Making Angel (Mariani Crime Family #1)

by Amanda Washington

  A chill went up my spine. I squinted into the dark, searching for whatever had the old man smiling. Figures emerged from the shadows in front of us, and chaos erupted. Gunfire shattered the silence. I tried to duck, but someone grabbed me from behind, yanking me backwards. The hard steel of a pistol jabbed into my ribs.

  No.

  It wasn’t the first time I’d had a gun pointed at me—not by a long shot, thanks to Father’s drills—but this time was different. It made me desperate and angry at the distraction keeping me from Markie and the twins. I spun and threw a punch at my attacker, hearing the satisfying crunch of impact before his gun went off. Fire burned through my side as I hit the ground, drawing my weapon. Father’s guards fell in, swinging at each other. Dark-suited men jumped, kicked, and swung to the thunder of bullets bouncing off the cement walls. The fray looked like an out-of-control mosh pit. Ears ringing, I searched for Bones. His fist slammed into the face of my attacker. The attacker flew backwards and slapped against the cement floor. Bones followed and kicked him.

  I raised my weapon, but couldn’t get a clean shot.

  “You’re surrounded Mariani. Give up and step down, and we’ll let the kid live. All your kids.”

  The familiar voice came from the shadows in front of us. I peeked around a car and squinted into the dark. Bruno’s voice came from the center of several dark shadows.

  “You want me to trust a bunch of cowardly bastards who attacked a house full of women and children?” My father asked.

  “We thought you were home.”

  “Is that what you plan to tell the other families? That you blew up my son’s car and expected me to hide in my house?”

  Bruno laughed. “You think the other families will step in? Ha! The borgatas are sick of being tied down to your rules, old man. The wolves want to be unleashed. They would have pulled you down years ago, but they’re just a bunch of bitches… not enough balls between them to attack. Well, my father’s just crazy enough to do whatever needs to be done.”

  Father twitched. A little red beam raced across the shadows, ending in the center of Bruno’s forehead. Before I could register what I was seeing, a shot rang out. The Pelino heir apparent crumpled to the ground. His stunned guards took a few seconds too long to react, and the little red light traveled down the line.

  Bam. Bam. Bam

  Bodies fell in its wake. I aimed and fired off a shot. A bullet whizzed past my head and I ducked back behind the car.

  “You cocky son of a bitch; this is my city!” Father roared. He ducked down, slammed another magazine into his Glock, and the little red beam resumed its deadly dance. I thought the old man was crazy when he’d tasked me with adding a laser sight to his Glock, but in that darkened garage he was a genius. In fact, if we made it out of the garage, I fully intended to get myself a gun just like it.

  For now, my Desert Eagle would have to do. I peeked back around the car and took a few blind shots. The fighting behind us began to die down, and more of my father’s guards joined us in the frontal attack. The Pelino men started to retreat. One guard slung Bruno’s body over his shoulder before the entire group turned and ran, weaving through cars and dodging our bullets as they disappeared deeper into the darkness.

  My father had lost several guards. The remainder of the force piled into one SUV, leaving the second in the garage. Bones and I followed in the Hummer. I drove while Bones fumbled with the first aid kit.

  “You’re gonna need to take off your jacket so I can get a look at your side,” he said, tugging bandages out of the kit.

  I stopped at a light and struggled out of the ruined coat, stinging the hell out of my side with every twist of my stomach. The bottom right quarter of my T-shirt was soaked with blood. Bones tugged it upward and swore.

  “How bad is it?” I asked. The light turned green, so I focused back on the road.

  “You got a chunk of meat missing; needs stitches.”

  I chuckled. “Yeah, we should probably call the Pelinos and ask them to chill the hell out so I can get back to the hospital. That gash on your cheek could probably use a stitch or two as well.”

  Bones pulled down his mirror and snorted. “I’ve cut myself worse shaving.”

  “Yeah? They probably have classes to teach you how to do that...”

  “All right, wiseass, let me get that bleeding stopped.”

  Bones rolled up the bottom of my shirt and taped it to my chest. Then he doctored my side while I drove. “Not bad for your first gunfight,” he said, admiring the wound.

