by MB Austin
Sienna opened the door as he reached it, looking excited to see him and anxious at the same time. “I heard your news,” she said. “C’mon, they’re downstairs.”
“What are?”
“The tables. Didn’t Ricky tell you?”
“No, Sienna. Apparently you can catch gay over the phone. What tables?”
She shushed him, looking around as if someone might overhear. “The blackjack and such. A bunch of guys showed up with a truck and left them here.”
Down in the large rec room, six gaming tables huddled by one wall. In the far corner, the heavy bag and mats waited for someone to remember them. “Just tables?” he asked. “No cards, chips, dice?”
“Oh, yeah. Over there.” Her cell phone rang, and she turned away.
Angelo started opening the boxes, looking for the tokens. Behind him, he heard Sienna’s half of the conversation. “How should I know where you put it? Am I your mother?…Very funny.” A long pause. “Pick your own shit up for a change, Rick. It’s probably under your pants again.” Another pause. “Jesus. Just hold on, I’m coming.”
He turned and looked at her sympathetically. “I’ll let myself out down here.”
“Good. And if I was you, I’d go back to girls—men are dogs.” She turned to leave before he could even summon a laugh.
When she was halfway up the stairs, Angelo found the right box. Enough tokens for all of Khodorov’s circle, and plenty to spare for Sirko. He let himself out the door under the patio stairs and walked home, barely noticing the weight of the box. What he brought to the party would be considerably lighter.
Angelo raised his glass in a toast. Rose and Jackie and Sienna stopped talking, but Paola was too caught up needling Gino about something to notice, and Ricky was droning on to Maji about motorcycles. Angelo clinked his glass with a knife, and the hush he sought finally fell. Even Nonna looked expectant.
“I know we got the party in a couple days, but as far as I’m concerned, this my real last supper with all of you. Nonna, Rose—I will miss the magic you work in that kitchen. The finest chefs in Vienna got nothing on you.”
“How do you know?” Ricky challenged. “You never been.”
Gino shot his son-in-law a look that made him glance away.
“Fair enough. But I’ll bet you a thousand bucks—no, euros—that I’m right. Sienna can be the judge.”
“She ain’t visiting you.”
Sienna looked aggrieved. “The hell I’m not. You don’t want to go, I’ll go with Rose and Jackie.”
Angelo saw his mother and Rose exchange a look and jumped back in. “Deal. But for today, can we agree that this is the best Italian meal in all of New York?”
They all raised their glasses, clinking and starting up conversation again.
“No marriage proposals tonight, Ri?” Sienna said, leaning across toward Maji. She looked to Rose, at her side. “You must be slipping.”
Maji reached for the serving plate for seconds. “No complaints.” She caught Rose’s eye. “I just have a thing for pesto.”
“And tiramisu,” Angelo added.
“And”—she paused, pointing her fork at Angelo—“I was told to play nice.” She looked at Rose again. “I’m sorry.”
“No offense taken. Angelo helped me see the compliment was sincere, even if the delivery lacked grace.”
“Ouch,” Sienna whispered loudly.
Ricky snorted. “You would take relationship advice from him.”
Gino shoved Ricky’s plate roughly away from him, into the center of the table. “You’re excused.”
Ricky blanched. “Um…”
“Now.”
Everyone watched Ricky silently leave the table, except Angelo. He watched his mother, who was looking from Gino to him and back again, worry etching her brow.
It was dark by the time they walked down to Jackie’s house, Dev out front, Tom at the rear. Angelo and his mother walked close together, behind Dev. Maji could pick up most of what Jackie was saying, grilling Angelo about who knew what, and how safe he really was. She didn’t envy him.
Maji slowed her pace, expanding the distance between Angelo and Jackie, and her and Rose. Rose brushed her arm lightly. The ripples that simple touch set off made her glad they weren’t alone.
“Could you turn your comm off a moment?” Rose asked.
Maji thought to tell her that she and Ang weren’t wearing them up at the Big House anymore, in case Gino got paranoid as the big meeting approached. Instead, she just nodded and touched her watch. Coward. She motioned Tom to fall back, to give them a bit of privacy.
