Mobster's Bones (Mobster #5) (8 page)

“I can’t feel it,” she murmurs.

I twist it off and she leans back against me. I can understand the numbness, the hollowness of not being able to control anything. I run my fingers over the back of her neck massaging, watching as her perfect olive skin passes under my own. A light moan escape her lips as I push my fingertips into the knots of her tight muscles.

Alessandra’s head bobs and dips, enjoying every sweep across her skin.

The water sloshes out of the tub when she completely turns to me, resting her head against my heart
.
My wet hand travels up to her temple to brush away the lose stands of her long, damp chestnut hair.

“Thank you,” she whispers. “I always knew I’d feel safe with you.”

Tiny fingers trace circles on my chest. I’m not one hundred percent sure what she’s talking about but I lean down and kiss the top of her head.

“I’m glad you’re here,” I say softly. I really am
.

I am so lucky to have her in my life… bullets and all.

***

Lying with a towel-clad Alessandra in my arms, I’m on the edge of sleep when my eyes pop open. Scratching noises are coming from the lock on my dorm door. I flip the free part of my body over, reaching for the drawer in my side table for the gun when my door slams against the wall wide open. Vito! He is filling up the doorway with fury coating his face.

“What the fuck!” he booms while grabbing me off the bed. He tosses me against the bureau and my weight knocks everything off of it.

“Vito!” Alessandra sits up. “Stop it!”

His fingers clamp onto my neck and he lifts me on to my tiptoes. My bare back scrapes against the metal drawer handles. I have no idea what the hell his problem is.

“Vito! Leave him alone!” Alessandra clutches a towel around her body while she tugs on Vito’s arm.

“I told you not to fuck her!” he spits at me.

“I didn’t,” I manage to squeak out. I am grasping at his hand but it is a vise grip on my neck. Vito is unbelievably strong. I feel light-headed.

“Vito! Calm down! Nothing happened!” Alessandra implores.

Everything around me darkens except for little tiny specks of light that dance in front of my eyes, and then entire room goes black.

“What did you do?” I scream. My fists pound on Vito’s arm as he lowers Troy to the floor.

“Calm the fuck down. I just knocked him out.” Vito sounds so callous, like it is okay to do this to a friend. How can Vito do this to someone I care about? To someone who is taking care of me? I’m hurt that he would do this.

“Don’t leave him on the floor. Put him over here.” I motion to the bed. Vito lifts Troy fairly effortlessly and places him on top of the covers. I sit beside him, taking his hand. “Is he going to be okay?” Tears burn at the back of my eyes. I am surprised there are any left after all the crying I have been doing.

“Get dressed,” Vito orders, and my fear for Troy turns into anger.

“I can’t believe you!” I stand and look up into Vito’s cold face. “Actually! How dare you!? I am a grown woman. I make my own choices!” I shove Vito and run into the bathroom.

It only takes me a minute to grab my clothes off the floor and slip them on. My shirt is completely soaked so I put on Troy’s dry one. I run a facecloth under cold water. I see Vito riffling through Troy’s stuff when I open the door.

“What are you doing?”

He ignores me and keeps searching around.

“So? You like this chooch?”

“Don’t call him that!” I sit next to Troy and gently place the cold compress on his forehead. “If you really thought he was a chooch, you wouldn’t have dropped me off here,” I counter.

“Mommy sends him a lot of shit, doesn’t she?” He has a pile of Troy’s mail in his hands. I jump up and snatch it away.

“Stop it!”

“Tell me what happened.” Vito gets serious. He turns to lean up against Troy’s desk.

“Some of it is hazy, but at the mall, we were coming out of Nordstrom’s. A guy fired at us. He must have been following us. He definitely had a silencer.” I sit back down next to Troy and hold his hand. “Will he wake up soon?”

“You said on the phone the shooter said something to you, what was it?”

“‘I know he was here.’” Intensity glints in Vito’s eyes. “What does it mean?”

“I’m not sure.” He’s lying. Deflecting the conversation, Vito asks, voice getting soft, “Did you sleep with him?”

