Page 47 of Gin & Trouble

Forcing myself to focus, I logged into my computer, the Marchionni network, and finally into my proprietary program.

The database populated, but there had to be a mistake. Heart pounding, I leaned closer to the screen. “That’s weird.”

“What is?” Julia hovered nearby, but kept a respectable distance, likely waiting for an invitation.

“This alert is telling me a plane took off, but I didn’t get one when it landed.” I motioned her closer.

She didn’t budge or speak or seem to breathe.

Her reaction confused me, but I didn’t have time to tease out what was going on in her head. Hell, at that point it could have been any number of things. I’d botched ninety-nine percent of our conversation since I’d returned from Leo’s.

I backed out of the program to run a diagnostic and pulled up my contacts list on my cell. “I need to call Marco.”

Julia sank into the chair beside me. Her gaze locked on the screen. “Dante, we really need to talk.”

“I’ll make it quick.” It wasn’t until I pressed dial that I realized my hands were shaking. I wished I could have blown it off as Julia’s nerves rubbing off on me, but I knew better. The people who’d ordered the hit on my brother had been in New Orleans for days without my knowledge.

“Dante, I was just about to call you about a fishing trip.” Marco spoke over the sound of children’s laughter and splashing. “Nico, look!”

I needed his attention. To accomplish that, I needed him to walk away from the pool. “This isn’t a social call. We have a problem.”

“You’re not going to believe what Renata did.” He chuckled, giving me absolutely no indication he’d heard me.

The mention of my infant niece turned my blood to ice. We’d screwed up. We’d allowed ourselves to become vulnerable since leaving the Cosa Nostra. With wives and children in the mix, we never should have let our guard down.

I swallowed past the lump in my throat. “This is serious. Tommaso Abruzzo was in New Orleans.”

Julia drew a sharp breath. Odd considering I doubted she knew who the guy was, let alone what he and his sisters were capable of.

“Are you sure?” All traces of humor left Marco’s voice.

Keeping an eye on Julia, I said, “Not until I get the security footage from the commuter airport in Lakeshore, but it’s definitely his plane.”

She glanced away.

“When did he come in? Any idea where he is now?” Marco muttered a slew of curse words under his breath.

“I said the son of a bitchwasin New Orleans. His plane took off a few minutes ago.” I braced myself for his reaction. “I’ll need some time to figure out when he arrived.”

“You didn’t know he was here? The hell, Dante? I count on you to keep track of this shit.”

“There’s a bug in the program. I’ll fix it.” Bybug, I meant the notification system I’d set up to track the identifier on certain aircrafts had failed—at least partially.

“I need to know when he came in, who he talked to, where he took a fucking piss.Capisci?”

“Capisco.” I didn’t take his shouting personally. I’d be upset too if my wife and infant daughter were in danger because of a glitch. “I’m digging into it.”

“Do that. I’m going to notify my security team.”

I pressed enter and skimmed the data, but the woman beside me was making it difficult to concentrate. At some point during the conversation, she’d started to cry. Not wailing and sobbing and drama. Silently. Had I not seen the tears on her cheeks I would have missed it.

Marco continued to rant but switched to Italian to speak to his bodyguards, which was a good thing because I wasn’t processing anything he’d said.

The phone and computer chirped in three quick beeps.

Julia startled.

I took her hand in mine and used the other to open the notification window. Abruzzo’s plane had crossed the Air Defense Identification Zone along the US border. Blowing out a sigh of relief, I said, “Abruzzo’s plane just cleared ADIZ.”

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