The Venetian and the Rum Runner - L.A. Witt Page 0,28
of manhood. Carmine shuddered to imagine what would happen if Maurizio ever found out some of the ways Carmine “made a mockery of manhood” when none of his associates were around.
Voices and footsteps made the hair on Carmine’s neck stand up. A moment later, he and Maurizio rose, buttoning their jackets, and Giulia drained her cup before she too stood.
Flanked by his own security detail, Agosto il Sacchi descended the stairs. The stout bald man was in his fifties, Carmine thought, so perhaps a decade younger than Maurizio. He shot an icy look at Carmine, but then put on a placid expression as he extended a hand to Maurizio. Greetings were exchanged, and then il Sacchi took a chair across from Maurizio, Carmine, and Giulia. They sat down as well, and various bodyguards situated themselves against the walls.
Il Sacchi eyed Carmine and Giulia coldly before he fixed his glare on Maurizio. “It’s unfortunate we’re meeting under such…grim circumstances.”
“It is,” Maurizio said. “And please let me extend my family’s condolences for the loss of your nephew.”
“Thank you. My brother and his wife are devastated. Their other son is inconsolable.” Il Sacchi slid his gaze toward the Battaglia siblings. “Ricky was their youngest boy.”
Carmine winced, more for il Sacchi’s benefit than his own. He understood the family’s grief, but he didn’t think the world was a darker place now that it was without one of those two brothers. The only reason he was glad it was Ricky who’d been killed, not Salvatore, was because he was sick just imagining Giulia alone with Salvatore, even with an unexpected Irishman coming to her rescue. He wasn’t sure what had happened to those brothers—if cold-blooded murder was in their blood, or if they’d grown into it being around their uncle’s gang—but Enrico and Salvatore il Sacchi were madmen. Brutal even by the standards of the circles they all ran in. Now only one remained. Aside from the tension the incident was creating between the families and the suspicion focused on his sister, Carmine couldn’t say he was sorry the man was gone.
Beside Carmine, Giulia smoothed her skirt with her palms, something she did whenever she was nervous.
Maurizio set his teacup on the saucer and looked right at il Sacchi. “Listen. What happened at the Plaza Hotel was unfortunate, but I hope we can resolve this without further bloodshed.”
Il Sacchi nodded slowly, shifting his gaze to Giulia. “Tell me what happened that night. What were you and my nephew doing?” The question was laced with an accusation that he didn’t have to say out loud, and Carmine fought hard to keep his mouth shut. Giulia was no chippy, and keeping the peace be damned, he bristled at the idea of this man tarnishing her reputation via Ricky’s well-known penchant for bedding every woman he could get his hands on.
Giulia may have been nervous, but as she looked il Sacchi in the eye, her tone and expression were fearless. “We went into the suite to talk. I asked to speak with Ricky in private because I needed his boys to stop hassling people at my bar. That’s all.” She shrugged tightly. “I didn’t think it would end that way.”
Il Sacchi narrowed his eyes. “How did it end that way?”
Giulia shifted almost imperceptibly. “Ricky got angry when I told him I’d ban his boys if they didn’t stop causing trouble. He grabbed me and he threatened me.” She waved a hand, shaking her head. “And then this boy came out of nowhere and—”
“A stranger,” il Sacchi said coldly. “A random stranger whose name you don’t know and whose face you’d never seen, happened to come out of nowhere and kill my nephew with a statue?”
She set her jaw. “I know it sounds crazy. It was crazy when it happened. But it’s the truth. I don’t know who they were, or how they got into the suite, but—”
“They?” Il Sacchi inclined his head. “I thought there was just one boy.”
“Just one who attacked Ricky, yes. But there was another.” Her eyes lost focus, and then she made a frustrated gesture. “Yes, it sounds insane, but it’s the truth.”
“And when it was all over…” Il Sacchi leaned forward, expression icy. “You and the boys disappeared. You ran away. Together.”
Her jaw worked, and when she spoke, she sounded affronted that she even had to admit it out loud: “I was scared. I’d just watched a man get killed, and I was terrified of what his men would—”