  I nodded. “Bruno’s dead.” My father’s bullet had splattered Bruno’s brains all over his men. No surviving that.

  “He was stupid to goad the old man… and standing out in the open like that? Why? Almost like he wanted to die.”

  I considered Bones’s words as my adrenaline rush faded, sapping my strength and leaving behind a bone-deep weariness. Bruno was free of our fathers’ war now. He wouldn’t have to take any more lives or watch the people around him suffer. Maybe Bruno had wanted to end it all. If I didn’t have Markie, Bones, and my younger siblings to think of, I might have been tempted to do the same.

  The street in front of my father’s house was lined with cop cars and ambulances. Father’s SUV parked behind a police cruiser and Bones and I pulled up behind them. What was left of the old man’s guards surrounded us as we made our way past the cruisers and into the mayhem.

  The mansion looked like a war zone. Bodies were strewn from the broken security gate to the front door that hung from its top hinges. Authorities clearly hadn’t been there long, because they were still checking for pulses and bagging and tagging the dead. A fallen man moaned and writhed on the ground. The guards around us tensed, but an EMT hurried over to deal with the wounded. I scanned the faces of the fallen as we passed; some I recognized, and some I didn’t. I knew I should feel sorrow for those who’d given their lives to protect my family, but all I felt was outrage. How many men had we lost? How many had the Pelinos sacrificed? How many more would it take?

  Where are Markie and the twins?

  My father saw my blood-soaked shirt and hurried over to check out my wound.

  “I’m fine,” I said, waving him off. “It grazed me. We’ll deal with it later.”

  “You should let me have a look at that,” one of the EMTs said.

  “Not now,” I replied, walking past him.

  Renzo and his team met us in the driveway. “Sir, I’m glad to see you’re okay.”

  “Where’s my family?” Father asked.

  Renzo’s gray T-shirt was darkened with sweat in several areas and he held a semi-automatic in his hands. “Rachele’s inside. They’re loading her onto a stretcher. She’s been shot in the leg. We can’t find the twins anywhere, sir.”

  “Did he get them? Did that bastard get my children?”

  Renzo shifted his weight and continued, “We don’t think so. Rachele said—”

  “Dom!” Rachele’s high-pitched voice strained.

  Renzo snapped his mouth shut, bowed his head, and stepped to the side, revealing the gurney that rolled my stepmother out of the house and toward us. One EMT navigated the route while a second held a mass of white cloth to Rachele’s leg, applying pressure as they walked.

  Rachele broke into tears and stretched out her hands.

  Father rushed to her side. The gurney stopped and Rachele leaned against him, sobbing harder. The old man’s jaw clenched as he stroked her hair. “I’m sorry you had to go through this. They’ll pay for what they did.”

  “She’s lost a lot of blood, and we need to get her to the hospital,” the EMT pushing the gurney said.

  Father nodded, and the gurney started rolling forward again. He stayed beside Rachele, and she clung to him.

  “I’m coming with you,” he told Rachele.

  “No. Please… our babies. Those bastards didn’t find them.”

  “What about Markie?” I asked.

  “She’s with them. I hope she knows what
she’s doing. She better keep them safe.”

  I let out a breath I didn’t realize I’d been holding. “She’ll protect them.” I was certain of it.

  Father continued to stroke Rachele’s hair. “Shh. Relax, we’ll find them, but I’m not leaving you again. I can do what I need to do from the hospital.”

  Rachele ignored him, focusing on me. “Find them,” she commanded.

  It was the closest I’d ever felt to my stepmother, because, for once, our goals aligned. “I will. I promise.”

  She leaned back and closed her eyes, releasing my father’s arm as the EMTs loaded her into the ambulance.

  Father pulled me aside. “Get that wound looked at, and then get to Tech’s office. I’ll message him on the way. I want you both staring at that goddamn screen until you find the twins.”

  I nodded.

  “Good. I don’t know who to trust right now, Angel, but I know I can trust you. You do whatever you need to do, you hear me?”

