“If you know my intentions are sincere, why must you insist upon rejecting my help?”
“Because I’m used to doing everything on my own.”
“You’re not alone anymore,chiquita. Take my help with the sincerity it’s offered. If you keep rejecting it, I’ll spank you.”
Heat flares in her eyes when she nods. I can tell she takes my comment as a challenge rather than a warning. I speak without shifting my attention away from her.
“TíoEnrique, may we use your office for that call?”
“Sí, sobrino.”
We rise and walk down the hallway to mytío’sstudy. Vita pulls her phone from her pocket and unlocks it. We sit on a sofa together as she hits her father’s contact. It rings twice.
Nicolò sounds groggy. “Toria?”
“Sì, papà.”
I have a moment’s fear that their entire conversation will be in Italian. However, she eases that worry.
“I’m somewhere where I need to speak English. Otherwise, it’ll draw too much attention if anybody catches a word here or there.”
“Are you not somewhere you can speak in private?”
“I am, but I just don’t want to run the risk of anyone hearing Italian.”
“All right. It’s the middle of the night here. Are you sure everything’s okay?”
“Yes, this is just my only opportunity to check in with you. I’m hearing things about you and the Torettas. It doesn’t sound good.”
“What do you mean by that, Toria?”
“I don’t know. It doesn’t make sense to me. We’ve been allied with them for decades, but I couldn’t tell from what I overheard whether that’s still the case. I caught something about our family clashing with another. Then I heard the Torettas’ name.”
There’s a long pause before her father responds. I didn’t think she’d begin the conversation about something unrelated to me, but maybe she’s warming him up.
“Did you hear this in passing or because of whatever your current assignment is?”
“My current assignment led me somewhere that caused me to hear this. It’s why English is better.”
She hasn’t lied to her father, but the way she’s phrased things suggests she’s in Italy, and that’s why she can’t have anyone overhearing her speak the language. It shows she has just as flexible a relationship with the truth as I do.
“The Carosis and Torettas are fine. It’s the’Ndranghetaand the Camorra that we have problems with.”
“Don’t we always have problems with’Ndrangheta? What do the Camorra have to do with this?”
There’s another long pause before he responds. “The power struggle is a little worse than it usually is because each alliance has some outside help.”
“Outside help,Papà?”
“Foreign syndicates based in New York.”
“Do you think anyone in the Camorra or’Ndranghetaknows who I am?”
“You know that’s a possibility,tesoro.” Treasure.
That’s what she is to both her father and me. I’ll remember not to use that endearment and leave that as something special with her father.
“Why are you asking? Did something happen?”
