Baby for the Beast

by Penelope Bloom

  The door opens and a woman with tattoos and a severe case of resting bitch face walks in and sits on the couch, folding her arms and staring at the wall. Ted reluctantly takes his hands from my shoulders and walks to the door. He glares at me once before closing it behind him. Sometimes I just wish Leo would come back, even if it was only for an hour. I’d love to see Ted try his bullshit when Leo was around. The thought is enough to cheer me up, and I turn to my patient.

  “So, tell me how you feel.”

  52

  Leo

  I wipe my prints from the gun and toss it in the sewer grate. I already filed off the serial number when I bought it off a dealer, so there will be no trace. Angelo waits in the car, face grim. Carlito sits beside him. He’s thinner now. He’s been hitting drugs. He won’t admit it to us, but it’s painfully obvious. He’s always got the shakes and he’s getting thinner by the day, but I can hardly blame him. The life we’ve been living isn’t a life I’d wish on anyone. We live on the run, moving from hotel to hotel, always looking over our shoulders. The Morettis want our blood, and they haven’t stopped sending crews after us since Angelo killed Nico so many years back.

  I tried to get away from the violence and forge a new life for myself, and now look at me. I’m still on the run, still up to my elbows in blood. Still missing her.

  I pull open the car door and Angelo tosses me a rag.

  “On your neck,” he says.

  I check the rearview and see a light dusting of blood. I’ve gotten better about placing the bullet just right to avoid splatter, but he flinched. I pour water from a bottle and scrub the blood from my skin. I look at my hands and see the dark crusted red under my fingernails that never seems to fully wash out. No matter how much I seem to try, there’s always blood on my hands.

  “We good?” asks Carlito. “I need to stop by Lakewood and grab something from a friend.”

  Angelo and I exchange a wary look. A while back I would’ve said something. I would’ve put my foot down and told him to stop being so stupid with the drugs, but now I can’t bring myself to care. We live our lives at night and sleep when the sun is out. We move in the shadows and we have to kill or be killed. All that’s left is the violence and the desire to make them suffer more than they make us suffer, to take from them more than they can take from us. But haven’t they already taken everything from me? Haven’t they taken Julia?

  Not everything. I punch Angelo on the shoulder and he smirks back at me. My little bro. He may be a fuckup and he may have a temper like a Chihuahua, but I’d kill for him. History can attest to that.

  Still, she has never left my mind. At first, I thought I’d be past her in a few weeks, then it was a few months, then it was next year. I think about her every day. When women throw themselves at me now, I can’t bring myself to care. I brush them off because I can’t be bothered. I know without even trying that they won’t be like her. They won’t be like my Julia. No one ever will, and I don’t want to dilute the memory of fucking her by being with anyone else, even if I have to die celibate. I don’t care.

  I drive past the place we’re staying to Lakewood, where shitty, crumbling apartments line the road, leaning ominously like they could fall over at any moment. Carlito must really not give a shit anymore if he’s asking us to drive him to a place like this. At least before he had the courtesy to be sneaky about it. He directs me to a place near the end of a street with no lights and asks me to park. I raise my eyebrows at him and he frowns.

  “It’s cool man. Don’t worry about it. I know these guys.”

  We wait as Carlito shuffles out of the car and heads into the building. One of the windows turns yellow with light. What the fuck were the people in there doing, sitting in the dark? Carlito is out of sight just long enough to make me wonder if Angelo and I are going to have to go kill some junkies, and then he emerges, shoving something into his jacket. I notice dark shapes moving around the car as Carlito approaches. I nudge Angelo and he nods back at me, hand already on his pistol.

  Carlito sits in the car, hugging the drugs inside his jacket to his body and twirling his other finger. “Let’s go, man.”

  Metal clicks on my window. A sickly thin man with tattoos is pointing a .22 caliber at me. I see another on Angelo’s side of the car as well. Without needing to give each other any kind of sign, we both slam our doors open at the same time. The junkies are knocked back, guns pushed aside long enough for us to squeeze off two or three rounds in them.

  Gunshots tear through the silent street, making my ears ring and my hand tingle from the recoil. The scent of hot smoke and blood reaches my nose, smells I wish weren’t so familiar to me.

  It’s over in seconds. Lives ended as easily and carelessly as if we had just stomped on a few ants.

  I look at the body, feeling disgusted. Killing the Moretti guys who come after us is one thing. Those are professionals, guys who know what they signed up for and are out to get us first. This feels lower, cheaper. I wonder, not for the first time, what the end-game is for me now.

  I holster my gun, glancing toward the house to make sure no one is planning to take pot shots at us from the windows. I doubt it though. People like this don’t rob because they are violent or capable, they do it because they are desperate and they don’t expect resistance. Whoever’s inside is probably just hoping these dead fuckers have some drugs on them to steal. I get in the car, gripping the steering wheel and twisting.

  “You happy?” I ask Carlito without looking to the back seat.

  “S-shit, man. I didn’t know they would try that. But you guys handled it, so no big deal, right?”

  “No big deal,” says Angelo as he settles back in his seat.