  “Yes sir.”

  “Excuse me, sir, but we need to go,” an EMT said, leaning out of the back of the ambulance.

  “Right.” Father got the attention of another EMT who was checking the vitals of a fallen guard. “See to my boy’s side,” he demanded, pointing at me.

  As the EMT walked my direction, Father climbed back into the ambulance. They closed the doors and he and Rachele rolled away.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

  Angel

  I FIRST MET Tech over Skype when I was eight years old and trying to network my father’s computer to the new security system. Tech walked me through a compatibility issue, and then showed me how to program the outside lights so we could turn them on remotely. He was the smartest person I’d ever talked to. Over the years, we worked on several more projects together, and I gained an awestruck respect for him. Although I’d never met him in person, Tech was my idol. In seventh grade, I faked poor eyesight so I could get glasses like his. The glasses had long since gone in the trash, but my hero-worship for Tech was still going strong.

  Excited to finally meet him, I leaned against the retinal scanner and waited.

  “You sure about this?” Bones asked.

  The scanner beeped and the door unlocked with a click.

  I nodded, turning the handle. “Yeah. I need you on the street. If I find them, I want you to be the first one there. I can’t trust anyone else. Text me when you get to Ari’s. Maybe the two of you can figure out where Markie would hide. Drive around. You search your way, I’ll search mine, and maybe one of us will get lucky.”

  I could tell my friend wanted to argue, but I didn’t have time for it. I pulled open the heavy iron door and walked into every geek’s wet dream. Over one hundred square security camera feeds were projected onto the white wall to my left. I froze and took it all in, hearing the door close and lock behind me. Tech’s messy blond mop peeked over the top of a high-backed desk chair, positioned in front of the wall. Keyboard keys clicked, and then the images on the wall rotated.

  Wondering if he realized I was there, I cleared my throat and stepped forward.

  “Take a seat.” Tech directed me to the empty chair beside him. “I’m dividing the screen in half, and you have a keyboard and a mouse to control the feeds on your side. If you have any… wait a second. What do we have here?”

  My gaze shifted to the feed he was studying. Blonde woman, two small children. Thinking he’d found them, I ignored the chair and rushed to his side. He zoomed in until we got a clear view of the faces. Not Markie, and not the twins. His only reaction was to switch to a different feed.

  “You shouldn’t have any questions. DOS commands, it’s self-explanatory.” Then Tech seemed to realize I was standing right beside him. He leaned away and looked up at me over dark-framed glasses. “Angel.”

  “Tech.” I nodded.

  His gaze shifted to the limited space between us. Right. I was too close. Who knew when he’d last had someone in his office? I slipped away, eased into my own seat, and looked around. Tech’s workspace was immaculate. He had a yellow smiley-faced stress ball in front of his keyboard, but that was the only decorative element. Everything else was functional. Coffeepot, phones, computers, screens.

  “So this is the Tech cave, huh?” Obviously. It was a stupid question, but I was strangely nervous.

  He turned and gave me a smirk. “Yep. This is where I watch the world.” He was somewhere in his midforties, wearing a black-and-white checkered button-up shirt, and black joggers tucked into classic red Chuck Taylors like some wannabe hipster.

  “I’m sending you a feed. It should populate right in the center.”

  A second later, the back of my father’s house filled the middle of the screen. Markie and the kids slipped from a hidden door and into the bushes. I tracked their movement to the fence and then lost them. Moments later, Pelino’s goons filled the backyard.

  “This one’s from the end of the block,” Tech said.

  Another feed populated. Markie and the twins were still running. Luciana was lagging behind. Markie slowed long enough to scoop up my little sister. Cradling Luciana in her arms, Markie said something to Georgio. He nodded and broke into a sprint. Still carrying Luciana, Markie followed. Once again, Pelino’s goons were right behind them. They pointed in the direction Markie and the twins had headed.

  “Those are the only two confirmed sightings we have of the twins. The Pelino family is still scouring the city for them.” He clicked a few more keys and several of my feeds were highlighted. I watched as grown men hunted for Markie and my siblings.