“It’s none of your business if I did. I… I have feelings for him. I have since the day I met him.” I glance over at Troy sleeping peacefully. Vito laughs out of the blue. “What’s so funny?” I snap.

“Your father. You’re gonna bring home this Irish dude to Vinny Maranzano?”

“We’re not a couple.” The statement tastes sour in the back of my mouth.

Vito shrugs his shoulders and takes the few short steps over to Troy. He uses the back of his hand to tap his cheeks.

“Wake up! Troy, get up!”

Troy’s eyes flutter and his hand jumps. After a few seconds, he lifts his arm and scrubs his hand down his face. He feels the facecloth and tosses it aside.

“What the hell happened?” His words are garbled.

“Get up! We have work to do.”

I help Troy to sit up. “How do you feel?”

“Like some big Italian guy jumped me and slammed me up against a bureau,” His voice is clearer.

“Where’s your friend? Jake?”

“How the hell should I know?” Troy’s annoyed and still somewhat dazed. His hand goes to his shoulder and he rubs it.

“He’s probably here,” I offer.

“Go get him,” Vito commands.

My feet carry me forward but I don’t want to leave Troy.

The hallway is quiet and I pad in my bare feet over to Jake’s room. I knock. Out of the corner of my eye, I see someone a long way down the hall. For just a second, the person’s skinny profile makes me think of Gus. The guy is way too far away for me to make out any features. He enters the stairwell on the end. I knock on Jake’s door again. This time he answers, shirtless and looking like I woke him.

“Hey, Alessandra, what’s up?”

“Can you come to Troy’s room?”

“Uh… sure.” He’s sleepy and steps away from the door to get his shoes. I fold my arms over my chest and squeeze tightly. An icy feeling travels down my spine, and I’m compelled to glance down the hallway in both directions. No one is there.

“Let’s go.” Jake closes his door and follows me to Troy’s room.

The door is ajar, the way I left it.

“You better know what you’re fuckin’ gettin’ into,” I hear Vito say.

I reach my hand out and stop Jake from going in. I put my index finger to my lips, letting him know I want to listen and be quiet.

“I do not understand why she needs permission from you to date anyone.”

“She doesn’t. But I’ve looked out for her since we were in diapers. So I make it my business.”

“Well, rest assured nothing has happened.”
              “Let me say this. You hurt her, I hurt you.”

“Yeah. I get it,” Troy deadpans.

I push the door all the way open.

“You look better,” I inform Troy. Thank God he is all right.

“Hi,” Jake says and looks to Vito. “How’re you doing, man?”

Vito ignores Jake’s pleasantries.

“You need to stay with Alessandra tonight,” he rumbles.

Jake turns to peer at each of us. What he sees, I’m not sure. What I feel, I know—I’m full of shame. I blame myself for allowing all of this to sit at Troy’s doorstep. He doesn’t deserve this. I care about him too much.

I should leave. Go back to Palmetto to face my demons. It’s unfair to expect Troy to just throw himself headfirst into our bullshit. The crap that comes along with Vito, and with me. Troy isn’t like us. He didn’t grow up in the Mafia.

I slide on my heels, feeling like a child being shuffled between divorced parents. Troy approaches me and I look up at him. He smiles down at me and kisses my forehead reverently.

“I’ll be back,” he says in an impression of Arnold Schwarzenegger.

“Where are you going?” I ask.

“Don’t worry about it,” Vito answers.

I feel alone and responsible for all of this. Troy should stay with me. He shouldn’t be going with Vito.

***

“Let’s order dinner,” Jake suggests when we get to his room. He reaches for some crumpled papers on his desk and hands them to me before flopping onto his bed. They’re menus. I sift through them while Jake runs through the channels on his TV. He’s sitting up against the wall with his hand behind his head like he had more interesting plans tonight than hanging with me.

“Am I keeping you from a date?”

Jake flips his gaze to me. “No. Just thinking.”

I lower myself to the bed and sit beside him, settling my eyes on a menu for Chinese food.

“You’re worried about Troy?” I can’t look at him. I blame myself for this whole thing.

“Yeah.”

