arrive and start loading the crates onto a truck, Dad waggles his finger at me and angles his nose towards the water, indicating for me to follow him. I go reluctantly.
“You are going to give me your ‘rage is a weapon’ speech,” I tell him.
His smile flickers for a brief instant. “You know me too well, son. Yes, rage is a weapon. But it cuts both ways. You must learn to use it or it will get you in trouble one day. You did not conduct yourself well, storming around like that. It was disrespectful.”
“I am sorry,” I say. “I did not mean to disrespect you—”
“Not me. Dujar.”
“Then I’m not sorry. I am glad he was disrespected.”
He puts his hands in his pockets and looks out at the water. “Ah, Angelo. You are hungry to lead. That is good. But a leader must know when to shake a hand and when to make it into a fist. How many times have I told you that?”
“Too many, Dad.”
He smiles lightly. “And yet you still don’t hear it, hm? Your mother would say you have cotton wool in your ears.”
I sigh. Maybe I haven’t truly heard him before. Though the devil knows I’ve heard my mother’s Old Country expressions enough times to last me the rest of my life.
“Speaking of your mother,” he goes on, “I have news for you.”
“News?”
“I know you are eager for me to step down.”
I don’t deny it. I never have. My greatest desire is to rise up in the Family and lead it as the don, just like my father did when he took the reins of the De Maggio organization.
This is a moment years—no, lifetimes—in the making. Instantly, my foul mood washes away. I can feel my future like it’s a living thing in my grasp, a horse that I’m finally wrestling under control.
Don Angelo. The words send a thrilling shiver down my spine. Dujar will not slime away so easily when I am in charge. He, his men, and anyone else in this city who draws my ire will suffer for it.
I cannot fucking wait.
Father is still talking while I ruminate excited, so I catch only the tail end of the last thing he says. “…a wife.”
I blink. “What?”
He tilts his head and stares at me curiously. It is strange to see my eyes in another man’s face, so similar and yet so different. Our irises are the exact same shade, but whereas his swim with a placid intelligence, mine are fiery and violent. Mother says that Father’s eyes once looked like mine; that he, too, was young and brimming with boundless force. The infamous Carlo De Maggio, king of the city, the man none dare cross, the man who slayed The Elephant. But it appears that the years have cooled him.
“You weren’t listening to me, son.”
“I was, Father.”
“Then tell me what I said.”
I open my mouth to say something crass, then think better of it. Father is clearly in a mood. And though the years may have tempered his fire somewhat, they have certainly not extinguished it altogether.
“I’m sorry,” I say. I hate the way the words taste in my mouth.
Father nods. “I said, When you have found a wife, so that you can make an heir, then I will step down. My hope is that this will teach you the meaning of responsibility.”
His words hang in the air—cold and unpleasant. I clench my fist. Marriage? … an heir? Has he lost his fucking mind? Those words are not in my vocabulary.
I start to stammer angrily, “That hardly seems fair—”
He cuts me off with an icy glare. “Am I known for speaking just for the sake of it?”
“No, Father. It’s one of your many perfections.”
He smiles. “I do believe you were being sarcastic then. But like it or not, that is the state of affairs. Find yourself a wife, and we will talk.” Dad turns when his consigliere, Nario, a tall, thin man with intelligent eyes set in a skeletal face, approaches. “Yes?”
“It’s baking powder in the crates, Carlo,” Nario says. “The Albanians have fucked us.”
My stomach drops for the second time in as many minutes. I think about how quickly they left, and my inclination to check the shipment. Unbelievably, my father glares at me like it’s my fault. I glare right back. “We didn’t have time to check it,” I protest. “You were too busy offering up our—”
“Bite your tongue,” Dad snarls. “The first thing a man does upon starting a deal