“You’re missing Ang in advance, aren’t you,” Rose guessed. “Asking Nonna about him.”
Maji shook her head. “No. I just like the stories grandparents tell. Even if they’re not mine.”
“Your mother’s parents didn’t survive the revolution, did they?”
Of course Rose would do her research, like a good academic.
“You been reading up?”
“Just her first book. And not to spy on you. I just got curious about the woman behind the legends.”
Maji walked on silently. She couldn’t blame Rose. There was plenty she’d love to tell her, things that would never make print. But that wasn’t going to happen.
“What about your father’s parents? Do you know them at all?”
Hell, it wasn’t classified. “Only from Papi’s stories. They were Pinochet supporters, unlike him. But then, he was a young man, a med student full of bold ideas. When Allende fell, they couldn’t save him from prison.”
“Oh God. Was he there long?”
Long enough to be tortured, Maji thought. Not long enough to break. “Just until Hannah got him out.” She briefly weighed how much more to explain. “Mossad went in to extract a Jewish woman, a British doctor arrested for treating injured rebels. Papi was her assistant, and she insisted they take him, too.” Rose would have to ask Hannah or her father, to learn more. It was their story. “His parents never knew what happened to him.”
“Never?”
“Nope. Pinochet stayed in power until ’91, and Papi didn’t want to endanger his folks by contacting them. His mother became one of those women who demonstrated in the squares, demanding to know what happened to the disappeared. They died not knowing.” Heart attack and stroke, Maji knew. Or broken hearts, depending on how you looked at it.
Rose took her hand. “I’m so sorry.”
“S’okay.”
“No, it’s not. It’s terrible. You don’t have to be tough about it.”
Maji sighed and tried to slip her hand out of Rose’s. Rose held tighter. Maji stopped and looked her in the eye. “I’m not being tough. It’s just—where I grew up, in my house, in my parents’ world, people were always coming through with stories like that. Refugees from Guatemala, El Salvador, Nicaragua. And then the Iranians—more affluent, but same kind of hurt.” She smiled sadly, tilted her head. “It’s not about tough—it’s just a different normal.”
Rose’s eyes, even in the dark, glistened. “Well, it’s not normal to me, this losing family to senseless violence. I think of Max and Carlo murdered, and Angelo having to leave, and I get so angry I don’t know what to do with it all. What am I supposed to do with it?”
“Keep hitting things. Bob, the heavy bag, Ricky if he gets in your way.”
Rose laughed. “Smart-ass. That’s the best you’ve got?”
Maji shrugged and started walking again, giving in to the small pleasure of Rose’s fingers intertwined with hers. “Well, if you were a juvie, I’d say steal cars, get in fights, deface public property, get in fights, shoplift, get in fights, get expelled, and finally learn to hit Bob instead.”
“Were you really that bad?”
Maji chuckled. “You’ll never know from Mom’s books. Editing protects us all.”
“Do I have to ask Bubbles if I want the unedited version of you as a little hell-raiser?”
“Be my guest.” She reconsidered. “
But tread carefully. Those were hard days for her, too.”
“Hmm. Maybe I’ll just hit Bob.”
The day before the meeting and Hotel Nacional party, the Big House was a hive of activity. Angelo breezed into the kitchen from the veranda, followed closely by Rey. Maji looked up and barely recognized him, transformed by a stylish scant mustache and thin beard line, with a tight T-shirt outlining his muscled torso. She raised one eyebrow, went back to chopping vegetables.
“Nonna? You need kitchen helpers?” Angelo asked loudly, leaning toward his grandmother’s perch by the central island.
She shook her head. “Not yet. Do the cleaning first.”
“Sure,” Angelo replied. “Fetch Raul here when it’s time.” He pointed to Rey, who ushered in a string of small dark-haired women in maid’s uniforms, speaking to them softly in Spanish. They followed their stylish leader silently across the kitchen and through the swinging doors into the house beyond.
A moment later, Gino stormed in. “Where’s Angelo?”
Nonna looked up, squinted. “What?”
