Atavus (10 page)

Alfonzo sighed. “Emilio, I’m only here because Jessica is worried and then she worries me. I have problems, but I’m not running off like some bitch and turning off my cell. You do whatever you need to do, but you’re not running out on your responsibility. Is that clear?”

Emilio nodded.

“And at least keep your phone on, shit, if you had I wouldn’t have flown here for this petty mess. Get the fuck out the car and talk to Jessica when she gets back from New York about your change of heart.” Alfonzo tapped his knuckles on the glass and the driver standing outside opened the door for Emilio to exit.

Alfonzo scoffed as Emilio walked swiftly to his car parked a few feet away. Pissed is an understatement. Selange was sending him soft porn, making him hard. And here I am listening to some knucklehead whining about loca Jessica, Alfonzo reflected. He seriously considered kicking Emilio’s ass for ringing a false alarm. Anyway, Emilio had exhausted his patience. A person can lose his mind dealing with other people’s relationship troubles. Did Emilio believe nobody cared enough to search when he disappeared?

Dumbass!

Jessica might not change, she wasn’t a transformer, heck, when Emilio met his cousin she was high-strung. The chica had been that way since Alfonzo could remember. Emilio’s problem is he wanted an excuse to take flight. Alfonzo suspected the broken foster care system screwed with his head. Abuse by strangers and not feeling loved by anybody can do that. Nevertheless, there’s a point when choices are made, wallow in the shit or grab hold of life and squeeze out every drop of happiness.

Alfonzo seethed before instructing the chauffeur. “Get me to the airport.”

He considered flying to New York; his mom was there for Domingo’s remembrance ceremony along with Jessica and the rest of the Diaz relatives. Instead, he phoned Jessica, to inform her that Emilio was fine. That’s all he told her, the rest was up to Emilio to divulge.

He heard the voices in the background, including laughter and hated he couldn’t be there for Tia Carmen. It would be hard to pretend, his guilt might show and that would devastate those he loved. Time and distance is what he needed to reconcile with himself. Visiting with a fake smile when Tia suffered would damage his insides.

The solitary place closed to outsiders served Alfonzo well during the ride. They were unaware of the turmoil that resided in their Boss over a killing that continued to appear in his mind. The gun in his face, held by someone he loved caused him to snap…and the fact Domingo didn’t seem to care about the danger he put his family in by consorting with the enemy.

Alfonzo’s lamentations were private conversations with Domingo in el barrio as Tupac and Big Pun rapped in the background. Then a wistful smile of regret weighed him down. He murdered a person who had been his best friend.

He recoiled, guilt-stricken at the notion.

The dodged narrow escapes from the police and making it alive to adulthood wasn’t an escape when the result is they turned on each other with knives and bullets.

Damn you Domingo for letting Matteo twist you against me primo…me
!

We were blood, I never thought you’d hurt me until then. What the fuck did I do to you to make you hate me so much?

The Alfonzo his mama taught right sold bricks for dinero and realized the exchange had been for his soul. The realization taunted him in the face as Selange’s tits had done.

He wasn’t going to New York to pay homage in a suit to Domingo like some gentrified person standing above a subculture of crime. He lived the struggle with his thug street brothers and it would be in him until the day he died.

Tupac’s lyrics spoke many truths and revealed the hopelessness of dudes battling against poverty and bias that continued to plague generations. However, Alfonzo saw hope. There had been a black president, and every day wasn’t a struggle, some were damn good in his opinion.

Domingo was the wake-up alarm that everybody related by blood isn’t a brother and loyalty is the anchor of all strong families.

He surveyed the dark beauty of the island, which served as a safe haven with a blank mind. Gone were the dreams of youth, stolen by reality.

I’m a thug in a suit, like Jessica, I am who I am and that won’t change.

He bobbed his head to the poetic chants of a dead rapper, reminiscing about his childhood, and the days he had love for the struggling people, and that would never change.

He mouthed the lyrics, “
I got love for my brother, but we can never go nowhere unless we share with each other…I’d like to go back when we played as kids, but we can never go back…that’s just the way…things will never be the same…you’re my brother, you’re my sister…that’s just the way it is
.”

Oh Yeah!

Chapter Eight

Tony spotted a plume of smoke in the distance. Nico’s residence sat in that direction on fields that once served as a farm. The private estate had trees spread about, several clearings of manicured grass where nothing larger than a grasshopper could hide because Nico needed to view everything coming. Tony suspected Nico the techie had pen sized cameras in those trees.

The putrid smell as he neared the entry gates were like rancid meat on a grill.

Without a honk, the electronic gates disguised by shaved bricks separated to allow the SUV through. The rustic villa sat far back on the property, several kilometers for sprinters and a trek for someone out of shape. Everything about Nico had security written all over it. He couldn’t see the exterior of the deceptively simple worker’s shed that had a modern interior. Tony did spot the large pit off to the right flaming and Nico tossing stuff from a huge plastic bag on the fire.

There were items on the ground by Nico’s booted feet that caught sunlight and reflected a brilliant light to the sky.

Tony parked a short distance away, exited the car and walked to where Nico worked. “Good morning, what are you cooking, boar?”

Nico didn’t answer. He wore angler’s gloves that stopped above the elbow. He reached in the bag, what he removed had Tony’s stomach churn and when the human meat struck the flame a cackling sound occurred.

Nico worked in silence, tossing body parts of some poor sonovabitch on coals without a care.

“Who was that?” Tony asked while looking at the body part charred to the bone.

Nico added an accelerant.

“I see you even bring work home.” Tony said, looking toward the house and wondering if his family had any inkling about Nico’s sickness.

