Page 13 of Connected

Chapter 5

Joaquin

“Are you just going to stand there, staring at the elevator doors?” Rocco questions, snapping me out of my trance.

I turn to him abruptly and narrow my eyes.

“If you had paid attention to anything but your dick, you’d know her leaving me was a pivotal moment.”

“Leaving you?” he scoffs, walking further into my penthouse. Instead of heading to the kitchen for a cup of coffee like a normal person, he heads for the rolling bar and pours himself a glass of bourbon. “It’s Pilar, that girl hangs on you like a fungus. I give it twenty-four hours before she’s at the club, looking for your dick.”

The urge to punch him in his face and break all his teeth tugs at me, but before I can lay a finger on him or tell him what a worthless fuck he is, he spins around and raises his glass.

“Now, put some fucking clothes on, motherfucker. I’m about to flip your world upside down and I prefer to do it without your junk staring me in the face.”

I don’t move, mainly to prove I don’t take orders from him, but then I realize the man I do take my orders from, showed his face unexpectedly last night and no good ever comes from that.

Making my way into my bedroom, I ignore the scent of Pilar that still lingers in the room and quickly pull on a pair of lounge pants. The open drawer once filled with her clothes catches my eye and I silently wonder if I can stay away from her. Shaking the thought from my head, I kick the drawer closed and go back to the living room where Rocco waits for me.

“You should probably pour yourself a drink,” he advises.

“It’s eight o’clock in the morning,” I growl.

“It’s five o’clock somewhere,” he argues, pausing. “On second thought, don’t drink. One of us should have a clear head and seeing as I haven’t slept in, oh, forty-eight hours, I’m going to elect you to be that person.”

I guess he needs to be reminded that out of the two of us, I’ve been the one with the clear and level head for the last six years.

“Look, I’m not in the mood— ”

“Uncle Vic is dying,” he reveals, cutting me off.

Sure I heard him wrong, I narrow my eyes and wait for him to elaborate.

“Stage four cancer,” he continues, diverting his eyes to the amber liquid sloshing around in his glass. I try to picture the man I’ve looked up to for nearly half my life, frail and sickly, but I can’t. Yesterday, he appeared to be a picture of perfect health, dressed immaculately as usual. His color was good and there was no fault in his demeanor. I suppose it’s like that for everyone, though.

You look good until you don’t.

Here today, gone tomorrow.

“No one knows and apparently, he has no intention of telling anyone,” Rocco continues.

“What about Grace?” He shakes his head. “Adrianna and Nikki?”

“What part of no one don’t you understand,” he says before knocking back the contents of his glass. Cringing slightly, he sets it on the coffee table and looks back at me. “No one in the organization knows either.”

That doesn’t surprise me. If word got around that he was so sick, his enemies and the other families would see it as a sign of weakness and likely put a bid out for his territory. But him not telling his wife and daughters, now that’s a shock. Victor might be one of the most notorious mobsters to ever walk the streets of New York, but he’s a family guy first and foremost.

While other bosses may have wives, they also got a side piece— the Italians call it a Goomah. They keep them shacked up in fancy apartments just like this one and shower them with designer handbags and stolen furs. Monday through Friday they’re with their families, but Saturday nights are reserved for their mistresses.

Not Victor.

Every day is family day for him, and so long as that man is on this planet, he only has eyes for his Gracie. It’s always been the thing I respect most and if I’m being honest, it’s the thing I envy the most too. But it’s because of men like Rocco and me, that he gets to live that life. We’re the guys on the front lines, the men who drudge through the shit and take the bullets and do the federal bids so he can remain hunkered down with the woman he loves, watching his daughters live their cushy lives.

“So that’s why he’s here,” I say, taking a seat in the armchair across from him.

“I suppose that has something to do with it,” he says, drawing out a sigh. “He wants to have dinner with the both of us tonight.”

That isn’t anything unusual, whenever he visits, we usually hit one of the steakhouses on the strip, but I can tell I’m missing something by the way Rocco pauses and leans his elbows on his knees. He lifts his eyes to mine and fixes me with a hard stare.

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