Page 37 of Married with Mayhem

Monte pauses at the door to the basement steps and faces me with a skeptical expression. “You can back out. In fact, I wish you would.”

“You worry too much.” I poke him in the stomach. I’m lucky I didn’t jam my finger on his washboard abs. That shit ishard.

Monte opens the door. Male voices blend together in the room below. There’s an outburst of bawdy laughter. Monte scans my face. I know he’s wishing I’d chicken out. Part of me wants to, if only to please him.

Instead, I stare right back and wait for him to move. He descends the short flight of stairs slowly and checks to make sure I’m right behind him.

“There’s our guest of honor,” bellows Pete Vecchio, who is already seated at a large round table with three other men.

Only one of the other men is familiar. I met Bruce Tarantella this afternoon when he and Pete showed up at Gino’s for lunch. Sal is here too, although he’s not at the table. He never plays. He’s arranging bottles on a liquor cart. His gaze zeroes in on his son. The hint of concern on his face gives me a moment of pause.

But Monte is now handing over his gun to a severe looking, jowly fellow who then turns to me.

Monte instantly steps between us. “She’s not carrying.”

The man narrows his eyes but has to look up to meet Monte’s glare. “You know the rules, Castelli. All weapons go in the safe and everyone who walks through the door gets a pat down.”

“You’re not touching her,” Monte snarls. “So back the fuck off.”

“Whoa.” Pete holds up a hand to make the peace. “No need to get riled up. Carlo, the girl’s okay.”

Carlo appears quite unhappy to be called off but he obeys his boss. He sticks Monte’s gun in a locked cabinet and then settles down to lean against the wall and glower at everyone.

The dealer’s name is Frank and he works at an Atlantic City casino when he’s not overseeing friendly mafia card games. I wind up sitting between Pete Vecchio and a slim, quiet man called Little Pete. Monte joins his father at the liquor cart and the two of them exchange some terse words before Monte reluctantly settles down and sits on a barstool. A few more men arrive and Carlo gets called back into action before they are allowed to join us at the table.

Pete Vecchio, who the others are now referring to as Big Pete, grins at me as I neatly stack my poker chips.

“Fair warning,” he says with a wink. “Just because you’re pretty doesn’t mean we’ll let you win.”

In response, I fold my hands on the table and arch an eyebrow. “Rest assured, Big Pete, I’d be deeply insulted if you did.”

Big Pete cracks up and jerks a thumb. “I knew I liked this girl.”

The other players all join in with Big Pete’s laughter. It’s clear that within the mafia hierarchy he sets the tone among this crowd.

I have to wonder if he knew my father. He must have. All these men probably did. Albie Barone, the Baron of Brooklyn, had been squatting at the top of the New York mobster food chain for decades before his head was blown off.

“We play Seven-Card Stud here,” Frank says, clearly directing the comment to me, the only newcomer.

“None of that Texas Hold ‘Em crap,” adds a man called Eddie D. He sits across from me. The gold chains around his neck are thick enough to sink a boat, there’s an alarming amount of wiry chest hair peeking out of the unbuttoned top of his shirt and heperiodically sucks on an oxygen tank. But he smiles at me, gold tooth and all, so I smile back.

“I know the rules,” I say.

Frank deals so rapidly his movements are almost ethereal. I’m jealous of his technique and I could benefit from observing him. That will have to wait. Right now I’m focused on the cards.

This group is clearly used to playing together. The game proceeds at a quick pace. Cards fall, snap decisions are made, chips are thrown in the pot. In Seven-Card Stud, some cards are face up and others remain face down. This gives players the opportunity to calculate which cards might still be in circulation.

In person play is totally unlike online gaming. I’m more tense than I expected to be. It doesn’t help when I look up and find Monte hunched on a barstool with his dark eyes fixated on my every move. My concentration briefly breaks.

The betting rounds go quicker than I expected. I fold at the fifth round and lose a small pile of twenty dollar chips. The last two standing are Big Pete and Eddie D. Big Pete emerges from the showdown as the victor.

“I think you’re my new good luck charm,” he says to me as his fat hand sweeps the chip pile.

It’s kind of amusing to see a bigshot mafia boss get so euphoric about winning a few hundred bucks. The money must be pennies to him, maybe less. It’s all about the triumph, the thrill of the win.

Well, I can certainly relate to that.

When Frank starts dealing again, I blot out everything but the game. The men sitting around me become as remote as virtual players. All I see are the cards on the table. The only sounds worth paying attention to are the fall of the chips. Even Monte needs to be mentally set aside for the moment. My brain memorizes and calculates. I won’t fold this time. I’m confident in my hand.

---