“An-gel-o,” he repeated, raising his voice. “Dov’è?”
“Outside with the band, I think,” Rose replied, gesturing with her knife.
Gino shoved open the door to the veranda, hollering, “Angelo! Subito.” He continued to stand in the doorway until Angelo appeared.
“Why is my house crawling with spics?” Gino demanded, his voice carrying indoors as well as out.
Angelo shrugged. “Cuba, Big G. Salsa band, Cuban food, you know. Am I on the wrong page here?”
“Not them, for Chrissakes. The bunch inside. I walk in my office, there’s two going over it.”
“Going over it? How?”
“Well—vaccuuming, brushing down the curtains. That ain’t the point. It’s my office.”
Angelo raised both hands. “’Course. I’m sorry. I shoulda showed them which rooms to prep, which are off-limits. I thought my guy took notes when he was here the other day. I’ll fix it.” He hurried off through the swinging doors, into the house.
Gino shrugged. He walked to the stove, lifted a pot lid. “How’s it coming, Ma?”
“It’s coming fine without you. Get outta my kitchen.”
Gino kissed the top of her head, winked at Rose, and went back out on the veranda. His footfalls receded down the stone steps.
“Nonna?” Rose ventured.
“What, hon?”
“Is my father Latino?”
Nonna squinted at her. “Your father? Your father is the man who raised you. You want to turn Gerald in now?”
“No, I just…” She sighed. “You just seemed so perturbed by Uncle Gino.”
“Perturbed don’t begin to cover it. I raised him better than that. He forgets that in my day, the Italians were dagos, or wops, or worse. We were the spics then.” She glanced at Maji. “No offense, hon.”
Maji looked at the old woman with new respect. “None taken, ma’am.”
Jackie looked around the dining table at the gang—Frank, Dev, Tom, Rose, Ri. Then she zeroed in on Angelo. “So, what fun you got planned for your last night with just your friends and your poor old mother?”
“Just hang out, I guess. Feels like I’ve hardly got to see any of you.”
“You had a lot on your shoulders,” Frank said.
Jackie scowled. “You been doing everybody’s work. I can’t believe you had to oversee the caterers and everything. Like you don’t have enough to do.” She pointed her finger at him. “But don’t take credit tomorrow. Let the light shine on Gino and that Khodorov. Try and keep your head down, for once.”
“You’re right, Ma—always are. But the Big House looks fabulous, don’t it?” From the driveway lined with fresh flower beds to the bandstand and dance floor on the lawn below the veranda, the place could pass for a stately hotel. Inside, it still looked like just a large house, except for the rec room downstairs with its gaming tables. “Maybe we should practice blackjack tonight. How’s your game, Ri?”
Maji raised an eyebrow at him, looking unhappy that he called her out. “Perfect. But I’m not playing tomorrow.”
“Not even if I stake you?” he teased, trying to elicit a smile. “Ri can take the house, even against a double shoe,” he added to his mother and Rose. His mother looked impressed.
Rose looked nettled. “I have no idea what you just said.”
Angelo looked to Maji to explain, but she kept her face blank. Everybody was edgy in their own way tonight.
His mother stepped in. “Double shoe is two packs of cards. So Ri must be a good card counter. Very entertaining for the wiseguys, I’m sure. But who’s funding the house?”
“Nonna. She and I worked out a deal. Whatever the house loses, our guests get to keep if they want. But they should be feeling pretty generous, given the outlook on their new investment.”
“What if the guests lose? They’ll be playing with real money, right?” Rose asked.
“Exactly, hon—wiseguys are terrible losers. It’s a bad idea, Ang,” his mother protested.
Angelo shrugged. “It’s for charity. Anything they lose, or don’t choose to cash in, goes to St. Maggie’s Relief Fund. Makes them look generous—and you know they love that.”
His mother looked skeptical. “Give those babbos a few drinks, all they’ll know is they’re losing money. You know what they say about wiseguys.”
Angelo answered Rose’s look before she could ask. “How much money does the average wiseguy need? Ma—punchline, please.”
