Sempre (Forever) (82 page)

Celia gathered the money for bail as the two men were processed out of the system. It was later that evening when Vincent walked out the front doors of the jail to come face-to-face with his sister, leaning against the side of her car with a solemn expression on her face. She appeared exhausted, her face lined with worry, as if she'd aged a decade over night.

“Hey, little brother,” she said, forcing a smile. “You look like hell.”

“Look who's talking,” he said. “You're starting to look like Ma.”

She laughed awkwardly. “Ouch, low blow. Speaking of Mom, she saw your arrest on the news. You should call her. She’s worried about her baby boy.”

“Worried?” Vincent asked. “That woman hates me. She’s probably just worried I’ll publically disgrace the DeMarco name even further.”

“She doesn’t hate you. She just has a strange way of showing her love. I had to talk her out of calling the Department of Corrections to ask if the foot of your bed faced the door, since it’s bad luck. She was worried your soul would slip out of the door while you slept.”

Despite his stress, he managed to smile. “Must be why I got lucky enough to be released today. The bed faced the other way.”

Celia returned his smile, and things grew tense as they drove toward Portage Park in silence. “Did Corrado get released?”

“Yes,” she said. “He went straight home a few minutes ago.”

Vincent nodded, turning to look out of the window. He wanted to ask about Carmine, but it was an answer he wasn’t ready to hear. It had been two weeks since the girl was kidnapped, and Vincent couldn’t imagine what his son was going through.

When they reached the Moretti’s house, Celia headed inside without waiting for him. He followed, his footsteps faltering when he heard her frantically whispering in Corrado’s office.

“I couldn’t do it,” she said. “How am I supposed to tell him?”

“You know him better than anyone else,” Corrado responded. “He trusts you. He’ll take it better coming from you.”

“It doesn’t matter who it comes from—he’s going to flip out.”

“That may be true, but someone needs to tell him,” Corrado said. “It would be better coming from you than the likes of Sal.”

Vincent stepped into the doorway. “Tell me what?”

Celia started stammering. “Carmine was worried. Or, he is worried. He couldn’t just sit around, and I didn’t know what to do. I suspected what he was going to do, but I couldn’t forbid him. I didn’t even know if I should. He’s an adult, and it’s not what she would want for him, and I knew you’d be upset, but it’s his life. And he was so worried, Vincent. The two of you were in jail, and he didn’t know who else to turn to. He was desperate.”

Her statements were disjointed, but the general gist of them registered with him. “Don’t you dare tell me he...”

She nodded, and Vincent stopped abruptly. “There’s no way he went to them after everything I did to make sure it didn’t happen.”

“He did.”

“You’re wrong! He’s not that stupid, Celia!”

Her eyes filled with tears. “I’m not wrong.”

“Then you misunderstood.”

“I didn’t,” she said. “Giovanni was here with him.”

“Giovanni? You have to be kidding. If he took my son—”

“Vincent,” Corrado said, his harsh voice cutting him off. “You need to watch yourself. You know there are things we cannot and should not say as men of honor, and you’re teetering dangerously close to the edge of saying something you’ll later regret.”

“But this is Carmine we’re talking about. This is my son!”

“Yes, but he’s made his choice. He’s in the life now, and there’s nothing you can do to change that fact.”

“There has to be.”

“There isn’t,” he said. ”What’s done is done. Accept it.”

“I can’t!” Vincent said. “I can’t just accept it! Carmine isn’t cut out for this! He’s too young and irrational. He’s throwing his life away and why, Corrado? For what?”

“For her,” he said, giving him an incredulous look. “How soon you forget, Vincent. You were once that eighteen-year-old boy, turning to
Cosa Nostra
to save the woman you loved. You may not be pleased with what your life has become, but I know saving Maura is the one decision you don’t regret.”

“But I didn’t save her! She’s dead, and if I would’ve never gotten involved in this, she’d—”

“She’d what?” Corrado asked, cutting him off. “She’d be alive? Even you can’t believe that! She’d still be dead today, but she would’ve died a slave. You gave her a chance. Her life was cut short, there’s no denying that, but it wasn’t you or
Cosa Nostra
that did it. Maura sacrificed herself. You think your son is so much like you, but what you fail to realize is he’s his mother, too. There’s nothing naïve about the decision he made.”

