by Gina LaManna
“What are you saying?” Meg asked.
“Just let me in the Family.” Alfonso broke in, his eyes watering a bit.
“Sorry, they don’t allow crying in the Fam. Or so I hear, I’m not Italian myself,” Meg said.
“I’m not crying.” He wiped his eyes hastily.
“Let’s bring him to the cops. They can do a more thorough investigation. If it turns out to be him, great. They’ll lock him up or put him in juvie or whatever it is they do, and we still get paid. Carlos doesn’t have to worry about the Russians—we’re all happy. If it turns out not to be him, they let him go, and we don’t waste our time.” Meg nodded.
“And if it isn’t him, then we jump right back in the case,” I added.
“That sounds good,” Meg said. “We can still poke around in the meantime at the bar, just in case.”
“It’s perfect,” I said. “Except for one thing.”
“When you say one thing like that, it usually turns out to be one very big thing.” Meg narrowed her eyes at me.
“This is a little thing.” I smiled. “I have a training session with Anthony in thirty minutes, and I really can’t miss it. He might kill me.”
Meg nodded again. “Either that or just not ever have sex with you. Which could kill you, I suppose.”
She leaned down to Alfonso, which wasn’t far as she was still splayed on his chest. “That man is a hunk of fiery love.”
“Burning love,” Alfonso said.
Meg stared him down.
“What? I’m just correcting the song lyrics.” Alfonso shrunk back.
“That’s a song? Damn, I’m in the wrong business. I could be the next Britney, don’t you think?” Meg fluffed her hair so that it flew right into Alfonso’s face.
Alfonso spat in an effort to clear his mouth of her long strands. “Britney after her meltdown and two kids.”
“Now, that’s the nicest thing you’ve said to me all day. Keep it up, pal.” Meg stood and tugged the kid to his feet. “Get in the car before I change my mind and squeeze the dickens out of you.”
Meg snapped a pair of handcuffs on him. She’d probably forgotten to return them, along with a few guns and a cop car, when she changed careers.
“What should we do with him?” I asked. “I’d drop him at the station now, but the police have a nosy habit of asking questions and wanting us to fill out paperwork, and I just don’t have time for that.”
“I know. You drop me off at your apartment. Me and Clay will watch him while you go train and then when you come back we drop him at the police station.”
“You are a rock star,” I said, giving her a huge high five.
“I told ya I could be the next Britney!”
“Right. Can you sing?”
She pursed her lips as we climbed in the car. “Does that matter these days?”
“What are you doing with me?” The prepubescent redhead sullenly glared at us.
“Wouldn’t you like to know?” Meg winked.
Alfonso turned as white as his teeth.
We pulled onto the freeway and he remained silent for the entire ride to my apartment. As I dropped him and Meg outside my door, the latter making odd kissing noises the entire time, I thought I heard Alfonso squeak, “Watch it, I’m a minor.”
“You’re not my type,” Meg said, then patted his butt. He yelped and jumped forward onto the artfully decorated front stairs.
Chapter 3
“DOLL.”
I nearly leapt out of my sweatpants—which wouldn’t have been a difficult task, as they were plenty loose. Between my sweatshirt and sweatpants, I think I could have surrounded the earth once with all the material swathing my body.
Anthony no-last-name happened to be my kind-of trainer, former bodyguard, and sort-of crush. He stood well over six feet tall and was made of solid muscle, though it fit handsomely within his skin. He had dark, wavy hair situated just right, complementing his dark brown eyes that melted from dark chocolate to a milky cappuccino, depending on his mood.
He wore a black, long-sleeved shirt made of spandex-like material that fit so tightly it could have been painted on. Sharp, black trainer pants sat snugly at his chiseled waist, just underneath a tasty rack of abs.
A tiny tattoo of the word Italy peeked out above the neck of his shirt, and I often wondered if it wasn’t the result of a drunken weekend in Vegas; that sort of tattoo seemed so out of character for the perfectly maintained specimen that was Anthony. Though whether he even drank alcohol or ever lost control was beyond me. It didn’t seem like he was the type. Then again, I didn’t even know his last name.