“So am I.” I let out a breath that has been stifling me. I hand the menu to Jake.

“What did you pick?” He looks down at the paper. “This place is good. What do you want?”

“Cashew chicken.” Jake grabs his cell phone from his pocket and scrolls through his contacts, hitting send. He orders.

“Cashew chicken and orange shrimp.” He pauses. “O’Neill Hall… I’ll be downstairs… Thanks… Bye.”

“Twenty minutes,” he informs me, ending the call.

“That’s fast.”

“They’re located right off campus.”

I stare at the TV without really seeing it. Dark shadows, my mother, and coming here sit at the forefront of my mind, making it difficult to concentrate on anything. Troy going with Vito puts it all over the top. We sit silently, blankly watching the screen until Jake gets up.

“I’ll be right back,” he says and tosses the remote toward me across the bed. I’m surprised that it has been twenty minutes.

“Okay.” I begin a search for a movie, forcing myself to do something to occupy my mind. I keep clicking the channel up button monotonously, watching each station slide by in a flood.

I hear the shuffling of feet outside the door.
That was quick.
I rise to help Jake with the food. No one is there. I look down the hallway and see a man at Troy’s door. A small voice in my head shouts,
Gus?
He turns and sees me. He rushes forward, devouring the space between the two dorm rooms with his long legs.

“You need to come with me.”

“What?” I am totally confused, and the way Gus is behaving is alarming me.

“Right now!” He beckons me to follow him.

“What are you doing here?”

“Vito sent me. Hurry!”

I have never seen Gus like this. He is usually indifferent, quiet, and unemotional. I have never seen him rattled.

“Huh? Where’s Jake?” I ask wide-eyed while slipping on my shoes.

“I’m relieving Jake! We need to leave.”

“Why?”

Gus crowds me, giving me no time to think. Corralling me, he rushes me out of Jake’s room.

And I let him.             

Practically running, I head directly to my room. A bunch of girls are hanging out in the hallway, laughing about something that is probably mundane and insignificant compared to the shit I’m dealing with. Fleetingly, life and death seem so concrete to me, like I never thought about them before. My own future laid out and planned was a field of dead flowers never to grow again. It never occurred to me to think about anything else. Selfishness sits salty on the back of my throat, hanging around where fear has been.

Vito is waiting for me downstairs. He could have mentioned bringing the gun in my side table earlier. Remembering to bring a gun or watch for unsavory people is new to me. Vito can’t expect me to get all this shit in two seconds.

The door to my room is ajar. I approach cautiously, putting my body up against the wall like I’ve seen in the movies. I reach my hand out, pressing on the door so that it opens wider. My light is on. Maybe Alessandra came back with Jake for something.

Doubting she would leave the door open, I raise my foot and put one in front of the other at a snail’s pace until I finally step inside. I blink slowly, my eyes telling my body,
don’t believe what you see
. Slender bits of white lie on my navy blue comforter. In the back of my mind, I know I’m being stupid but I tiptoe forward.

Perfectly posed is a skeleton… lying in my spot… on
my
bed.

Is it supposed to be me?

I creep even closer when I know I should run like hell. I can tell there is something familiar but off; the bones are detached, just formed back into their original shape of a man.

The bag of bones!
Flashes of driving with Vito in the passenger seat to a secluded spot out off the highway jump across my brain. My heartbeats become grenades going off in my chest.

“What the fuck?” I hiss aloud to a fleshless corpse. I reach into my side table by the bones of a dead man, and they shake. I pull out the gun and stick it into the back of my jeans.

My body is numb but I am seeing everything like it is the first time. I back away in horror, letting my fight or flight instinct kick in. Letting it take over seems like the right thing to do. My breath is lodged in my throat, holding there until I reach the other side of my door and I am back out in the hallway. My head turns at the movement in my peripheral vision.

Celia is coming. She is walking with her typical shimmering smile. Even though I have blown her off and am living with a girl, she is still glittery and happy like a pixie. It just proves that it was all physical between us. There were no sparks or life-changing feelings when we were together—another realization for me within minutes.

