They know, and they’ve come to kill me and Carlo. I find myself moving instinctively, getting Carlo behind me so that if anyone pulls a gun, the bullet will hit me first.
“Well?” Clemenza spits. “Answer my question or get your goddamn Boss down here to explain to me why my godson’s disappeared from his own wedding!”
Ah. Theydon’tknow. Clemenza is merely appealing to me as the highest-ranking Morelli in the room, which should have occurred to me fucking five seconds ago. “Why don’t you sit down, have some coffee, Don Clemenza,” I say, and I try to sound as lazy and uninterested as I can. “And explain tomewhat the problem is.”
“My boy Ray’s gone,” Big Gee booms. He’s almost as big as me, although I know I could take him. We’ve had a few run-ins, both when I was a Gee and after I joined the Morellis, and he’s always come off worst. He remembers, too. I only have to raise an eyebrow at him and he leans back on his feet, sullen.
“Gone? Gone where?” I ask.
Big Gee shrugs. “No one knows.”
Louis Clemenza is squinting behind me at Carlo. I move into his line of sight again, blocking Carlo from his view, and glare. He looks away.
“What about you, Fontana?” Frangello asks suddenly. “You got any idea where Gatti is?”
I snort. “Why the fuck wouldIknow anything?”
“You were supposed to catch up with me after the meeting, talk about old times, business opportunities. Never saw you.”
It might be my imagination, or I might really be hearing Carlo breathe faster behind me. “I had better things to do than get drunk with you, Frangello,” I say. “But I’m sorry if I hurt your feelings.”
“Some Morelli fucking killed him!” Clemenza bellows, his voice creaking with rage. “I know it! I feel it in my bones!”
“That’s a serious accusation, Lou,” says a calm, soft voice from the doorway, and we all turn to watch Luca walking in, adjusting his shirt collar. He walks between Clemenza and Big Gee, straight to his husband, and leans down to kiss him. When he looks back up, his eyes are cold. “And I take offense to the suggestion.”
“You heard Don Morelli,” I say at once. “Wherever Gatti’s gone, we had nothing to do with it. He was probably out drinking late with his boys; fell asleep on the beach somewhere.”
“On hiswedding night?” Clemenza wheezes. He reaches over to the kitchen counter and clings onto it for support. Is he having a damn heart attack? Last thing I need is another inconvenient body.
Big Gee’s shaking his head too, or as far as that thick neck can actually turn his head. “Nah. Nah, this is some bullshit. I’m gonna have my boys search this whole fuckin’ place until they find him, and no one’s moving from here until we do.”
“Has anyone bothered to ask the bride?” Luca asks, cool and silky as ever, and the room goes silent in a way that it hasn’t so far, despite Clemenza’s blustering.
Clemenza gives Luca a look like he’d prefer to see that head mounted on a wall somewhere. “She’s not talking,” he snarls. “Says he never came back to the bridal suite and she fell asleep waiting for him. But there’s something she’s not saying. I can feel it in my bones. She’s a liar, that girl.”
“Maybe she’s pressed that her new husband didn’t bother to spend the wedding night with her,” Finch suggests, and takes another sip of coffee. Luca looks like he’s suppressing a smile.
“Maybe,” Luca says. “And I have to say, Lou, your bones aside, I don’t like what you’re insinuating—about my men,orabout Sophia. It’s nothing to do with any of us. Now,” he says, turning to the room in general as though the conversation is finished. “I’m afraid I’ll have to skip breakfast. I have some unexpected business back in the city. Carlucci, go load up our luggage and bring the car around, will you? And tell Vollero to go over to the Villa to check on Sophia. Send our regards. Let her know we’re at her disposal.”
“Sure thing, Boss,” Carlucci says, leaping to his feet.
Clemenza bangs a fist down on the counter hard enough to shake the extra breakfast plates and cutlery still stacked there. “No one’s leaving!” he bellows.
Carlucci doesn’t even turn around to see what the issue is. He just keeps walking past the old Don. I like that about the guy. He never gives an inch to any old asshole who thinks he deserves attention just because he’s got a few years on the rest of us.
Luca gives a dangerous smile. “I’m sorry, Don Clemenza; you really can’t expect me to wait around for your godson to be pulled out of his drunken stupor just to give his apologies. It’s disgraceful, of course, but I’m not going to waste my time watching you punish him for it—which I’m sure you will.”
He stands, and Finch stands with him, keeping his mouth shut for once. Finch D’Amato is smarter than he likes to portray himself at times, and I think he’s making the right play here. Saying anything—anything at all—could weaken his husband’s position.
Clemenza stands upright again too, pulling on every ounce of willpower he has. The old man is a force to be reckoned with, always has been, but his glory days are long gone. Still, he tries to be the man he was. “You scumbag Morellis have done something to him,” he hisses. “And you all are gonna stay here until someone answers for it.”
The atmosphere is charged instantly, every single one of us vibrating with it, twitching muscles as we try to judge if—when—we should pull out our argument-deciders.
Everyone except Vitali, who’s been watching from the doorway with the kind of relaxed air Angelo Messina used to have. He comes up behind Big Gee and Clemenza, pulling his jacket straight. He clears his throat says, “Don Morelli will be leaving now.”
“No one’s leaving,” Clemenza says, and he’s no longer shouting.
Luca gives a grin. “Oh, Lou. You really don’t want to do this.”