“More, hon. No matter how much they got, the answer is always more.” She looked from an unamused Rose back to Angelo. “You better put somebody down there, make sure they don’t punch out your dealers.”
Angelo thought of the trained field agents who would be undercover as casino staff. “The Cuba Libre crew are pros, Ma. But if it makes you feel better, I’ll ask Khodorov to put a couple of his guys in the room, just to keep an eye out.”
“Maybe you two should be there, too,” Jackie said to Tom and Dev.
Angelo shook his head. “I’m putting them down by the shoreline.”
“Now they’re lifeguards, too?”
“No, Ma. Somebody has to make sure Sirko don’t sneak anybody in off the water.”
“Also,” Frank pitched in, “they can’t really come to the party. It’s Family only.”
“I suppose. So tonight, what then—Scrabble? Parcheesi? Strip poker?”
“Jackie,” Rose admonished, then blushed as the whole table chuckled. “Scrabble sounds good.”
“Yay,” Maji said with false enthusiasm, raising her glass of water to clink with Frank. “Sober fun.”
Frank came into the kitchen carrying a tray of snacks for the group—popcorn, chips, and mixed nuts. “Rose is gonna make virgin daiquiris. Sent me to take orders—strawberry, mango, or lime. Anybody?”
“Mango,” Dev said without hesitation.
“Mango,” Angelo echoed.
Tom looked ambivalent. “Strawberry. Unless it’s mango all the way. No point making her do extra work.”
“Likewise,” Jackie agreed. “Whatever the kids want, so long as mine has rum in it.”
Angelo winked at her. “Then it’s not a virgin, Ma.”
“Nobody here is, funny boy.”
Maji unfolded herself from the floor beside the coffee table and stood. “I’ll go give her a hand.”
“Make sure Rose gets some rum, too,” Jackie instructed. “She won’t take my Ambien.”
Maji saw Rose setting up the blender, her back to the door. She resisted the urge to sneak up and slide her arms around Rose’s waist. She knocked on the door frame.
Rose turned partway, and her face lit up when she spotted Maji. “Hi. Lend me a hand?”
“Just one,” Maji replied, sliding her left behind her back and offering the right, palm up.
“I’ll take what I get.” She set Maji to retrieving frozen fruit from the chest freezer in the pantry and didn’t comment w
hen Maji came back with both arms full.
When they had one pitcher of each flavor ready, Rose started setting glasses on a tray. As she looked up from the task and caught Maji’s eye across the island, her face betrayed an inner struggle.
“What?” Maji asked.
“I have a favor to ask, and I don’t want you to take it the wrong way. I would have asked you even if we hadn’t…Well, I would have asked because you see things other people don’t.”
“Okay. And?”
“At the party tomorrow, keep your eyes open for my father. Please.”
Maji stifled her initial reaction. “I’d be happy to, but I think you overestimate my powers of observation. If you’ve met all the guys around the right age before and haven’t formed your own theories…”
“Oh, I’ve had plenty of those. All as dumb as yesterday’s. Maybe Nonna was right.”
“Maybe. And maybe getting outed would be dangerous for this guy you keep calling your father.”
Rose put her hands flat on the counter and pushed, a move Maji remembered from the first night she ever saw her, arguing with Frank. “How? It’s been thirty years!”
“Maybe the Mafia has no statute of limitations on betraying a mob boss by sleeping with his underage daughter. Maybe your mother and Nonna know things you don’t. You might consider respecting their decision.”
“You mean maybe it’s not all about me?” Rose sounded bitter. Then she laughed and shook her head. “Thank you.”
“For what?”
“Reminding me what matters. I guess I’m not as well trained as you, to put the well-being of others before my own needs and desires.” She paused to reflect. “Before this summer, I never even thought about that.”
“Sure you did. You’re kind to everybody, even when they’re an asshole. You should never have to do it in a life-or-death context, that’s all.”
“Well, it’s not going to come to that.”
Maji knew she should have a reply, but she was worn out trying to say the right thing without saying too much. She rolled her neck, which gave a series of satisfying pops, and reached for the tray.