All of these reasons added up to the larger reason that I was wearing enough clothes to house a polar bear. I had taken to wearing baggy clothes after a run in with Anthony at the gym hot tub that had nearly caused me to faint on the spot. Or orgasm. Sometimes they felt similar. I was trying out a natural method of birth control— dressing like a man in order to remind both Anthony and myself that I shouldn’t be attractive to him.
It seemed to be working, as he hadn’t made any advances after rescuing me from a crazy Jewish man who’d been posing as an innocent, struggling Italian. Maybe it was the clothes that did the trick, or maybe it was the fact that he worked for my grandfather, the Godfather. It was difficult to tell.
“Doll,” he said again.
I blinked and brought my eyes up to meet his. “Hey, what’s up? I missed ya, pal.” I smacked his shoulder lightly.
He raised his eyebrows.
“Sorry, rough day,” I explained. “I’m still a little bit wired.”
“I can tell. I can help you with that if you want.” Anthony leaned forward and rested his hand on my side, on that tingling, sensitive area right between my hip and my stomach.
I flinched and leaned into him, blushing so hard that I must have turned as red as Alfonso’s hair.
“I, uh, don’t know about that,” I stammered.
“What do you mean?” Anthony backed away.
“I mean, I just—I’m confused.” I trailed off, looking for help.
“Did you or did you not come here today for a training session?” The corner of his mouth twitched slightly.
“Oh! Oh, yeah. Exactly. I’ve been working out so much lately, I think it’s making me scatter-brained. Maybe I need a few days off.” I crinkled my nose.
“Hmm, I see. Two days off wasn’t enough?” His eyes glittered. It was obvious he knew that my mind had temporarily taken up residence in the gutter.
“Oh, just stop it already. You know what I mean,” I said.
He caught me again, right in the middle of the lobby with one hand on each of my hips. He leaned his head close to my ear and whispered, “I have alternative methods of burning calories. Just say the word, sugar.”
I meant to swat him away, but it took me a full thirty seconds to move. My body was frozen next to his. I enjoyed closing my eyes and pretending for a second that we didn’t have a crazy, complicated connection, made even trickier due to the fact that we worked together. He smelled manly: a hint of pine and lemon on his skin, and an expensive, heavenly musk clinging to his clothes.
“So?” he asked against my ear. “Which will it be?”
“Uh, treadmill. Bicep curls. Maybe the elliptical if I’m feeling frisky.” I took a step backwards.
“All right, then go get changed and we’ll get started.”
“This is what I’m wearing.” I looked down at my clothes and gave a sharp nod of approval.
“Are you trying to repel all men, women, and children with your choice of clothing?” He eyed me up and down with an amused tilt to his chin.
“Kind of.” I jutted my chin out defiantly.
“Well, it’s not working. If you think clothing can stop a man on a mission... Honey, you’ve got a lot to learn.”
I followed Anthony as he sprinted up the three flights of stairs to the cardio equipment. I felt like I’d completed my workout by the time I got to the top, wonderin
g the whole time exactly what sort of mission he had in mind.
“I HAVE A QUESTION,” I huffed, pausing mid-curl with five-pound weights.
“Keep going,” barked Anthony.
I curled once more. “If you had—” I gasped.
“You’re at eight,” Anthony shouted. “Two more to go.”
I squeezed one more out.
“Nine,” Anthony counted.
I heaved a large breath and prepared to do my last curl. “—somebody locked up who had killed someone, what would you do with him?”
Anthony stared back at me. Then he shook his head.
“One more,” he growled.
“Fine.” I grunted and completed my last curl.
“Now, was that a made up excuse to get out of exercise—or do you really have somebody locked up?”
I walked to the drinking fountain and didn’t make eye contact as I muttered, “Kind of.”
“You should not keep murderers hanging around. Is he at your house?”
“Also kind of.”