  Yeah, I think, starting the car up and driving away from the two fucking bodies on the street that wouldn’t be there if Carlito didn’t need drugs. No big fucking deal.

  53

  Julia

  Callie smiles at me over her wine glass. She’s beautiful, as always. I still remember the first time I saw her walk into The Spot where I used to bartend. I thought she was beautiful then and now that I know the personality underneath, I know she’s even more amazing than she looks.

  “It has been way too long,” says Callie. Her smile shows no hint of accusation, even though we both know the reason it has been so long is me. I’ve been dodging her invitations for years now. I call her every once in awhile, but it has been years since we met in person.

  I finish chewing my bite of caesar salad, taking my time to pick the right words. “I know. I’m sorry.”

  Callie frowns, reaching across the table to squeeze my hand. “Hey. Don’t apologize. You’ve been busy as hell. I just wish you’d let me—”

  I hold up a hand, stopping her because I already know what she’s going to say. “I can’t take any money from you.” Callie is sweet, and she means well, but she doesn’t understand how hard it would be to live with myself if I took her handouts. I know I’m a terrible person for it because I’m letting my pride get in the way of good sense, but I just can’t do it. Before my dad passed away, he always pushed me to be a strong woman, to break the stereotypes and to find success on my own. I’ve tried to live by that as much as I can, and anything else feels like it would be a betrayal.

  She purses her lips. “Will you at least tell me what’s going on? I promise I won’t offer to give you money again. But let me in at least. You can’t just keep bottling all these things up.”

  I feel my lips quiver and my eyes grow heavy. I really am holding in so much. Way more than I should. If anyone knows how much I should talk, it’s me. But I’ve built a sort of mental dam, and I’m worried even opening a small crack to let some of the pressure through would bring the whole thing down, and I don’t know if I would survive that. “I’m fine, really.” I say. I can hear the strain in my own words, the lack of inflection.

  The level gaze she gives me says she sees straight through my lie. “Julia. I say this as your friend...you have a son to look out
for. You can’t take care of a child if you don’t take care of yourself first.”

  I love her, but her implication that I’m doing anything less than the best for Roman rubs me the wrong way, even if I know there’s truth in it. “I’m doing all I can. Talking about any of my problems isn’t going to make them better. Do you know how it feels to spend all day sitting in my chair, trying to get people to talk through their problems and help them heal, knowing I’m always the most fucked up one in the room?

  “The worst part is none of my problems are internal. I know how to help people like a doctor, looking at symptoms tracing them back to the cause. Except this shit I’m dealing with isn’t treatable. The diagnosis would be malignant life fuck-ups, resulting in acute pissed-offedness and suffering.”

  Callie smirks. “Is that really a diagnosis?”

  I can’t help smiling a little, already feeling better from venting. “No. But it should be.”

  “Why don’t you just tell me the thing that’s bothering you most. Right now. What’s the top of your list of problems?”

  “Ted,” I say without hesitation. It feels good to voice it. Of all the crap I deal with, Ted is the culmination. “He has been blackmailing me for years now.” Saying it out loud makes me feel vulnerable like I’m suddenly naked in the crowded cafe.

  Callie’s face scrunches in sympathy. “Why didn’t you say something sooner? You said he went to the board with his evidence and they overturned it. Is this still about the thing between Leo and you? I’m sure Damian could get a lawyer to—”

  I shake my head, interrupting her. “I’m sorry, but I knew you’d just worry if I told you. He never went to anyone with his evidence. He’s still holding it over me, and if he turns it in, I’ll lose everything. So he knows he can get away with pretty much anything he wants. For a while it wasn’t so bad. He would just give me the shittiest clients and constantly make it known that he wanted to date me. Now I think he’s gotten into something bad. He’s been showing up to the office looking harassed and stressed, and he has been taking money from my paychecks. I think he may have taken some loans out and can’t pay them back.”

  “Can you please tell me where to find this guy? I’ll go deck him myself. Better yet, I could tell Damian what you just told me. I think Ted would rethink his ways pretty fast.”

  I smile, touched by how much she cares about me. I can hear the sympathy and worry in her voice and the genuine desire to hurt Ted she has. “I’ll figure something out.” I feel a stab of anger toward Leo. If he had stuck around, none of this would be happening. If I had a dollar for every time I’ve thought those exact words, I’d be set.

  54

  Ted

  I cringe in pain, struggling against the ropes holding me to the chair. I distantly realize the whining sound I’ve been hearing is coming from my throat. I didn’t even realize I’ve been crying. Shit. Everything hurts so bad. The ropes dig into my skin, and my face is sore from where he hit me.

  “Forty grand, Ted. That’s not chump change,” says Killian Moretti. I look at him in disbelief, still having trouble remembering how I ever thought he was a pushover that I could use. I met him at the greyhound tracks and he seemed like a weak-spined nobody with money to spare. Now it’s like he has transformed into a vengeful demon, out for blood if he doesn’t get the money I owe him. He brought me to some warehouse in the middle of nowhere. Chains dangle from the ceiling and the place is lined with bloody tables and grisly metal tools.