“You’re wrong. I didn’t save Maura. I never gave her the one thing she needed most—freedom. She should’ve been free of me.”

“
Se ami una cosa, lasciala andare
.” Corrado laughed dryly. “If you love something, let it go, right? You were always too philosophical. What does that even mean, Vincent?
Freedom
?”

Before he could respond, the phone in the office rang. Corrado grabbed the receiver off the desk in front of him. “Moretti.” He paused. ”Yes, that’s fine. We’ll be there.”

Vincent sighed when he hung up. “Salvatore.”

“He wants to see us.”

“So, where’s my son?” Vincent asked, trying to push back his anger.

Celia stood off to the side, her arms wrapped around her chest. “I haven’t seen him in a few days.”

“Days?”

“He was here with Giovanni, looking for something. I don’t know what they thought they’d find, since the government took pretty much everything. He said he’d call to explain when he had a chance, but I haven't heard from him.”

He frowned. “Did he at least get the chip working?”

“I don’t think so,” Celia said. “I know Dom was working on it.”

Vincent shook his head. “Carmine's in way too deep. He has no idea what he’s doing. He’s going to get himself killed.”

“Let’s hope you’re wrong,” Corrado said. “I hope he knows exactly what he’s up against, because we’re running out of time. How long do you have before you need to report in?”

“Forty-eight hours.” Vincent had two days to self-surrender to be fitted with an ankle monitor. It wasn’t house arrest, with a curfew or a base that restricted him to a certain location, but a precaution to make sure he didn’t try to disappear. It also meant they could keep a log of everywhere he went, which would strengthen their case if he showed up places he had no business going. He knew it could incriminate others if they were found associating with him, which put him in a precarious situation within the organization.

“Well, then, I suppose that means we have forty-eight hours,” Corrado said, grabbing his keys. “Let’s get this over with.”

Corrado started for the door, but Celia grabbed his arm to stop him. “It’s good to have you home, so make sure you come back.”

He brushed his hand across her cheek as Vincent turned away, not wanting to intrude on their moment. “I always do,” Corrado said.

Vincent glanced back at his sister once Corrado walked out, seeing the sadness in her expression. “Be careful,” she said. “I expect all of you back in one piece… including Haven.”

*  *  *  *

Anger festered inside of Vincent as they drove to Salvatore’s house. They went straight to the den when they arrived, where Salvatore sat with a few members of the organization. The younger ones stood up out of respect, but he ignored them and took his usual seat.

He ignored the glass of scotch someone tried to hand him, too.

“It’s nice to see the two of you,” Salvatore said. “It's regrettable this happened, but I know you’re both honorable and trustworthy, so I’m not worried about any future issues in this case.”

Vincent just stared at him. As usual, Salvatore’s only concern was it coming back on him. He expected them to keep their mouths shut and accept whatever punishment they were given, and the saddest part of all, Vincent thought, was that they’d do it. The
Omertà
vow of silence they’d taken swore just that.

“Anyway, onto lighter business,” Sal said. “I assume you’ve heard the good news by now.”

“About Carmine?” Vincent clenched his hands into fists in his lap. There was nothing
light
or
good
about it.

“Yes,
Principe
. It’s great to have another generation of DeMarco men working with us. You’ve raised a great son, a loyal man like you. You should be proud.”

He nodded, clearing his throat to force back the words he really wanted to say. “Where is he?”

“He's with Giovanni,” Salvatore said. “They've been quite trying to track down poor Haven. Such a shame she hasn't been located.”

“Have they gotten any information?”

Salvatore's insensitive laughter cut through the room. “Vincent, you know I’ve chosen to remain uninvolved. You’d have to ask them.”

“Still? What did my son come to you for then?”

“Carmine choosing this path had nothing to do with me,” he said, his lips still curved into a sinister smile. “He decided this was the best place for him. Giovanni volunteered to assist on his little mission, and they have all of our resources at their disposal, of course, but it has nothing to do with me.”