“You have got to stop these meetings with dangerous criminals. Do you understand me?” Anthony sat me next to him on the bench, probably harder than was necessary.
“I get it. But it’s not like I send out invitations to tea and crumpets with the entrance fee of a body. They just stumble into me. Literally.”
“Well, stop it.”
“Fine, I’ll try,” I huffed, and realized we both had our arms crossed. I gave a small smile. “So, can you help me?”
“Are you going to give me any information?”
I half rolled my eyes and then stopped, reminding myself I actually did need his help. I explained some of the situation, leaving out other, less important parts.
“I don’t particularly want to go to the police station, seeing as I work for Carlos. At the same time, I feel guilty letting a murderer walk around free.” I laid out my options to Anthony, who sat deep in thought.
“Are you one hundred percent convinced he did it?” Anthony asked after a long pause.
“I mean, he admitted to it.” I shrugged. “I didn’t exactly have time to do a lot of research. He fell into my lap about forty-five minutes ago.”
“And you still came for your training session?” Anthony’s eyebrow crooked with curiosity.
“I was afraid not to.”
Anthony leaned his head back and roared with laughter.
I let him have his fun for a few minutes before I punched him in the shoulder—the equivalent of smashing my knuckles against a brick wall—and told him to shape up.
“I’d hold onto him for a bit. If he’s fifteen, I wouldn’t imagine that would be too difficult. Dig around a bit. I’ll help, and I’m sure Clay will have a few tricks to find out more about this kid. I don’t particularly want to bring the cops into things if we can avoid it.”
Like the rest of the Luzzi family, Anthony obviously shared a wide distrust for the organized government. The only rules Carlos’s employees lived by were the ten rules of honor laid out by the Italian Mafia, which aren’t exactly cop-friendly. And I can tell you for certain that “You Shall Not Kill” did not make that list.
“Do you need help watching him?” Anthony asked as I grabbed my keys and prepared to head out.
“A twerp like him?” I made a show of my biceps, displaying them like a body builder. “Not this girl.”
“Call me when you need me.”
“I don’t appreciate that,” I yelled over my shoulder as I punched the handicapped sign to open the door automatically. My arms were too tired to pull it open myself.
I RETURNED HOME, SWEATY and tired, wanting a big, fat s’more. But when I pulled open the front door to my place, Tupac the Cat screeched an ear piercing yowl, and the smell of burning plastic infiltrated my nostrils. Alfonso stood in the kitchen, a guilty expression plastered on his face and a smoldering bowl of black junk smoking away in front of him.
“That’s my pink popcorn bowl!” I shrilly shouted. “You burned a hole in it!”
“I was just trying to pop popcorn,” he said with a shrug of his shoulders.
“How did you manage to fail that miserably?” I snatched the bowl from him, whimpering at the melted husk that was once my favorite snack dish.
“Isn’t this thing like a dollar at Target?” He took the bowl back and dumped it in the garbage.
“Then buy me a new one.” I crossed my arms.
“Aren’t you taking me to the police station?”
“Not yet,” I said. “I decided to keep you here for a little bit and think about what to do with you. But I swear to God if you try and escape, I will have my cousin plant a tracking device in your ass and let Meg seal it with a kiss. Got it?”
“I’m not going anywhere.” He looked left and right, and then dropped his voice to a low murmur. “She’s crazy. How are you friends with her?”
I dropped my voice to a whisper. “Because she is crazy, and I’m a little afraid of what she’d do if we stopped being friends. I’m not exactly sure what she’s capable of.”
“Well she’s capable of clearing an entire room of people with a single fart, and that’s when she’s happy.” He eyed me knowingly.
“Exactly my point. I’d hate to see what she does when she’s mad.”
“Or when she’s had a burrito.”
We each stood nodding for a moment, and then at the same time we realized that we shouldn’t be bonding. He was the enemy, and I was the captor.
“Why are you cooking, anyway?” I asked.
“She’s hungry.”