My mouth opens before I comprehend that I am yelling; the length of the hallway seems as though it stretches forever. A warning bell rings in my head and my eyes blink in that slow disbelieving way.

She’s not alone!

Coming up behind her is a man with a gun that swings with each quick step he takes. The guy from the alley in Chicago
!
His arm raises and he fires. Time becomes irrelevant as a bullet collides with Celia. Thick red droplets coat the air and they have all the time in the world to fly and land harshly on the carpet and walls, securing their future as staining life. I lunge forward watching her feet tangle. Her head snaps back from the strike of the bullet and she falls into my arms, making gravity sluggish.

Doors all along the hallway open, dorm residents checking to see what the bang was. Horrified faces peek out and doors slam. Using all of my strength, I shift out of the line of fire and pull Celia into the nearest open door. Blood trails thick and dark, puddling onto the carpet. I’m in Jake’s room.
              “Troy?” Celia whispers. “What…” Her words are slurred. “Happened?” Her eyes roll leaving only the white.

“Shut the door and call 911!”

Jake moves quickly, his phone in his hand.

“Stay with me, Celia. Look at me.” Nothing is real at this moment.  Reality is a feather dancing on a strong wind out of control.

Jake drags the dresser in front of the door as he speaks. “O’Neill dorm. There’s been a shooting.”

I don’t hear the rest of what Jake says to the person on the end of the emergency line. I look around the room searching for Alessandra.

“Where is she?” My eyes settle on Jake’s for the first time. Across his forehead is a large, red oozing gash.

“She’s gone!” he conveys to me while I rip a blanket off Jake’s bed. “Somebody hit me over the head when I went downstairs to get our food.”

“I’m going to turn you over,” I tell Celia. Her eyes are closed and I tip her to the side. I slip the blanket underneath her. “Hold this. Keep pressure on it. Jake!”

“Yeah, okay.” Jake kneels down next to me.

“Stay with Celia!” I order.

Alessandra’s purse is on his desk. Wherever she went, she wouldn’t have forgotten it. I grab it, rummaging through it. I find her gun and hand it to Jake.

“What the fuck?” Jake is surprised. “I don’t know how to use this.”

“You’ll figure it out.” I hold my gun up and stand at the door frame, using my hip to move the dresser back out of the way.

“What are you doing?”

“Get Celia to the hospital. I’m going after Alessandra.”

“What? There’s a guy with a gun out there!”

“There’s a guy with a gun right here,” I counter.

“You’re not Vito! Or Antonio! Or a fuckin’ Mafia enforcer!”

Sirens whir outside the window. I open the door slowly, peeking out into the hallway. It’s empty.

“Go to the hospital with Celia. I have to go.” I inch out, making one hundred percent sure that the way is clear and the guy is gone. I dash down toward the back stairs.

I jump down them a few at a time.

“Hey! Troy!” I turn my head in a fast snap. My gun is by my side. Kurt is in the stairwell. I don’t have time for his shit. “What’s going on?”

“I don’t know,” I call out lying, brushing him off, and clipping down the steps away from him.

“Did you have to call the cops to get your ‘girlfriend’ back?”

I stop dead in my tracks, my eyes narrowing.

“What did you say?” I hold the hand rail in one hand and hide the gun behind me as I climb back up toward Kurt.

“I saw her leave with another guy,” he sneers, definitely still pissed about our fight at the frat party.

“Who?! Who did you see her with?”

“I don’t know.” Kurt shrugs. “Some wiry-looking guy. Looked like a thug... I think she called him Gus.”

I get in Kurt’s space, closing the distance between us to nothing. “Did you see where they went?” I’m in his face.  He stiffens and leans away from me.

“Yeah.” He points to the bottom of the stairwell. “They took off in a beige car about ten minutes ago.”

“Shit!” I spin and descend the steps as fast as I can, push the metal bar on the fire door, and rush out into the night.

Shadows of flashing red lights come from the front of the building. I creep toward them by the entrance and see uniformed people all over the place. My car is gone; I don’t see Vito anywhere. Confused, I twist around, searching under the streetlights at the buildings around me. I can’t find him.