  “I also have the facial recognition software scanning, so it may highlight a feed from time to time. Let me know if you see something,” Tech said, resetting the feeds.

  I watched the wall for a while. My phone buzzed. Hoping for correspondence from Markie, I checked it to find a text from Bones. He’d picked Ariana up from work and the two went to her apartment. There was no sign of, or word from, Markie. He and Ariana were going to go look for her, but they planned to circle back by the apartment periodically just in case she showed up there. I thanked him, and then turned my attention back to the screens.

  I’d always known Tech had access to most of the city, but I didn’t grasp the extent of his reach until I shuffled through the feeds, populating my half of the wall. It was like watching all of Las Vegas at once. I saw the fountain Markie and Ariana had sat on, and the High Roller we’d rode on. Someone jumped from the tower of the Stratosphere.

  Markie, where are you? I wondered while scanning faces of strangers. Maybe they checked into a hotel? Only they couldn’t have, because her purse was in the Hummer. We’d found her phone in pieces in the hidden passageway of my father’s house. No credit cards, no phone. It was getting dark. I rotated the feeds again. Hours passed in a blur of energy drinks, snacks, and staggered bathroom breaks. Still no sign of them. It was as if they’d vanished from the street.

  The sun was beginning to rise by the time my phone rang again.

  “Hello?” I couldn’t answer it fast enough.

  “Rachele’s out of surgery and in recovery,” Father replied. “Any word on the twins?”

  “We’re still looking. The good news is so are the Pelinos.”

  He took a deep breath. “Those bastards still haven’t given up, huh? Sounds like they need something to do. I’ve got just the thing.”

  He disconnected, and I returned my attention to the screens, wondering what the old man was up to. Tech’s phone rang. He answered it and changed feeds as he listened. The right side of his screen populated with what looked like GPS readouts. He pulled addresses from the screens and sent them to the GPS readouts. I watched in awe as he worked, amazed by the speed in which he had six of my father’s SUVs en route.

  I continued to watch for Markie and the twins until activity on one of my feeds drew my attention. An SUV pulled into an alley behind the strip. The doors opened, spilling out men with semi-automatics. They gunned down a group of Pelino’s men wh
o’d been searching the area.

  “Team one was successful,” Tech confirmed into his phone.

  Only seconds later another SUV pulled up in front of a hotel. But this time, the Pelino soldiers seemed to expect the attack. They pulled their guns and opened fire before the SUV full of my father’s soldiers had even rolled to a stop. The feed disappeared.

  “Team two, successful,” Tech said.

  Successful? I searched for the feed, but it was gone.

  “Team three, successful,” Tech said.

  Team three? Where the hell is team three?

  Tech’s police scanner pealed in the background, reporting the shootings. All of my feeds were rotated, removing the Pelino goons from my view. I tried to bring them back, but those feeds disappeared, too. He had to be blocking my access.

  “Team four, five, and six—all successful.”

  I glanced at his screens, searching for the battles, but saw nothing.

  He looked at me and asked, “Have you found them?”

  I startled. “No. Still looking.” I went back to my feeds, wondering what the hell was going on. Tech had been loyal to my family for as long as I could remember. He was the best at what he did, yet someone had hacked into his system to break into my father’s house. Had someone hacked him again to get the jump on the attacks?

  No, not that fast. Impossible. And he told Father the attacks were successful. Why?

  Tension crept up my shoulders, stiffening my back. I kept one eye on Tech and the other on the feeds.

  “Angel, I know you saw that,” Tech said, watching me.

  “Saw what?” I feigned. “Did you find them?”

  His forehead scrunched up in response. “You know what I’m talking about.”

  He was on to me. “You tipped them off, didn’t you?” I asked.

  Tech pulled out a pistol and trained it on me.

  Hell of a confirmation. He was a traitor. It explained so much and made me feel so stupid. How had I not seen it before? I raised my hands in the air. My gun was in the pocket of my jacket, hanging in the closet. The only weapon on me was a knife strapped around my ankle, and there was no way I could get to it before he got a shot off.