“Did you feed her something?” I gasped. “If she’s hungry, you need to deal with that shit. Or else she’ll turn into a monster.”
“She came up with a donut from somewhere. She’s okay.”
Meg walked on in. “Who’s okay?”
“You are. I was just telling Alfonso how you’re my best friend, and I probably couldn’t live without you,” I squeezed Meg around the shoulders.
“Probably not,” Meg agreed. “You’d be hurting real bad, that’s for sure. You’d have no action without a wing woman like me.”
Alfonso looked between us like a scared mouse.
“You—” I pointed at him. “In the bathroom. I’ll make up a nice bed for you in the bathtub for tonight. Take whatever food you want with you.”
“Can I take him?” Alfonso nodded to Tupac the Cat.
“Are you going to eat him?” I asked.
“No, we’re just friends.”
“Fine, go ahead. Don’t forget his bucket or his food.” I handed over the litter box. “Good luck trying to get him to let you pick him up.”
Alfonso walked over and picked Tupac the Cat right on up. The little turd didn’t even growl. In all the years I’d had him, ever since he’d wandered right up to my front door, he’d barely let me pet him, let alone walk around the house with him cradled in my arms.
Alfonso disappeared into the bathroom with the cat.
“What now?” Meg asked.
“Is Clay here?” I looked around, but there was a surprising absence of clicking keyboards and blinking lights.
“He’s up at the laundromat for a shift. Carlos promised him a big bonus for helping out today.”
“Well then, I’m headed up to the laundromat. Wanna come?” I asked.
“Sure. What about the twerp?” she asked.
“The bathroom locks from the outside, and there’s no way down from the window. We’ll only be gone twenty minutes. I just need a little help from Clay. Find out more about that kid’s story.”
“Sounds good to me. Plus, I can get a donut refill at 7-11 and you can get your sugar bomb coffee.” Meg grabbed her purse and headed for the door.
I secured the lock on the bathroom door and followed suit. “See Meg, you’re brilliant. This is why we’re friends.”
SUGAR BOMBED AND DONUTED up, Meg and I entered the laundromat. Clay sat watch at the coin changer station and the rest of the place was fairly e
mpty.
“Hi.” Meg waved to Clay.
“Hey.” Clay waved back.
It took everything in my soul not to roll my eyes, but I didn’t do it. I just sipped my diabetes drink and took a deep breath.
“Clay, can you please help us out with some info on this Alfonso kid in our apartment?” I perched on the counter next to his screen. As usual, a game of video poker was in full swing.
“Not now. You need to leave. Get out of here.” Clay’s voice was urgent and low, more hurried than the normally relaxed cousin I knew.
“Why?” I whispered back and looked around skeptically, but business appeared as usual.
“Later,” he said through gritted teeth.
Feeling my frustration gauge tilt up a notch, I leaned closer. “Our situation is rather urgent, Clay. We have a potential murderer sleeping in our bathroom holding Tupac the Cat hostage.”
“How’d he get the cat?” Clay looked up.
“Tupac just let Alfonso whisk him right off the floor. Didn’t even meow once.”
“That little shit.”
“Yeah. So, a little help?” I poked him gently in the shoulder.
“Not now. You need to leave, or else—”
“Where does she need to go?” A voice boomed behind me, the cockiness palpable from across the room.
Joey emerged from the back room hallway looking as neon and shiny as ever.
“So...did they let you in?” Clay asked lazily.
“Stupid bouncer doesn’t know what he’s talking about,” Joey said, looking flustered. “Said I didn’t have a meeting with Carlos. Who needs a meeting to see his uncle these days?”
I looked at Clay, who gave me the slightest wink imaginable.
“What is this world coming to?” Clay asked. “Also, he’s not quite an uncle. Sorry again about Vivian.”
“It’s fine,” Joey growled. “I was looking for her, anyway.”
“Me?” I pointed to myself under his stare. “Why?”
“Well, I don’t know who that chick is, and I already talked to that knucklehead.” Joey nodded first at Meg and then at Clay.
