Could Pops have worked for another family?
While I was still trying to puzzle it out, my phone rang. Carlo was calling.
“Hello?” I answered.
“What are you doing?” Carlo asked, his tone clipped.
I glanced at my laptop, confused. Carlo was a hard man, but he wasn’t a micro-manager. At least, not with me. He trusted me to get my shit done, and I always came through. He’d never called and asked what I was doing before. “Research,” I replied.
“I gave you a task and told you it takes priority, and you’re sitting at home fuckin’ around. Get your ass to my office. Now.”
Startled, I stumbled over my response, “Yessir.”
Carlo hung up.
I stared at my phone, wondering what the hell had just happened. Everyone knew the underboss had one hell of a temper, but since I kept my head down and did my job, it had never been directed at me before.
“Was that Uncle Carlo?” Angel asked, sounding as confused as I felt as he stared at the phone in my hand. No doubt he’d heard the conversation, or at least the tone.
I nodded.
“He sounds pissed. What’s going on?”
“I’m not sure.” I pocketed my phone and pushed my chair back to stand. “He accused me of fuckin’ around instead of working. Told me to get to his office.”
Angel’s forehead scrunched up. “Something must be going on.” He plucked his phone from the table and turned it on. “I don’t have any messages.”
“They know you have your hands full with Markie.”
Angel didn’t look convinced, and I couldn’t blame him. As the family heir, they should be keeping him in the loop no matter what. “Yeah, that’s probably it,” he lied.
A feeling of unease crept under my skin. I rubbed the back of my neck and voiced the question that had been running through my mind since the phone call. “Do you think Carlo knows we were searching for information on Pops?”
“It’s possible.” Angel’s unsettled look told me he’d been thinking the same thing. He glanced at his screen. “Tech could have enabled a digital tripwire to notify him whenever someone looks up your father. But it doesn’t make sense. I don’t understand why Carlo would care about that.”
“I don’t know, but I better hurry up and get over there.”
Angel nodded, his expression tight with worry. “Be careful.”
We both knew what happened to people who pissed off Carlo. The underboss wasn’t exactly known for his leniency. I reequipped my holster and slipped on my jacket. “I’m always careful.”
Again, Angel didn’t look convinced. Maybe because I was still rocking stitches in my cheek and at least one cracked rib.
“If shit goes sideways…” Angel didn’t finish his sentence. He didn’t have to, because we both knew what would happen.
If shit went too far sideways, I’d be feeding the worms out in the desert with Matt Deter. I needed to get my story straight and tread carefully.
***
Carlo’s house was a modest, split-level Southwestern stucco in a gated community. Carlo’s personal guard, a thirty-something ex-marine who everyone called Wolf, greeted me and took me into the garage to relieve me of my weapons.
Carlo was a mustache Pete (an old school wiseguy), whose paranoia had enabled him to outlive most of his peers. He should have retired years ago, but he wasn’t the type of man who could hand over the reins. Most likely, they’d have to be plucked from his cold, dead hands. Carlo’s old school ways extended past his modest home and his human security to his car. The same old Jaguar he’d been driving when I met him.
Carlo was loaded—he had to be—but nobody knew what he did with his money. The son-of-a-bitch was as frugal as they came, and like me, he didn’t place bets that weren’t a guaranteed win. Since he didn’t trust banks or pay taxes, he probably had his money buried in glass jars in his back yard. No doubt he planned to take it with him when he met his maker.
The split-level home held many memories. Growing up, any time I wasn’t guarding Angel, I was here, learning how to fight, talk, and think like a wiseguy. Although Carlo’s men usually trained my body, he insisted on training my mind, saying that brains would protect me when brawn failed.
As I passed his living room, memories of my first day of his training assaulted me.