“Don’t mind my business.”

“Is that all you’re going to say?”

Nico stooped down, sifting through the personal items. Whatever he was looking for, Tony didn’t have a clue. If Nico wanted assistance, he’d ask.

“What time is it?” Nico did ask without looking up.

“Nearly six.”

“Exact time, no nearly shit!” Nico hissed while examining an expensive silver timepiece encrusted with black stones fit for a fashionable male.

Tony wondered why he needed the time when he held a watch in his hand. “Five, forty-two.”

Nico fumbled around with the item, changing the hour, cracking the glass and then tossing it in a small bag that he added rocks and dirt to before standing. “Give me a few minutes, pull the car to the gate and wait for me there.” Nico instructed.

Tony didn’t have a problem with that order. He didn’t want to stick around watching Nico clean his mess. He couldn’t imagine earning a living with the dead.

Inside the vehicle, Tony shook his head. The image of a hitman in his mind mimicked the movies. The reality is there’s nothing entertaining about murdering people when you’re close to the scene.

He drove to the gate, turned on music to clear his head from the grotesque and tried to think about something nice. Tiffany instantly came to mind and their extended honeymoon in paradise.

“Hey, wake up. Change seats, I’m driving!” Nico said loudly.

Tony sat forward. Hell, had he actually fallen asleep?

~

“Did you enjoy the honeymoon?” Nico asked as he sped through the countryside with Tony strapped in, clutching the armrest as if he was on an amusement park ride.

“Yep, sure did,” Tony answered with a crooked smile.

Nico nodded. “The honeymoon’s always the icing on the cake.”

Tony agreed. “Yep.”

“Too bad you won’t get to spend a lot of time at home. There are several assignments I have for you.”

“Care to share?”

“One deed at a time. I’m superstitious.”

“No, you have trust issues.”

“Damn right.” Nico replied without moving his head. He could see peripherally, Tony’s expression change.

“It must suck to be you.”

“Not trusting everybody is how you stay alive. You foresee the knife before it plunges into your back”

“Well, since you don’t trust me why am I
entrusted
with jobs?”

“They’re tests to see if you can be trusted to handle the bigger ones.” Nico sped through a circular turn during a decline and skid on dirt, drifting like a hillbilly in the sticks bouncing up and down in his seat as the SUV crushed pebbles. “I’m the trainer and you have to trust me; it isn’t the other way around.”

Nico’s statement was unsettling to Tony. “Oh, so I have to trust you, to what, not get me killed, yet you can’t trust me to divulge exactly what I’m getting into?”

Vincent, may have laughed or said something witty, however Nico hadn’t mastered that sort of engagement. To some he may come across pensive, anti-social or a loner. He was all the above. “The more you ask what, where, when and how the more the amateur comes out and the more I question your motives for wanting to be part of my family.”

“Oh man,” Tony responded. “I guess this mistrustful person is that way because he’s apt to step out on his lady.”

Tony recognized he might have said more than he should, but Nico had begun really pissing him off -bad. Talking at somebody isn’t going to win over any friends. Nico probably never had a friend that much is obvious.

The comment didn’t go over well. Nico became rigid. Even the slight curvature on the edge of his mouth went firm. Perhaps, Tony believed he had the freedom to speak a man’s transgressions and use as stones to toss. Tony wasn’t without his faults and what he thought he knew about anybody else isn’t true unless he lived through it. Nico didn’t answer to Tony or anybody for his actions. The line is crossed when malice hides in the words.

Now Nico realized Tony thought too highly of himself. The vehicle jerked to a halt. “Are you begging for a bullet Tony?” Nico asked, swiveling his torso, staring venomously at his passenger.

Dark ice is what Tony considered Nico. He began to question Nico’s stability. Everybody withered in Nico’s presence. Nobody stood up to him and he had grown accustomed to fearful people.

“Are you going to shoot everybody when they say something you don’t like?”

“Not everybody –you.”

“Go ahead, I’m sure that will solve your dilemma,” Tony replied.

“You know I’ve seen a person eat their foot. I’ll give you one warning. Call it belated wedding advice. Pushing my buttons can be fatal. You may find yourself gnawing off your toes.” Nico squinted. “Capisce?”

Nico then compressed the gas as he worked the gears, racing the SUV on terrain that a less experienced driver might slow to navigate. He wanted to make up for lost time. Visconti was a stickler for punctuality, fortunately for Tony because Nico considered tossing Tony over the rocks for putting a finger inside a sore spot. Yes, he should’ve had his eyes open about his mother. It all seemed too good to be true. Nevertheless, when the heart of a man reverts to a neglected child wanting maternal affection, he is blind and stupid. Sabrina used his love to deceive him into a compromising sexual relationship with Bianca. Bianca is sexy and was an enjoyable bedmate, but he never loved her. No, love is not the word.

Ari has always been the one.

Bianca had mastered seduction. He supposed the thumping bass of his heart is because Ari saw goodness in Selange…Ari…yes she could discern a person’s essence accurately. Selange wasn’t manipulative, Bianca on the other hand had motive in her latest attempt to get him in bed. Selange was an inexperienced girl in distress seeking comfort with the wrong man. It took a long time before Nico could discuss what happened that night and how the affair spiraled out of control afterward. Selange's actions were not conspiratorial.

Ari had jokingly remarked, “Selange was out of her league. She was dick-whipped and googly eyed after you put that anaconda inside her grass.”

The truth is he had been out of his league. He wasn’t accustomed to the trusting eyes of a virtuous young woman or scorching kisses of innocence. He had wanted more like a greedy whore and then didn’t want to return what he stole until Vincent’s death woke him from a delusion.