Page 139 of The Mafia's Christmas Baby
She knows me as the woman who once bought a scone and read the paper like she might eat the secrets on it.
She believes both of us because she believes in men who leave a good tip and a woman who buys the same pastry twice.
“You want me to lie?” I ask.
“You want me to get what we need?” he says. “Words are a currency.”
His face is open and clean.
He has a way of making illegality look like a conversation.
I slide to the counter.
Rosa squints at me and says, “You got a name?”
“Geno Petruzzi,” I say, practiced and steady. “Delivery receipt. Small thing.”
Her eyebrows move like curtains.
She goes to the register, opens a drawer that smells like pennies and gum, and reaches under with a sleeved hand.
The ledger comes up on a clipboard, cream pages folded together.
She flips.
I see Geno’s name on a line with a Penelope’s code—Marco’s signature tucked beneath in a way that is sloppy if you know how to watch.
“Why this one?” she asks, eyes narrowing.
“Audit,” I say. “Just doing the right thing.”
She shrugs. “Folks who do the wrong thing sometimes pay me to forget.” She taps my wrist. “But if you bake something good, I’ll look the other way.”
I hand her the paper bag.
She peeks, sees the scone, smiles the way people who have time to be kind do.
She hands me the page and I fold it into my jacket like a legal cushion.
A small thing performed exactly buys you bigger things.
Outside, the black sedan slides.
Not his usual.
Too neat.
Too new.
We move like two people who want coffee and nothing else.
We head to the union hall on Delancey like the city will not notice.
At the hall, the door is propped open by a broom and a man yawns like it's Tuesday and he never slept.
I slide the clipboard into the box under the counter where the takeout menus live.
I tuck a twenty on top like an offering.
