Perhaps he knew no one there would be stupid enough to think differently.
“Okay, okay, let’s all calm down,” Jack said, as though he were a kindergarten teacher interrupting a schoolyard fight. “There’s no need for anyone to start shooting. And whatever you just saw on that video, Mr. Messina, I’m sure it can be explained. Let’s talk it through.”
I felt rather than saw Angelo’s manner change to match Jack’s. “Oh, I’m very interested to hear the explanation,” Angelo said, and he holstered his gun. “I agree, Jacopo. Let’s go downstairs and sort this mess out.”
He nodded at me. It took me a few seconds, but I holstered my gun as well. “Sure,” I said. “Why ruin a beautiful friendship?” Castellani let out a long wheeze of air. He must have been more stressed than I realized.
Alessandro was the last to put his weapon away, but he did it, although he gave a contemptuous sneer as he did. “So much fucking talking in this city,” he said. He looked at Angelo. “The Families here, theyboreeach other to death.”
Angelo gave a polite smile. “After you,” he said to Julian, indicating the door.
Julian gave him a bright, ingratiating smile. “Whatever you say, Angelo.”
The situation had calmed considerably, enough for me to realize that neither Alessandro nor Jack seemed surprised or uncomfortable with Julian’s nudity as he brushed past them.
Strange Family, the Castellanis.
* * *
There wereno soldiers or guards waiting downstairs. We went into the salon again and sat opposite each other, Angelo and me on one sofa with Jack hovering nearby, Julian and his father on the other with Alessandro standing behind them.
Nobody spoke for a moment, and then Angelo said, “Julian was about to explain why he killed Donnie Greco.”
Jack rubbed a hand over his jaw. He’d been cagey in the car when I suggested it, and that reaction alone had told me I was right. Alessandro’s eyes showed dawning comprehension as they flew to the back of his brother’s head. Comprehension, but no surprise.
With a flutter of his eyelashes, Julian said, “You see, Angelo, I’ve always had athingfor you. Ever since I heard about the Morellis of New York, you were my favorite. Like a celebrity, only better than a celebrity, because you werereal. The things you did were real. The kills you made, the blood you shed…” He gave a blissful smile. “You were a real artist, someone to look up to. A role model for someone like me.”
“Julianus,” Ciro snarled, but one glance from Angelo shut him up.
“How did you hear of these things?” Angelo asked. It was a good question. Angelo’s crimes were rarely attributed to him—unless he or Don Morelliwantedthem to be, to send a message to another Family.
“Oh, Papa brought me up on tales of all the Families,” Julian said. “He used to tell me bedtime stories about the things that were going on in New York. It was very exciting. But the Morelli stories were my favorites—andyou, particularly. When I was training, I always pretended to be you, Angelo.”
Angelo turned his head very deliberately to look at Ciro Castellani, who was scratching at a non-existent stain on his knee. “Training?”
“I wanted my sons to be able to take care of themselves,” Castellani said smoothly, with a horrible, false smile. “They both undertook self-defense training when they were growing up. That’s all Julian means.”
Angelo took that in and then turned back to Julian. “Continue.”
Julian went on. “When I heard you were here in Los Angeles, I wasthrilled. I had dreams of meeting you—of you falling in love with me—”
I made an involuntary movement, and Julian’s eyes flew to me. “That was before I knew about you, Baxter Flynn. When I heard you were Angelo’s squeeze, Ididthink about killing you.”
Next to me, I heard Angelo make a noise I’d never heard from him before: a low, warning hiss. I put a hand on his knee. Julian observed us both with interest and then looked at Angelo. “Oh, I would never do that now,” he said earnestly. “I’ll admit I considered it the other night when we were out at the pond. But I can see how much you love each other. Irespectthat. Besides, I quite like Baxter Flynn. He’s very attractive. It would be a waste to kill him.”
“Ricky Fiori,” Jack said, before Angelo or I could respond. “The Bernardi guy, the one running Greco around town. What happened there?”
Julian gave him a friendly smile. “I was trying tohelp,” he said earnestly. “I decided to save you all some time and effort, and take care of him for you. I thought it’d give you a clear pathway to Greco—” Julian frowned. “—but then Greco just got picked up by a wholegroupof Bernardis instead. That one kind of backfired.”
Jack ran a hand through his hair, shagging it up. “And how’d you do it? With Fiori?” When Julian told us, it was almost exactly as I’d suggested to Angelo and Jack on the way here.
Julian Castellani had taken advantage of his Family’s meatpacking and frozen goods business. The night crew working in one plant had been willing to look the other way when the Boss’s son turned up, asking for access to an industrial freezer and a cold delivery truck. We’d see that truck driving back as we were making our way out to the desert. We just hadn’t connected it to the body at the time.
“But…” Jack mussed up his hair again, and I saw it now for what it was: a gesture of agitation. “Why likethat? Freezing him and then going to all the trouble of driving him out there—why?”
“Well, I thought it wouldamuseyou all,” Julian said, smiling around the room as though it was a great joke. “A man frozen solid in the desert? I thought you’d all see the funny side.” He waited for us to smile with him, and when we didn’t, his face fell. “Wow, tough crowd.”
I had to move on before I pulled out my gun and shot the guy point-blank myself. “Did you kill all those Bernardi soldiers at the docks?”
