I scramble back through the house, out the back door, to see Carlo lying in the grass of the yard, rolling onto his back, holding up his hands as he’s advanced on by Dellacroce.
“Hey!” I shout, but Dellacroce only glances my way.
“Stay where you are or this motherfucker gets it,” he snarls.
Behind me, Matt has run in through the house after me and is moaning “Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God,” under his breath like a mantra. “I’m so sorry, Mr. Fontana, he came back and he saw us talking in the alley and he made me tell him—”
“Mattie told me you fuckers run with the Morellis,” Dellacroce slurs. He’s drunk as hell, clearly. “So I thought I’d show you what happens to assholes like you.”
“I’m so sorry,” Matt moans again. His face is a bloody mess. His father had to beat the information out of him about me and Carlo. I don’t have my gun on me, or I’d clear the brains out of Dellacroce’s skull without hesitating. But I left it upstairs, too caught up in the idea that this was a vacation.
It’s not a fucking vacation and I was stupid to ever think it could be.
“Dellacroce,” I snarl. “You better fucking look right at me and see who you’re threatening.”
Dellacroce glances my way, then does a double take. “Oh, you. Yeah, I know you.” He laughs, a mocking, boozy laugh that sets my teeth on edge. “Fontana, eh? What an honor that the Morellis would send someone likeyouafter me. You doing a favor for Sonny, is that it?”
He still has the gun on Carlo. So I grab Matt, hook my arm around his throat, and squeeze hard enough so that he grabs my arm, but not hard enough to hurt.
“Don’t you hurt my boy,” Dellacroce snarls. “I’m the only one who gets to make that little shit hurt.”
“Then don’tmakeme hurt him, asshole.”
I have no intention of doing anything to Matt. I just want Dellacroce’s attention off Carlo, so Carlo has a chance to get up, to run, get out of here. But Carlo is only getting up from the grass slowly, inching up cautiously like Dellacroce is a cobra that’ll turn and strike if he makes any sudden moves. For a moment I fear he’s been shot, but he’s still holding on to the bottle of wine for Christ’s sake, the cork sticking jauntily out of the neck.
Any one of my crew, any one of my brothers in the Family would know to bolt like hell, duck and weave, trust me to take care of Dellacroce, but Carlo’s thinking about it too hard to justact. All that thinking is going to get him killed.
Still, hedoesn’tseem to have been shot yet, so that’s one good thing.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing, coming around here threatening me and mine?” I demand. “We ain’t in town for you.”
“Bullshit. What else would you be doing in town?”
“We’re on vacation,” I spit, “but I can make it a working vacation if you want to die so bad.” I move forward fast, off the deck, Matt stumbling along with me.
Dellacroce’s gun moves, tracks toward me, and I throw Matt aside. I don’t trust this asshole not to shoot through his own son to get to me. I swerve, keep moving as fast as I can, but Carlo lets out a shout and from the side I see him throwing the wine bottle wildly at Dellacroce.
It’s so wide it just about hits me instead, but it alarms Dellacroce enough that he swings his gun back toward Carlo.
I feel the same pure and overwhelming rage I had that night with Gatti. Everything in the moonlight seem pinpoint clear. Time slows down for everyone around me, but I increase my speed. I barrel straight at Dellacroce, lowering my head to tackle him, and hit him so hard in the chest with my shoulder that I hear his ribs crack. He drops the gun as he flies back through the air. For a moment he catches against the chain at the edge of the yard before the metal poles are dragged out of the ground, and he topples right over the edge of the bluff, cartwheeling like some demented circus trick, but there’s no net waiting to catch him.
And my own momentum is carrying me forward, too close to the edge—Carlo is running towards me, reaching out, but I’m already falling, grabbing wildly, desperately—
Chapter Forty-Three
Carlo
The second Nick collides with Dellacroce I start running towards them. Dellacroce has already gone over the side of the cliff, and Nicky is contorting himself, reaching out for me, but I’m too late, I’m too late, and he disappears into the dark emptiness.
I manage to stumble to my knees just before the edge. I hear a solid thump from the black beach below, and nothing after. For a moment I’m frozen in time. My head is spinning, and I feel cold all over despite the warmth of the night.
There’s still no sound from below.
I creep forward, hardly daring to breathe, and peek over, but I see nothing. Only black night.
“Fuck,” comes a voice to my right, and I just about break my neck twisting my head to see where it’s coming from. On the edge of the bluff to my right, the chain from the not-fence is hanging off the cliff, taut, jerking against the ground. I scramble over, lean down as much as I dare, and wind my arm around the chain to anchor it. There’s definitely something at the end of it.
“Nicky?” It comes out in a whisper.
