“Giovanni Russo. Giani.”
“Wow, a fellow Italian.” I shake my head. “Sunday dinners, lots of pasta, everybody talking at once.”
“More like screaming and yelling, throwing shit, and me leaving and never looking back.”
“Sorry.” If he only knew how I could sympathize with and relate to the fucked-up family story. “Sometimes life sucks. Believe me, I get it.”
“I have a feeling you do, but back to your father’s trucking business.”
I mash my lips together. “My father’s trucking company was one of the only legit things he ever did.” Deuce nods, and I go on. “After his first stint in Rikers, he promised my mother he’d never go back, and he kept his word for about five years.
“Between the time I was fourteen and nineteen, he was a model citizen. Working all day, eating dinner with us at night. When I got my driver’s license, he even taught me how to drive the big rigs, and I liked it. Most of my friends struggled with driving a small car, and I knew how to drive a semi.”
Deuce smiles wide. “You’re fuckin’ kidding.”
“Nope, it was fun, and it took real skill. Not as easy as you might think.”
“I can just see you behind the wheel.” He smiles wider, and his eyes actually sparkle. “Total badass.”
“You should smile more often.”
“Nah, I’m a badass too, remember.” He waves his hand at me. “Continue.”
“You sure you want to hear all this?”
“Positive.” He points to his head. “Possible concussion, remember, you gotta keep me up and awake.”
“Those years were probably the only happy times in our lives—then Covid hit.” I lower my gaze and swallow hard. “My mother got that bad strain—she died two months later.”
“Shit, babe, I’m sorry.” His warm hand covers mine, but I can’t let myself feel the pain. It’s too overwhelming.
I blink away the images of my mother gasping for her last breath. Images that can take me down in a matter of seconds if I allow myself to go there. “All businesses suffered during Covid, but it was my mother getting sick that really did my father in. He came off like this big tough guy, but my mother had the grit and strength in the family. Without her, he collapsed.”
“He needed her to keep him straight.”
“He needed her for everything. They were like a throwback to another generation, where my mother took care of the house, took care of me, and did the books for the business. I tried to take her place, but in my father’s eyes, without her, he had nothing worth living for, and it all fell apart. It hurt that I couldn’t fill the gap she left but . . .”
“Nah, don’t do that to yourself. You were just a teenager.” He squeezes my hand. “Still doesn’t explain how you got with the Dogs.”
“As you can image, it was a terrible time. Not only did we lose my mother, but my father wasn’t taking care of the business. He started drinking again and, of course, hanging out with his lowlife buddies.”
“Did he lose the trucking business?”
“Not exactly. As fate would have it, his buddies told him about a way to make quick cash right around the time my high school boyfriend, Tommy, joined the Rabid Dogs. You know him as Bullet.”
“No shit.” Deuce cocks his head. “So if you were Bullet’s property, how come Viper was coming down so strong on you?”
“First of all, I wasn’t Bullet’s property. I hung around with him, but I refused to wear his cut because of the term ‘property.’”
“Sounds like you.”
“I throw him a look and continue, “My father’s buddies said the Rabid Dogs could end all his money problems by shipping some cargo up and down the East Coast.
“I don’t think I like where this story is headed.”
“Yeah, it got way worse and never got better.”
“I gotta ask—what was the cargo?”
