Page 96 of The Picasso Heist
“Maybe we just wanted to wish you good luck.”
Bergamo looks over and up at Skip. There’s a hint of recognition. Or maybe it’s just the first twinge of unease.
“Oh, that’s right,” I say. “You’ve never met my brother. When you first started doing business with our father, Skip was already off at Valley Forge. Military prep school—go figure.”
“Two minutes!” a stagehand yells. “Two minutes to show!”
Bergamo anxiously looks over his shoulder. Models and makeupartists are gathering, waiting for his final approval. “I’m needed, but thanks for wishing me luck on the show,” he says.
“The show? No, that’s not what we’re wishing you luck on,” I say. “We’re referring to the trial.”
“Excuse me?”
“You know, the trial,” says Skip.
“What trial?” asks Bergamo.
“Yours, of course,” I say.
“What are you talking about?”
“You were willing to sacrifice our father for money, so we suggested a trade of our own with the US attorney’s office.”
“Call it a prisoner swap,” says Skip. “You for our father.”
“There was just one problem, though,” I say. “Although we knew that you set up our father, we didn’t actually have the proof.”
“You’re damn right. Because it never happened,” says Bergamo.
“But it did, Enzio. You know what also happened? Your laundering money for Dominick Lugieri. Now, there’s something that can be proven,” I say.
Bergamo steps toward me, enraged, the tendons in his neck bulging above his collar. He wants to strangle me, kill me, but he can’t even reach me, as Skip steps in the way. Big brothers are the best. In Skip’s case, really big. He towers over Bergamo, who immediately backs off.
Still, I can see the wheels in Bergamo’s mind turning as he races to figure out the argument, the angle, the right-back-atcha moment.
As quick as a smirk, he thinks he’s got us.
CHAPTER82
“YOU’RE NOT THATstupid,” he says. “Or are you? All the work to set me up, pretending we were partners, making me think you were repaying your father’s debt—and where did it get you?”
“You tell me,” I say.
Bergamo shrugs with the subtlety of a B movie actor. “It’s nothing more than a case of ‘he said, she said.’”
“You mean my word against yours?”
“No, I mean your word against his,” he says. “I’m talking abouthim.”
“Who? Lugieri?” I ask.
“That’s right. Which means you don’t have an endgame, Halston. At least, not one that doesn’t end with your funeral,” he says. He jabs a finger at Skip. “Same for you, big brother.”
Bergamo’s so pleased with himself for delivering his gotcha line, the threat that Skip and I will end up being fitted for cement shoes. He’s grinning so widely, I can see all the way to his molars. But there’s something about the way I smile back at him that makes his begin to wither.
“Yeah, I get it. Lugieri’s a dangerous guy,” I say. “It sort of makes me wonder why you were doing business with him in the first place. Seriously, Enzio, what were you thinking? Laundering money for the mob?”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