“How can you say that? Our women are to be respected; we're supposed to honor and protect them! It's part of the oath; it’s one of our commandments! How can you still not act? How is that not your problem? It's all of our problem!”

The room fell into a tense silence, and everyone stared at him, stunned. Corrado spoke up before the strain had time to grow. “If you don't mind, I think we should try to catch up with Carmine.”

“Yes, do that,” Salvatore said. “Use whatever you need.”

Corrado stood up. “Come on.”

Vincent pushed his chair back and followed Corrado out of the room. Whispers started up as he exited, but Salvatore demanded silence right away. Vincent knew he shouldn't have reacted as he did, but he was so disgusted that he couldn't stop himself. It felt like everything he’d done had been in vain, a waste of time and energy, because Carmine ended up exactly where he was trying to keep him from going.

And the girl certainly hadn’t been saved.

“You must want to die,” Corrado said, walking through the house. “Speaking to him that way will get you killed.”

Corrado opened a door to a back room and stepped inside. He started opening cabinet doors and grabbing weapons, tossing Vincent two .45 Smith & Wesson's. He pulled out two guns for himself, slipping them into his coat along with more ammunition.

Giovanni lived not far from Salvatore. The house was empty when Corrado and Vincent arrived. Corrado slipped around the back and kicked in the door, the two of them heading straight to Giovanni’s office. Corrado rifled through drawers and files, looking for anything they might've dug up, while Vincent booted up the computer.

Corrado found a map of Chicago and unfolded it on the desk beside him. Areas of it were circled and crossed out, the entire thing riddled with writing. Vincent recognized some of it as his son’s, the sloppy words scribbled with a frenzied hand.

“They have Ivan's properties pinpointed on the map, but there's no way they would've taken Haven somewhere with his name on the deed,” Corrado said. “He’s smarter than that. He would've found somewhere close to home but far enough away to keep the two separate. Somewhere isolated where there was no chance of her being stumbled upon, but not so isolated that their traffic would draw curious eyes. Somewhere people mind their own business.”

“You would've made a good detective,” Vincent said.

Corrado shot him an incredulous look. “Just because I understand the mind of a criminal doesn't mean I'd be a good cop.”

“Yeah, maybe you're right,” Vincent said, scrolling through the computer’s history. “You wouldn’t last a day before you got an excessive force complaint.”

Corrado stared at him in silence for a moment before turning back to the map, and Vincent focused his attention on the computer. There were numerous addresses and names that had been searched but nothing that stood out as important.

Corrado pointed to a section of map circled with a pencil. “What’s over here in this side of Austin?”

“Nothing that I know of,” Vincent said. “It’s a bad neighborhood with a lot of gang activity. Most of the businesses moved out of the area, so there are a lot of vacant buildings.”

“That’s what I thought,” Corrado said. “It’s a money pit, yet Natalia Volkov owns property there.”

“Natalia? His daughter?”

“Yes.”

“Isn’t she still a teenager?”

“I believe she just turned nineteen.”

“Sounds odd.”

“It does,” Corrado said. “It also sounds like a good place to start.”

Chapter 49

The sun had set, darkness falling over Chicago as Vincent and Corrado drove toward the west side of the city. There was a full moon hovering in the sky, a ring of light surrounding it that was partially shielded by a thin layer of cloud covering. The wind whipped a bit, vibrating the car with its unpredictable gusts.

The lack of communication was beginning to wear on Vincent’s nerves. He had no idea what his son was up to, what situation he was in or if he was even okay. Giovanni had never given Vincent reason to distrust him, but the fact that it was his
soldati
that had gone awry didn’t sit well with him. If he'd been paying attention, he would’ve seen it.

Corrado turned off the highway when they neared the area, cruising through the streets. Most of the buildings appeared abandoned, worn down and boarded up. Gang signs were strewn around with spray-paint, made by street thugs and hustlers that thought themselves to be hardcore. Men who had no true loyalty, no respect within their orders. Antonio had always been disgusted by them, disturbed by their tactics and lack of civility. He loathed their usage of the words ‘gangster’ and ‘Mafia’, cringed at their definition of ‘initiation’ and ‘brotherhood’.