Page 37 of Coerced Kiss

“Could he?”

“No.” I look him straight in the eye. “He said he was too busy.”

“He didn’t have the time?”

“He didn’t have the capacity to take on more business.”

“His murder must’ve come as a shock to you,” he says, openly mocking me with his toothy grin.

I opt for honesty. “Not particularly. People get killed all the time.”

“But surely not people you know intimately.”

Yeah, I’ve seen a lot of people I knew intimately take a bullet, and more than half of those times, the bullet came from my gun. However, I don’t take the bait by admitting that I knew Lewis well. “I only met him that once.”

“Where were you on the night of his murder?”

“As I told the officer who questioned me, I had dinner at Rusty’s before walking Anya home.”

“She didn’t join you for dinner?”

“She wanted to work late.” I check my watch. “I’m afraid your minute is up. Was there anything else?”

“No.” He straightens and drops his glasses back onto his face. “Not for now.” Walking around the car, he adds as he opens the door, “Have a nice day, Mr. De Luca.”

I watch him go, committing every detail to memory. It’s always good to know your enemies. I have enough friends on the force, but I don’t lack adversaries.

After a quick shower, I dress in a pair of jeans and a sweater. As no one can know that Giorgio and I will be in Boston, I booked a private helicopter with a pilot I trust. We don’t want the cops to make a connection between Lewis’s murder and the men we’re about to execute.

While I pull on my boots, I send Giorgio a message to let him know I’ll pick him up. I won’t rely on him to make it to the helipad on his own. I missed enough flights due to his tardiness. No wonder Luigi needs me to babysit him. Giorgio is a loose cannon. He’s untrustworthy and unpredictable, incapable of taking responsibility for his actions. Putting your faith in him is a mistake. The only person Luigi can trust is me. As much as he respects me, he also resents me a little for that. He hates that Giorgio isn’t more like me, because I’m more like Luigi than his own son will ever be.

Luigi saw the qualities in me he recognized in himself when Giorgio befriended me in middle school. The private school was expensive, but I made well above average grades in the public school I attended, and the principal recommended me for a scholarship at the posh establishment. Giorgio got picked on for being stupid and behaving like a brute until I taught him how to use his fists.

My mother was always sick, and despite the fact that my father worked around the clock, there was never enough money for food and medicine. That’s why I started stealing, first shoplifting and later pickpocketing. I told my father I earned the food and money with casual jobs after school.

Every penny I took from the purses of well-dressed people with fancy cars went into taking care of my mother and putting another meal on the table. All I wanted was to lighten my father’s burden and make my mother well again.

The more money I made, the more reckless I became. I started buying myself snazzy clothes and hanging out with Giorgio’s friends. I never told Giorgio the real reason I stayed more at his house than at my own. From the minute I saw his younger sister with her black hair and red lips, I was smitten. I’d set my target on Rachele as far back as then, trying to win Luigi’sapproval in any way I could, working toward the day he’d give me his permission to court his daughter.

My efforts paid off. Luigi took a liking to me. At the same time, he couldn’t help comparing Giorgio and me, and Giorgio always came up short. For that, Luigi begrudged me. He’s always had these conflicting feelings toward me—respecting and liking me while hating and resenting me at the same time. It’s like a grenade living in his chest. I never know when it’s going to blow.

During our adolescent years, before Giorgio had to get involved in the business and the conflict warring inside Luigi was easier to ignore, he took us to high-end restaurants and parties where the women wore enough diamonds to fill a jewelry store. Luigi took it upon himself to teach me how to dress. On our fifteenth birthdays, he took Giorgio and me to his tailor. It was the first suit I owned, a proper three-piece with a double-breasted jacket. I became someone I never thought I’d be. For once, I was popular, a part of the in-crowd. I had no shortage of female attention or proposals, not that I wanted it. I only had eyes for Rachele. I was on my way to the top, and I thought I was invincible. Until, one day, I got myself caught.

I used the phone the cops gave me to call my father. He hung up on me and never called back.

Luigi bailed me out. He gave me a pat on the back and organized a party to celebrate myinauguration. That’s the first time Rachele looked at me as if I were someone and not just a poor kid with no prospects or wealth.

When my mother found out where the money came from, she turned her face away and said she never wanted to see me again. My father took the news that I was working for Luigi as if he’d learned I had cancer. He told me I was dead to him and ordered me in a flat, dejected voice to leave the house and to never come back.

Once again, Luigi came to the rescue. He took me in. Giorgi and I grew up like brothers. The men respected me as a part of the family. The rest is history.

I continued to send money to my parents, making monthly transfers to my father’s bank account, but he always returned the funds. And then my mother died without giving me a chance to say goodbye. To this day, my father lives in that house. I drive by there from time to time. The yard is still messy, and the paint on the walls is forever flaking. He looks older than his age, stooped and used up from working his hands to the bone. There’s no one to lend him a hand, no one who visits.

A single call can change that, but he never did pick up the phone after that day I got arrested. Like he told me, I’m dead to him now. I learned to accept his decision. What I do know, however, is that there’s no fucking way I’m ending up like that. I never want to watch the woman I love die a little each day because I can’t take care of her. I’d commit unspeakable crimes before I send my children to school with empty stomachs and threadbare clothes. If the money I make is considered filthy, I prefer to be dirty. I’d rather be detested than adored. I’d sooner go to hell than suffer in righteous poverty.

It’s difficult to say when exactly I became so corrupted. My intentions for stealing were clear at first. It was born from helpless anger as I was forced to see my mother suffer day after day while slowly wasting away. Then there was Rachele and the need not only to impress her but also to prove that I fit in her circles. The money was always secondary, not that it wasn’t nice to have. Now that there’s nothing left, the money is everything. All that remains is the power. I climbed too high to give it up. I’m at the top of the chain, one step below Luigi on par with Giorgio. Falling from that kind of height is fatal. If anyone succeeds in taking my place, he’s not going to let me live. It’ll be toodangerous, an uncalculated risk. No, if I go down, it’ll be with a bullet embedded in my skull.

I give myself a once-over in the mirror, making sure my grooming is impeccable before I shove a few clean outfits in a bag and head out. As I commanded, Kevin waits in the garage. There’s no doubt that the cops are having me watched, and it’s best not to let them see me leave with a bag. We’ll shake them off on the way to the helipad.

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