The Venetian and the Rum Runner - L.A. Witt Page 0,138
never seen another do.”
Danny stared down at the cigarette between his fingers. James had always had frighteningly spot on intuition. Why should it be any surprise now? “I don’t know what to think about him. You’re right—sometimes I look at him and see Carmine Battaglia, the gangster who pays the lads and me to run liquor in from the sea. And other times…” He shivered just thinking about him. Crushing his cigarette in the ashtray, he exhaled. “I’m going out of my mind, James. I truly am. I can’t stop thinking about him, and believe me, I’ve tried. And ever since the night he got us back from the il Sacchis…”
“Because he cares about you?”
Swallowing, Danny nodded. “I keep telling myself I’m being an idiot. Of course he came for us—we make him loads of money. But…” He sighed, deflating a bit. “Afterward, the way he…” Danny’s spine tingled. The memory of Carmine’s hand sliding over the top of his in the shadows of the backseat brought goose bumps to life on his arms. And the way he’d looked at him in the office afterward. The tender touch. The soft kiss. The way they’d kissed the next time they’d been in the office.
Everything about Carmine that night—down by the warehouse, in the car, in the office—that wasn’t a man who’d only been there to take back what was his. Not with the fear that had flickered across his expression when Agosto il Sacchi had said he wasn’t releasing Danny after all. In that moment, Carmine had been afraid. Danny had seen it. He’d felt it. Was there a man alive who’d be that afraid of losing someone just because he made him money? Especially when the rest of the crew had been returned? Bernard and the lads could’ve picked up without Danny, same as they had without Francis, but—
“Danny?” James’s gentle voice startled him, and when Danny looked up, his friend’s expression was soft but still knowing. “You went back to him, didn’t you? Just now?”
Danny sighed and wiped his hand over his face. “I did. And I keep going back to him. He’s been distracting me since the start, but after that night…” He looked in James’s eyes. “I swear to you, it’s like he cares for me. Really cares.”
“Same as you care for him?”
More warmth bloomed in Danny’s face, and he avoided James’s gaze again as he whispered, “Aye. Same as I care for him.” As soon as the words were out, he winced. “My brothers have got to be turning in their graves over this. Carmine’s a… He’s one of…” Danny threw up his hand. “What is wrong with me?”
“Nothing.” James squeezed Danny’s arm. “You think your brothers would turn in their graves knowing you feel this way for a man who took on a capo to save you? I reckon they’re looking down now and thanking the Lord for the man who didn’t give up on you.”
“Maybe.” Danny rubbed his eyes. “But he’s a gangster.”
“Couldn’t it be said that you are too?”
Danny’s head snapped up.
James shrugged. “You’re working for a gang. You’re stealing from other gangs. Maybe you’ve never shot a man, and maybe you’re not Sicilian, but you’re—”
“But I’m not a gangster,” Danny protested weakly.
“Ain’t you?”
He held James’s gaze.
James absently brushed a few ashes off his cassock. “I’m not making accusations, Danny. I’m saying what I said before—that you and he are both doing what you have to in order to live another day in this place. You’re both men who love and sin and hurt and confess.” He shrugged again, subtler this time. “So maybe it ain’t so much that you’re a gangster, but that you know now that Carmine is a man first, then a gangster, and that you’re more like him than different.”
Danny swallowed. He couldn’t even argue with James. He wanted to insist he wasn’t so much like Carmine, but that felt like a lie. So did insisting he didn’t want to be with Carmine more than he wanted to be away from him. Finally, he whispered, “What do I do, then?”
James was quiet for a long moment, probably contemplating everything Danny had told him and all the implications of that deceptively simple question. Then he looked Danny in the eyes. “Maybe it makes me a failure as a man of God, but I can’t help thinking that if your heart keeps pulling your mind back to this man.” He half-shrugged. “Maybe it’s time you listen to it.”