Page 118 of Mob Knight

“Who’d you piss off more than us? Who’d her father piss off more than Enrique? Or was it one of his little psychopath minions?”

He means Enrique’s nephews. There’s nearly as many of them as there are the rest of us in each family. Pablo, Alejandro, Jorge, Javier, and Joaquin. “Este pequeño cerdito.” Any of them could be the little piggy who cried wee, wee, wee all the way home. Did one of them bitch to Enrique about something besides who Joey’s father is?

“I don’t know. You sound awfully certain while you point the finger at them.”

“Because the most obvious answer is usually the right one. I knew you didn’t learn shit in law school.”

Not all of us went to Yale for law school. Ionlywent to NYU, but I know my fucking bar exam score was higher than his. I fucking bribed someone to check.

“Don’t deflect.”

“Whatever. I did nothing, and neither did anyone in my family. We couldn’t give two shits from Sunday about any of you right now.”

“Give Maria our best.”

“Thanks.” Actual sincerity—that doesn’t last. “Vaffanculo a chi t’è morto.”

I have my own response to his go fuck the souls of your dead family members.

“D'anam don diabhal.” Your soul to the devil.

Basically, I hope you eat shite and die. The difference between Gabriele and me—one of many differences—is my family’s bothered to learn more Italian than we’ll ever let on. No one in theCosa Nostra—or any syndicate—has bothered to learn Irish.

We hang up, and I’m left just as fucked as I was before. Seamus meets my gaze, and I know he’s mulling something over before he speaks.

“Besides three of the Four Families, who hates the Diazes most right now? Who’d want us or Jesus to accuse Enrique?”

“How much time do we have?”

I glare at Sean, who I don’t find funny. “Shouldn’t you be home with a wife kissing your boo-boo?”

I want answers, not smartass quips. I inhale before I say something I can’t take back. It’s not my family’s fault, and considering what Sean did to protect Joey, I’m being an arse fornot showing more appreciation. I open my mouth to apologize, but Sean nods. He gets how I feel, so he apologizes first. I shoot him a tight smile of thanks, dipping my chin to reciprocate the apology.

“Joey told me her father has other Mexicans plus Hondurans, Guatemalans, and Salvadorians to back him. They might want to feck Enrique over.”

We’re not allowed to say fuck to each other, and especially not at each other. Certainly not with our dads in the room. We’re not even supposed to use it amongst us in casual conversation.

“If they side with Jesus, I don’t see them going after his daughter. What about the Dominicans and Ecuadorians we squeezed in Port Richmond? Are they pissed at me for enforcing? Pissed at me for dating her? Maybe pissed at Enrique for not protecting them?”

I’m just thinking aloud right now.

“Aren’t those families Jocelyn helps?” Seamus’s brow furrows as he watches me crack my knuckles.

“I haven’t seen her out there enough to know. I can ask when she wakes up. She’s also having problems with her boss. The woman keeps claiming people are filing complaints against Joey. She gave her shite about not coming back into work today even though Joey said she had a fire at her place and got injured. I’ve heard parts of their conversations before. Joey says the woman’s completely different toward her now that she’s dating me.”

“I’ll look her up.”

Finn’s in front of his computer and starts typing. He’s not just our CPA. He’s like one of those hackers on TV shows with the black and green or white screens with all the mumbo jumbo scrolling. If there’s anything worth knowing about Martha, he’ll find it. He doesn’t even need her last name to get started.

My dad and uncles sit quietly, letting the rest of us hash this out and plan. They’re semi-retired, if there is such a thing in themob. They don’t go out on many missions anymore, but they’ve come out of retirement a few times lately. If we need extra hands or they want to scream a message that no one touches their children—by blood or by marriage—they suit up. We all follow Dillan’s orders, but even he still defers to their experience and wisdom.

“Da, what do you think?”

“I think someone in the other families hired low-rung gang members to scout, so they’d go unnoticed. But you recognized the mercenary, and some no-name off the street won’t know how to make those kinds of bombs or have drones. Find the woman driving that car. Make her tell you.”

Uncle Donovan and Declan shattered the cardinal rule we don’t target women and children. It was a downhill fall from grace after that. My family’s slowly—like at a fucking snail’s pace—rebuilding our reputation for not targeting them anymore. But they opened the floodgates, which means people have targeted most of the new wives.

However, a female mercenary is entirely different. If you hire out your sword arm, you give up any protection. We treat all mercenaries the same: a threat to extinguish or an asset to pay well, but never trust.

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