off.”
Alessandro nodded, and I gestured over a spooked-looking waitress I knew to be Tony’s granddaughter.
“I’ll have the carbonara, heavy on the guanciale. He’ll have the puttanesca.”
She scurried away, and Alessandro raised an eyebrow at me.
“We didn’t get menus,” he said.
“Work as long as I have,” I said with a shrug, “and if you don’t know San Fredo’s menu by heart, I’ll be shocked. Now, you have news?”
Alessandro pushed the folder across the table. “Sal finally got a visitor at that park.”
I flipped open the folder. Inside, I found dozens of pictures of Sal talking to a bald, muscular man in a wifebeater and cut-off shorts, covered everywhere I could see in tattoos. They looked, if not friendly, then at least familiar. Sal’s posture remained at least as relaxed as it ever was around me, and the bald man crossed his arms a few times but never seemed seriously irritated.
I picked up a close-up of the man’s face where I could clearly see the tattoos crawling over his bare skull and throat. If he was in the line of business I thought, I figured that I should be able to read his tattoos like a book.
At the top of his head bloomed a rose ensnared in barbed wire, most likely to indicate he’d turned eighteen in prison. A snarling wolf on his neck showed a disdain for the authorities. A ship with full sails to say he’d escaped from custody once and would again.
I knew what mob used this tattoo language. But I had to be sure.
I shuffled to another picture. Just like I thought, two eight-pointed stars adorned his knees–the mark of a thief-in-law, or member of the Russian mob, high enough that he didn’t have to kneel to anybody.
I looked up at Alessandro, who grinned like the cat who ate the canary, just as our food arrived.
“Do you know what those tattoos mean?” he asked as I twirled a bite of carbonara with just the right amount of meat.
I looked at him and sighed. “This is good work, but don’t get too big. If I couldn’t read those tattoos, I should be shot. Eat.”
Alessandro meekly shoved a forkful of spaghetti into his mouth.
“This is great,” he said through a full mouth.
“I know.” I shook my head. “Do we know anything about this man, have any reason to believe they’re actually in bed together?”
Part of me, I realized at that moment, wanted to be wrong. I didn’t want to be looking at a man with Russian prison tattoos chatting with my wife’s father. I wanted to welcome him into our lives, wanted to crawl into bed with her tonight and apologize for being so paranoid.
Alessandro shrugged. “Haven’t tracked him down yet. They didn’t exchange anything physical at the meet, and I figured you’d want us to stick with Sal and see what he did next.”
I savored my bite of carbonara for a moment. “And what did he do next?”
“Nothing,” Alessandro muttered. “Just went back to sitting in the park.”
I bit back another sigh. He’d sounded so goddamned pleased on the phone, I’d thought he had a lead we could chase. This was bad, of course, but it was deniable if you really wanted to believe Sal was a good guy, which Olivia did.
“Next time, take too big of a team. Then, you can send a splinter squad after any arrivals.”
Alessandro nodded, and we ate in silence for a few minutes.
Eventually, I asked, “Has there been any Russian activity lately?”
He shook his head and swallowed quickly. “Nothing beyond what we’ve been seeing. But I was thinking—we lost Lorenz. What if he gave it some time, but now he’s looking for revenge? Sal said he got in deep to a local family. Maybe giving them you is a way to pay his debts.”
I stirred my pasta. He was right. It made perfect sense. We’d suspected there might’ve been Russians operating under James’ nose for a little while now, and it would explain why he suddenly appeared. I didn’t exactly publicize my and Olivia’s wedding in business circles, and there’s a chance it might’ve taken a couple of years to reach the Russians.
I ran a hand over my face and sighed. “That is a distinct possibility.”
