Daughter of the Mob (Sample)

04 | Mafioso

"No one will ever kill me, they wouldn't dare." — Carmine Galante

JOHNNY SICILIANO had seen the girl. There was no doubt about it.

He thought about this as he sped across the Brooklyn Bridge the day after the shipment had come in and Old Friedenberg had complied with his orders.

He didn't know if she had been there all along, but he could still picture her face as he cruised over the East River from Manhattan to Brooklyn, Billie Holiday's raspy contralto voice humming through the lungs of his Becker Mexico car radio. The mounting waves below him glinted white in the waning autumn sun.

When Johnny noticed someone watching him, it profoundly surprised him that the busybody he detected in his trajectory was not an intimidating thug or a sharpshooter, but a young woman.

Johnny possessed eagle eyes—the kind that allowed him to shoot from far distances. His stellar vision had also helped him view the girl in great detail. From where he was standing, the streetlight had made the woman look almost ethereal, like an incarnate image of Selene: the goddess of the moon.

Johnny snorted.

He wasn't even sure why he remembered that; he had paid little attention in school and later dropped out in freshman year. Besides, his teachers had perpetually called him a worthless wop.

He rolled his eyes and looked out upon the city unravelling behind him, thousands upon thousands of bright city lights glittering across the canvas of the purple sky.

There was nothing Johnny loved better than the New York City skyline at night. It gave him an odd sense of comfort—knowing that though the night cloaked the city with darkness at sundown, the lights on the bridge and in the skyscrapers still shone. But that night, his memory of the mystery woman distracted him from admiring the breathtaking view.

Whoever she was, she had seemed terrified when he noticed her staring. Her soft features had hardened, her mouth going taut and her eyes widening with fear. Her forehead had creased, creating a worried line between her eyebrows and spoiling the serene face that had been there a fraction of a second earlier.

Meaning she had seen.

And heard.

She had shot at his instincts.

Nobody could watch that kind of business happen and rarely was Johnny watched. He was too good of a mafioso for such careless mistakes. He took great lengths to be discreet, unlike some of his brasher counterparts. He wasn't supposed to feel ashamed; it was just business, and yet, he had a sinking feeling dragging his soul down to the bottom of his feet.

The girl was afraid of him, and yet they had never had the chance to meet. If he had met her in passing at a dance or dinner club, he would've likely charmed her with his smooth talk and charm. But he had no such opportunity to do so now.

He banished these thoughts as he parked his car outside of a colourful stretch of taverns, produce markets and bungalows on Pioneer Street, across from which abided his boss—the venerable Don Roberto Mancini.

People called Don Roberto "The Enforcer," to his face and "Blue Eyes," behind his back. Not that he disliked being called "Blue Eyes," it was more that he preferred being constantly reminded of his authority and the fact that the world could stop turning at the snap of his fingers. More often, the men referred to him as Don Roberto, or simply boss, for the sake of convenience.

The Mancini home was in a quaint block of tenements and red-brick buildings, with a flourishing olive tree out front and a patch of flowers that Roberto's wife, Isabella, cared for. Roberto had built a trellis out of planks of wood and metal to serve as a sanctuary for the grapes and other climbing plants he grew. The Mancini couple would garden together in the summers, producing olive oil from the olives they harvested. The hobby provided a sense of normalcy for their otherwise unconventional lives.