“Thanks,” I said. “I still need to tell them.”
“Drink in my office after your shower?”
“Yeah. I need it.”
Parker Bowles walked toward us, and we both grew quiet. He wasn’t a favorite in the office. If this place was a home and everyone in it a work family, he was the sleazy uncle-in-law everyone wanted to kick out but couldn’t. He was someone to Edna, though no of us knew how they were related.
Edna’s respect was hard earned, but the rest of us thought she had more of a tolerate attitude toward Bowles than the rest of us. Especially because we all knew she knew he didn’t bust his ass or put it on the line like everyone else. He tried to snoop around our offices to gather intel for his articles.
“Edna wants to see you in her office, Nash.” He looked between me and Neil. “Something’s going on. Care to share?”
We both declined. No one shared with him because he wasn’t a family member, he was a user. Parker Bowles only watched out for Parker’s bowels. That was a running joke between all of us, except for him.
“You’re both assholes,” Parker said. “If no one has told either of you lately.”
“Whew!” Neil turned to me. “My heart was almost crushed. I forgot today is mirror day, Peps. Parker’s seeing his own reflection when he looks at us. Dodged a bullet with that insult coming from such apristinemouth.”
Parker mimicked him in a whiny voice.
Neil rolled his eyes and shooed Bowles in the other direction. “You better bolt back to your office. The sun will be going down soon, and you’ll be turned back into your rodent state.”
Parker’s cheeks heated and he blew a hot breath in my direction. I made my hands into paws and made rat noises with my teeth.
He pointed at me. “Better watch your step,Peps. You have enough enemies salivating at your door.”
Neil stood a little closer to me, and Parker turned and headed back to his office. Parker made threats like that sometimes, but only to the people he loathed. He disliked Neil, was jealous of him because he was a better…everything. But he loathed me. I didn’t take it personal. Whatever it was that makes two people just instantly dislike each other, growing into something worse than hate over time, we’d had since the moment we met.
“That fucker brings out the worst in me.” Neil sighed and pulled a piece of gum out of his pocket. He squeezed my shoulder. “How about I make that drink a double later?”
I smiled as I parted from Neil and headed back to my office. I set my things on my desk and unlocked my locker. The blood-soaked picture of Rosaria Caffi had turned hard, and I knew if I bent it, it would crack. I slipped it back into my secret pocket and headed for Edna’s office.
She didn’t answer when I knocked, so per her instructions, I let myself in when I knew she wanted to see me. Her office was empty. The same smell that had entranced me years before—old ink, old papers, and cool, fresh air—swirled around me. The picture of Marzio Fausti still hung on the wall, looking down on me.
“Ciao,” I breathed, stepping into his line of sight. And just like the smell of this place, something about him seemed to swirl around me too, putting me in a Fausti trance.
Maybe that was why Edna understood me so well. We both shared that same obsession—passion—when it came to that family. Except where hers was focused on Marzio, I took a wider lens to his faction.
Edna wasn’t much of a sharer, but one night, over Chinese takeout, too many drinks, and of course, a long-winded conversation about the Faustis, she confided in me that she’d cried over Marzio’s death. She’d met him once (a quick but powerful conversation, she’d said), fell in love (one sided, of course), and never got over him.
It was the entire reason I believed she was still in her Marzio era and always would be. She dressed the part in her usual uniform of a collared blouse with the sleeves rolled up, tucked into flowing slacks. Sometimes she’d put on a long, fancy dress from his time, like she was going to a ritzy event. Edna was tall and thin, willowy, but there was nothing soft about her face. It was all business, all the time. Her speech was even exaggerated in that old New York way.
Basically, because of Marzio Fausti, she always seemed to look like she stepped out of a Glenn Miller song.
“You might have more luck asking him questions than I have.”
I turned at Edna’s voice and watched as she made it to her desk in a few long strides. She seemed to pour into her seat, like she was made of water instead of flesh, blood, and bone, and set her long, slender feet on the desk, one ankle crossing over the other.
She nodded to the picture. “He has always been so quiet for me.”
“If only dead men had tales to tell.” I took the seat across from her.
“Oh,Peps,” she said, as if she was exhausted by me, “haven’t I taught you anything? Dead menalwayshave tales to tell, if we follow the right clues. It’s up to us to tell their stories.”
“Sure, but when it comes to the Faustis, they bury their secrets too deep.”
She grinned at me. “Touché, my young apprentice, but nothing is ever buried too deep, not when we have the tools to find them.” She studied me for a second, her shrewd eyes taking in every inch of me. “Tigran Macaluso.”
I nodded, becauseone, I already knew she knew (she had moles all over the city), andtwo, I didn’t feel like going into detail again. I was still too close to the scene. His blood was still on the bottom of my shoes, and the smell of it was trapped in my nose.
