One month to prove Quentin Vanetti killed our father.
One month to get close enough to execute him if he had.
One month to prove myself.
No pressure.
"You still up?" Vinny shuffled into the living room, hair sticking up at odd angles.
"Couldn't sleep."
"The meeting?" He dropped onto the couch beside me. "Silvio's always been an ass. Don't let him get to you."
"I'm not." I was. "I just need coffee."
"Use my espresso machine. It makes everything—cappuccinos, mochas, affogatos—"
"I just want plain coffee, Vin."
"Fine. But if you're using the machine anyway, make me an affogato?"
"Do I look like a barista?"
"Come on, Jules. Just one—"
"Only if you let me drive your Ferrari to the airport."
"Never mind."
I smiled despite everything. This was normal. Safe. The kind of family banter that had nothing to do with assassination assignments or impossible deadlines.
"I'll take you," he said after a moment. "The limo's impersonal."
"It's fine. I need the time to think."
"About Vanetti?"
My stomach flipped at the name. "About the job. The mission. Everything."
"You'll figure it out. You always do." He stood, squeezed my shoulder. "Get some rest on the plane. You look like hell."
"Thanks, Vin. Really feeling the family love."
"Anytime."
∞∞∞
The limo arrived at ten. I'd managed maybe an hour of sleepon Vinny's couch, enough to feel more exhausted than if I hadn't slept at all.
The drive to the airport was predictably awful—New York traffic on a Sunday morning somehow still managed to be hellish. I turned on the car's TV, hoping for distraction.
News. Always news in this city.
A bombing in Brooklyn. An unsolved murder in the Bronx. A restaurant fire in Manhattan that authorities were calling "suspicious."
I wondered idly how many of those stories connected to families I knew. Probably more than the news anchors realized.
Then a celebrity gossip segment. Some Hollywood actor caught cheating on his wife of twenty-four years. The wife looked devastated in the paparazzi photos. The actor looked smug.
