“It’s over on the other side of Midland, somewhere along the river. I’ve been there once. I’ll look it up when I get a little closer.”
“Have you got a map?”
“A map? Pops, who uses maps? I got a GPS on my phone.”
“See, that’s exactly what I’m talking about. You’ve got to start listening to me. You shouldn’t use a cell phone on the job. How many times have I told you that? If the FBI wants to track you, all they’ve got to do is get your cell-phone number. You can’t leave an electronic record for them. No phones or credit cards. If you need gas, or something to eat, you pay cash, so no one knows you were there.”
“I swear, Pops, I’ve never seen anyone who worries like you.”
“You’d be wise to worry a little bit. It’ll keep you alive. I’m supposed to be training you, but you don’t listen. You got your own ideas and they’re going to get you killed. You’re careless, and in this business you can’t be careless.”
It started spitting rain. I slouched and looked out the window as raindrops beaded on the glass and raced past. I might as well have been talking to the wind. This kid, he was born careless. He would never make it to seventy-two.
Carlo never made it that far, but he had no one to blame but himself.
We were like brothers — Carlo, Big Tommy, and me. When Big Tommy’s dad was head of the family, we were seen as the future of the organization. We weren’t like these punks today. We had respect for the family. When Big Tommy took over, there was no one that he trusted more than Carlo and me. If he had a tough job to do, he handed it to us.
One day in the summer of 2008, Big Tommy called me into his office and said, “I got a job for you.”
“Do you want Carlo in here for this?” I asked.
“No. It’s a solo mission.” He pointed to an index card on the corner of his desk. In order to maintain his distance from any dirty work, Big Tommy never uttered the name of the mark. The name was printed on the underside of the index card. I picked it up and a flush of heat consumed my face.
The name on the card was Carlo Russo.
“Can you do this?” he asked.
It felt like I was trying to chew a mouthful of steel wool. “Why?”
“Carlo...” His voice faded out. “Carlo has been playing double agent with the Varacalli family. They want to cut into my turf. He’s been helping them. In exchange he gets a piece of the pie. You know, Angelo, I love Carlo like a brother, but I cannot tolerate this kind of disloyalty.”
“Carlo?”
He nodded. “I’ll ask you again, Angelo. Can you do this?”
“My loyalty is to you and the family, first and always.”
“You’re a good man. Take him to the cabin. Tell him we have a shipment coming in.”
I thought my face would combust. “Okay,” I said. “Consider it done.”
I handed him the index card. Big Tommy put it in the ashtray and set it on fire with his cigar lighter. Just before I left the room, I turned and looked at the head of the Fortunato family. Where Big Tommy was concerned, I was largely a man of blind obedience. I rarely questioned him. But I had to ask, “You’re sure about this, right, boss?”
“If I wasn’t sure, his name wouldn’t have been on that index card.”
Big Tommy owned a hunting cabin on two hundred acres south of Buffalo. Periodically he would send us up there to make an exchange of prostitutes. It wasn’t good to keep the same girls in a whorehouse for a long time. Some johns get tired of seeing the same talent, while others fall in love. Either way, it’s not good for business. So periodically we would ship our hookers to Cleveland, the Cleveland girls would go to Buffalo, and the “Buffalo gals,” as we called them, came to us. Carlo and I would meet our contacts with the Buffalo mob at the cabin and they would bring down the girls. Carlo liked this, because it usually meant an overnight in the cabin with the ladies.
I didn’t waste any time. Carlo went into the bathroom to take a leak as soon as we got to the cabin. “When are they getting here?” he asked me from behind the closed door. I didn’t answer. As he stepped out, still hitching up his pants, he was asking again. “Angelo, when are the girls—”
He was looking down the barrel of my Baby Glock. “There are no girls, Carlo. Get your hands up.”
He slowly lifted his hands to shoulder height, frowning; his pants fell down around his ankles. “What the hell’s this?”
“You know what this is.”
“No, I don’t. I swear.”
“Big Tommy found out you’ve been burning the candle at both ends — working with the Varacallis.”
“What? No, no. They wanted to talk to me, but I...”
“No more, Carlo. I’m sorry.”
“No, Angelo, wait. Don’t do it, for God’s sake. Let me go. I’ll go away, far away, and no one will ever hear from me again, I swear. You can tell Big Tommy you clipped me. He’ll never know.”
“I’ll know.” I pointed at his pants with the barrel of my pistol. “Pull your pants up. I don’t want you to go out like that.”
He started to cry. “Come on, Angelo, we’ve been friends forever.”
His blubbering made me angry. How many times had I heard Carlo Russo tell a mark to take it like a man? “Is this how you want to go out, crying with your pants down around your ankles?”
He extended his right hand, tears running down his cheeks. “Please, Angelo, I beg—”
I put one right in his heart. A clean shot. He dropped on his back and was dead before he hit the floor. I took his 9-millimeter Beretta out of his suit jacket, then wrapped up his body in a paint tarp. I dragged him deep into the woods at the back of the property and spent the rest of the afternoon digging a deep grave in the sandy bottom of a dried creek bed. When I got back to town, I stopped at Undo’s. I had the shrimp with linguine in a cream sauce and ordered a bottle of Chianti with two glasses.
The name of Carlo Russo was never again uttered in the presence of Big Tommy Fortunato.
Gaetano drove through Aliquippa, my old stomping grounds, and up into Monaca. “We’re going to Midland. Why didn’t you just cut across to Shippingport?” I asked.
He looked at his phone and tapped some buttons with his thumb. “It’s not right in Midland. The GPS says this is the shortest route.”
“You kids couldn’t find your way to the crapper without looking at your GBS.”
“GPS, Pops.”
“Whatever.”
We crossed the bridge over the Ohio River into Rochester, and another bridge over the Beaver River into the city of Beaver. As we were driving out of town on Route 68, I sat up straight in the seat and turned slightly toward Gaetano. “Little Tommy, he wants to make sure you’ve got the stones for this job. Are you ready to pull the trigger tonight?”
He smiled and nodded. “Oh, yeah. I’m ready. I was born ready, Pops.”
This kid, I could have smacked him.
“Taking a man’s life is no small thing, you know?”
“I want to do this. I’m ready.”
“What are you carrying?”
“A Luger.”
“A Luger? What are you, a member of Hitler’s SS?” I retrieved the revolver that I had tucked into my waistband and held it out on my palm.
“What’s that?”
“If you’re going to be a pro, you need a pro’s piece,” I said. “Use this. It belonged to a great man — Carlo Russo.”
Gaetano looked at me, then the pistol, then back at me. “Really? You’re giving me Carlo Russo’s gun?”
“Carlo never called it a gun. It was his ‘piece.’”
He snatched it out of my hand. “Thanks, Pops.” Gaetano examined the pistol as he drove, rolling it around in his hand. “I appreciate it. I’ll make ol’ Carlo proud.” He drove with his knee while releasing the cylinder, checking to see each chamber loaded.