  “Wait,” I say, heartbeat getting faster. “I only owed you thirty grand last week.”

  “Interest is a bitch,” says Killian.

  Gio huffs a laugh from beside him. He’s a burly guy with huge forearms that make me think of Popeye.

  “I’ll get the money, I just need more time,” I say.

  Killian nods to Gio. I flinch, frantically trying to bend over in the chair and hide my face, but it’s no use because I’m tied too tightly to move. Gio’s fist cracks into my temple. I see a flash of white and then black dots racing across my vision. I have an instant migraine that makes my head lull and my eyes close in pain.

  “Think about how you’re going to get us the money now. Not later,” says Killian.

  He and Gio move to the metal table where several very frightening tools are laid out on display. They talk in low tones for a while and I can’t hear them over the ringing in my ears. Eventually, they seem to forget I’m in the room.

  “...Leo Citrione? Good luck. Fucker is like a ghost. The boss has blown over a hundred grand hiring guns to go after him. No one wants to take the job anymore because none of them ever come back,” says Killian.

  Gio sniffs. “He’s tough. I’ll give him that. Problem is we’re fighting on his ground. If we had a way to lure him out, something to use against him, I guarantee he’d be in the ground within a week.”

  “The guy doesn’t give a shit about anything except that hothead brother of his, and Angelo isn’t exactly a pushover either.”

  My mind races. Leo Citrione? The fucker who slept with Julia? It still boils my blood that he managed to sleep with her after only being in her office for a few minutes, yet I’ve been trying since grad school and haven’t made any progress.

  “You want Leo Citrione?” I ask, surprised by how husky and weak my voice sounds.

  Both men snap their heads toward me.

  “The fuck did you say? You been eavesdropping on us?” asks Killian. “Gio, take this prick’s ears off with that saw.”

  “Wait! Wait! I know how you could lure Leo Citrione out. He has a son. He doesn’t know it’s his, but he sure as hell knows the mother.”

  Killian narrows his eyes, kneeling in front of me and cracking his knuckles. His voice is low and deadly. “If you’re blowing smoke up my ass, I’m going to take a personal interest in torturing you. Do you understand?”

  I nod. “I understand. Just hear me out. I can tell you where to find her. If he knows you’re targeting her, he’ll come. I know he will.”

  55

  Leo

  They fucking what?” I say into the phone.

  “I’m telling you as a courtesy, Leo,” says Marco Bianchi. “The family still hasn’t forgiven you and your brother for the mess you made, but we’re also not about to accept the Morettis insult. As far as the rest of our world is concerned, you are still under the Bianchi wing, and the Morettis are targeting your woman. That means they are targeting us. You come back to Jersey, and we’ll extend our protection to you and your brother again.”

  I don’t bother pointing out that Marco had no problem letting my brother, Carlito, and I get targeted for the past four years. Chances are he’s using this as an excuse to backstab us because the Morettis are probably breathing down his neck. Angelo was acting outside the will of the family when he killed Nico, and the only grudge between the two families is that my brother and I are alive. But if Marco wants to try to pull some shit on me, he is welcome to try. I’m coming back either way. Julia needs me.

  I glance across the hotel room to Angelo, who is sitting cross-legged on the bed, cleaning his gun. He looks so much harder than the little brother I knew before prison, before we had to live these hard years on the run. There are lines on his once smooth face and a darkness in his eyes that was never there before.

  “Good,” I say. “We’ll be in touch.” I hang up the phone, fuming. How the hell did the Morettis find out about Julia anyway? I would have thought they put two and two together the day they saw me at the restaurant, but it has been way too long for that. They would’ve figured it out a long time ago if they were going to. Knowing she’s in danger twists my insides.

  It’s only five minutes later that I have Angelo and Carlito packed into the car. Once I explained, they both understood. They know I still hold a fire for Julia, and they know better than to get between me and my woman. My woman. I doubt she would agree with the sentiment, but tough shit. She’s mine, whether she realizes it or not, and the Morettis made the mistake of t
heir lives when they brought her into this. I was content to just shoot back, until now. Now I’m going to go for the throat.

  I left Carlito and Angelo to meet with the Bianchis and get us all set up with our own places to stay again. It will be strange living alone after our years on the run. I got used to having the two of them around.

  I’m waiting outside Julia’s office, leaning on her same shitty Acura that has gathered a few more dents and scratches since I saw it last. The inside of her car is a mess, and it makes me grin. This was actually the last place I talked to her.

  Damn. This girl turns me sentimental. My chest is hot and I can feel my heartbeat running a little faster than normal while I wait for her. I wonder what she’ll think when she sees me here after so long. I never had a chance to explain why I had to bail on our date, and she probably just thinks I lost interest. Hell, if she carries a gun, she might even take a shot at me. I wouldn’t blame her.

  I eventually get tired of waiting and let myself into her office. There are a few people in the waiting room, but still no secretary, so I move through the waiting room and find her door. I open it and she’s sitting behind her desk, writing something on a legal pad while a depressed looking woman dabs at her eyes with tissues.