“God, I’m hopeless,” I grumbled as I slipped into my warm clothes while the radio sang a happy song about how the person they loved made them feel like Christmas.
Maybe I did need to rethink the whole male escort thing.
I grabbed the plastic container with the sweet little holiday wreath pattern. The sweets were nestled inside.
As I made my way toward the warehouse, I couldn’t help but wonder what Venezio might think of the cookies.
Dammit.
CHAPTER SIX
Venezio
Lorenzo had been slightly disappointed that I didn’t think Stephanie would be willing to look the other way to allow in our contraband. But he’d been equally as excited that I’d landed myself a job unloading the trucks.
I went ahead and left out the bit about getting that job because the director clearly thought I wasn’t cut out for anything else around the warehouse.
Though I felt like I’d gained everyone’s favor when I showed up on my third day of volunteering with several large propane space heaters to try to fend off some of the chill in the warehouse.
Jackets, hats, and gloves started to get peeled off. Everyone’s moods seemed to shift.
And when Stephanie came back from her bell-ringing, she shot a shocked but delighted look at the heaters.
“Don’t worry,” I said when I saw her jaw tighten. I could practically hear her mentally tallying how much it would cost to run them. “They’re propane-powered. I’ll keep ‘em filled.”
She was momentarily conflicted about that but ultimately decided to be okay with it as she peeled out of a few layers, sat down at the phone bank, and started making some calls.
I spent that whole shift pretending to be focused on sorting the gifts I’d already unloaded from the truck while mostly spending my time casting glances at Stephanie.
In my world, you learned young to mask your feelings because if anyone knew they got to you, they used that shit against you. I’d led a pretty insulated life, full of people just like me. So to see someone like Stephanie, who wore every feeling she had on her face, was fucking interesting.
She started each call with bright eyes and a customer-service smile even though no one could see her. Sometimes, the smile stretched even wider as she (it seemed) got someone to open up their wallets. More often than not, though, I watched that plastic smile dim or fall completely, often within just seconds of greeting someone.
She cared so fucking much.
I don’t think I ever gave a damn about anything in my life like she did about this charity.
I’d been a kid once with no presents at Christmas. It never occurred to me as an adult with some grown-up money to actually do anything about other kids who were dealing with the same shit.
I guess that was the difference between good people and those with hearts as black as mine.
I did call in early before I showed up one day, though, to add another five grand to their coffers. That was another two hundred kids with a gift.
I made a shit-ton of money. I lived in a crappy apartment in a crummy area. I wouldn’t feel the loss of it.
I could practically hear the other capos in the city and their never-ending ribbing of me and my apartment and how I lived like I still didn’t have anything.
There was a good reason for that.
I was scared of someday being in that same place, not having shit, not knowing where my next meal might come from, having no fucking idea how to drag myself up out of the circumstances of my birth.
So I hoarded everything I made.
I set it aside for a rainy day.
Even if, logically, I knew that when I was working for the mafia, there would be no more rainy days. This was an organization where the most successful capos were pulling in well over a million a year—more if they also diversified by starting legit businesses, and they all did eventually.
Sure, I was just a soldier. But I was a big earner. My kick-up was better than almost anyone in the Family. Once I proved myself with this job, I would become a capo. Once I was a capo, I would quickly get five or eight soldiers underneath me. They would kick up to me, increasing my income.
