Page 41 of Family Secrets

As hard as Sully tried to be a badass, of all the Vitale men, he was by far the most sensitive. Growing up, Gino took the role of big brother to heart, doing most of the dirty work when their father handed out assignments. Gino recalled the first time Sully held a gun, how his hand shook, and he dropped the damn thing twice before Niko took it away from him. As they got older, Gino did most of the enforcing, allowing Sully to take credit for shit he didn’t do, just so he would look good in their father’s eyes.

Niko waited until Sully was out of the room before continuing. He worried the youngest Vitale would never recover from the loss of his father, at least not as well as Gino would.

“As I was saying, whoever did this knew Jonathan’s routine. Where the cameras were and how to shut them off.”

“In other words, we’ve got nothing. Not a fucking clue who’s responsible!” Gino roared.

“Giovanni, it’s no secret your father had a long list of enemies, not including your mother’s family.”

“Mom may have hated him, but if she wanted to kill him, she would have done it on Italian soil.” Gino reasoned, having spoken with his mother a few hours ago before she went to bed.

“I put a call into Luca, but this should come from you, Giovanni.”

Gino nodded his head, “I’ll call her later. My father stole enough sleep from my mother when he was alive.”

Surveying the room, Gino tried to look at things as the killer might. Having been given the task of shooting a few men in the back of the head, he moved around the couch to stand where he would have been the one to kill him.

“My father had an odd sense of awareness. As a child, I could never sneak up on him, he always knew I was there.”

“Unless he had something to distract him.” Niko reasoned. “How many men sit around in their living room with their dicks out unless they’re jacking off—”

“Or getting their dick sucked.” Gino finished. Rounding the couch, he took in his father’s body. With his slumped position, it was hard to tell at first, but sure enough, his father’s flaccid dick was stuck to his pants, dried cum staining his dark slacks.

“Call our friend at the lab, offer him whatever he wants to come and swab his dick. If someone was sucking it, they left behind their DNA.”

Niko pulled out his phone, turning from the couch as Gino continued to scan the area around his father’s body. They would have to call the authorities, allowing the funeral home to take the body away to prepare him for burial. The other Families would be called in, a meeting held to choose their new leader. With his death coming before he passed the reins, it was anyone’s guess who would be chosen.

“He’ll be here in half an hour,” Niko advised as he took his place beside Gino. “Apparently, he has something to tell you. Wouldn’t say what it was, only you needed to hear.”

“It’s fine, Niko,” Gino responded absentmindedly, his focus on the ring on his father’s hand, more importantly, what was under the hand. “Tell me, have you known Jonathan to carry anything other than a Glock?”

“No, he has a gun safe full of them, some shit about NATO bullets.”

Pointing to the gun in his father’s grip. “Then whose gun is that?”

Niko reached into his pocket, pulling out a handkerchief, covering his fingers before prying the gun from Jonathan’s hand. Rigor mortis made it nearly impossible, several of his fingers snapping in the process. Holding the gun in the air between them, Gino and Niko stared hard at the revolver, Jonathan’s blood staining one side of it.

“Gino,” one of the men called from the door. “Cops are here.”

Niko pulled the gun away, wrapping it in the handkerchief and sliding it into his pocket. Crossing the room, he pulled open the top drawer of Jonathan’s desk, carefully removing a Glock before tossing it across the room to Gino’s feet. Using the tail of his jacket, Gino picked up the gun, laying it strategically on his father's lap.

“Mr. Vitale,” the suited man greeted, stepping around the handful of Vitale men now standing guard.

“Rhoads,” Gino acknowledged, grateful Niko had the brains to call in one of the men on their payroll. “I’d say it was good to see you, but…”

Rhoads nodded his head, hooking his hands on his hips allowing his gun and badge to show. “Do we know what happened? I know your father was fairly serious when it came to cameras and such.”

Nodding, “Best we can gather is he shot himself. The reason we may never know, as he didn’t leave a note and he turned off all the cameras before he swallowed the bullet.”

Rhoads looked from Gino to Jonathan, the exit wound clearly on his forehead and not the top of his head. Rhoads found himself deeply indebted to the Vitale’s, Gino in particular, and if the man said his father killed himself, then that is what his report would reflect. “The Coroner is going to want ten G’s to corroborate.”

“No, he won’t,” Niko added, kneeling and firing a single shot to Jonathan’s temple, the hollowpoint taking off the back of his head and the original entrance of the first bullet.

For the first time since he was a child, Gino jumped at the sound of a gunshot, the reality of it all crashing down around him.

“I've got to call my ma.” Gino muttered before walking with purpose from the room, ignoring the sad faces of his men he jumped in his car and sped out the gates. Night had fallen on the city, the clock on his dash reading almost midnight. His mother would be awake by now, most likely having coffee on the veranda outside of her bedroom with Luca beside her.

“Good morning, Gino. I d—"

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