Page 27 of The Sicilian Heir
The fight flew right out of me with this information. I shouldn't have underestimated the bratva. "Why isn't the leader dead yet? You've been working up taking care of soldiers. We need to cut the serpents head off its body." I might not spell it out, but Luciano knew what he was supposed to do.
"They have the cartel and the yakuza's backing. That's the current rumor," Nick finally chimed in.
"Where did we get this information?"
It was probably unreliable. All three factions working together. That had never happened before. What could they be trying to gain?
"An informant," Luciano said.
"A snitch?" I sneered, like I thought this was unreliable information.
"They say it's because they want to sell more flesh. That's why they are all working together. Some kind of treaty." Nick gagged on his mouthful.
We didn't sell flesh. It was a ruthless business and many innocents got hurt—drugs, weaponry, and the easiest, extortion. The reason I pushed so hard for an alliance with the Falcone famiglia was because they also didn't believe in dealing with flesh.
"They won't be doing it in my city," I vowed savagely.
"Nor mine," Nick promised alongside me.
I grinned, as this was the reason I wanted in with his famiglia. We were alike. There were smaller mafia we could've allied ourselves with, but I also wanted a large foothold in New York. It was sheer luck that Rosalina procured the son of the Don as her man when she was on the run.
"So, we need to take them down."
The waitress came back and took our plates. I asked her for more alcohol and Nick ordered dessert. Luciano and I didn't eat anything that was too sweet. I thought back to Eunji's legs wrapped around my head and remembered her honeyed taste.
"We can't fight all three of them. We may need to make deals," Nick pondered.
I didn't like the idea of doing deals with them. It was just going to make life messier.
"We need to figure out if the rumors are true. Then we need to give a blow to the Russians to give them a message." Luciano had a gleam in his eyes that said he was going to be the one to give out the message.
"The cartel?" I asked both of them.
We should've had the other members here. At least family. We could've voted. I paused. We didn't vote. That's not how my late father ran things.
"What do we know about them?" Nick was thinking about them seriously, I could tell.
"We need eyes," I told Luciano.
"On it. Give me a few weeks. Until then?" He was waiting for orders.
I knew I wasn't going to see him for a while after this. He couldn't stay around people for too long. Not after what happened before. That was when he was living in the compound.
"We take out the pakhan. What else?" I scoffed.
Nick laughed, a full belly laugh, at my statement.
"You act like it's an easy feat, friend. We don't have a description of their pakhan," he reminded me.
"Eunji saw him at the wedding when he carved her face in," I spat out. I thought they knew this.
"Let's pick this back up. I need to check in at the compound. Are you flying back or staying here?" I asked Nick, ready to wrap this up until we could get more information.
A guilty expression crossed Nick's face. "I'll stay at the compound tonight and fly back in the morning."
It was then I realized he was avoiding home. We didn't need to have a sit down. We could have spoken on the phone, he could have sent a proxy, or I could have brought Eunji with me to New York. He didn't even bring my sister with him. It wasn't my job to judge him, but I couldn't help myself. He was leaving my sister to fend for herself. She was all alone in New York.
"If you can't take care of Rosalina, send her back and I will." I left with that parting remark.
