Omerta

Chapter 16

        I was surprised that we were having such a formal meeting where several of the heads of families and also the Russian's would all be together in one place. I was only asked to join because Mikhail would be there and this relationship was all business in their eyes. Typically these types of things are held by men only. They're very old school and you wouldn't catch a woman being formally involved with the Italian mob. They are of course involved, but not acknowledged in rank other than to be the wife or daughter of said mobster. 

The meeting place was going to be at a family owned restaurant that they'd shut down for the day to maintain some privacy. The curtains of the place were drawn so nobody on the streets could look inside. Vehicles around separate parts of the building's parking lot and street were littered with unmarked cars with security goons inside with loaded glocks.

        I've been to this restaurant a million times but it took on a different ambiance when there were no other patrons in it. All the tables were round and varied in sizes but each one was covered in thick white table clothes with a battery operated fake candle glowing in the middle of each. The floor was square styled wood that looked waxy in the light, but this place was always in the slightly dimmed light, which made the gold accents of the bar create glowing bottles. 

This was a classy establishment, but a bit more low maintenance during lunch hours. It didn't matter today because we weren't in dress codes here, even though all the men would be in suits today.

        It was funny to me how the Russian's often wore their shirts unbuttoned, with at least four buttons down, exposing their chests. Both Alexei and Mikhail Bokarev wore their shirts that way today and both were crisp white. Mikhail's suit was blue and it was perfectly tailored to his body which made him look damn good. Since his eyes are so clear they popped with the suit as their background. When he extended a hand to me I could see the 'OMYT' inked into the knuckles of his hand. I decided I would ask Mikhail today what that even meant.

        A lot of important men were scattered around tables with their hands in their suit pockets as they spoke informally to one another before the sit down would be called. I hadn't seen Nick yet but Mikhail escorted me to his table anyway. The tables were lined closer together so everyone would be relatively close and able to speak and hear others speak also. The head of the Morello family, the Lombardo family, and Ragusa family were seated here. Dominic was standing in as head of the TerraNova family. 

Another one of my cousins was here today. Everybody calls him Smalls, because he is actually a heavy set guy and I don't know for what other reason than that. In the TerraNova family there is my Zio, my dad Mickey, and their sister Cecile who married a lower level mobster named Richie.

Zia Cecile wasn't a part of the mob but when her son was of age he stepped into the picture too. Cecile is the oldest of them all so her boy is in his late thirties. I told Mikhail I would be back and walked off to go give my cousin a hug. 

        We have more family members affiliated with the mob but on lower rankings. They worked under my Zio Tony and their kids worked under them. It was a long line of 'keeping it in the family'. If you were a nobody who joined it meant you were a street kid for a long time before you were trusted in anything else. An outsider like that would never become one of the heads of households or under bosses. 

"Ay, principessa. I wasn't expecting you here" Smalls lifted me into a back breaking hug. I squealed but kissed his cheeks on either side like us Italians do in greeting. I even did the same to a few of the guys I knew to be my father's 'friends'.

Every single one of them asked, "How's Mickey?" They would visit him from time to time but the thing is criminals don't often like visiting other criminals in the clink as not to raise any flags or prove they are of any affiliation. They like to fly under the radar.