Our waiter sets down a mound of some sort of chocolate cake. He uses a small cup to pour steaming chocolate over the top, and the cake splits open, revealing a thicker chocolate filling inside. Then he drops two scoops of ice cream beside it. I’m mildly annoyed that he interrupted my interrogation of Leo, but I can’t quite make myself be too mad when I dig my spoon in and taste the chocolate bliss.
“My family’s business is their own. I don’t get involved.”
I drop the topic, feeling like I’m tiptoeing around his shut-off point. I take a bite of the chocolate cake. “Wow,” I say.
He smirks up at me, looking irresistibly handsome in the candlelight. “I used to come here with my parents when I was a kid. My brother and I would always beg them to let us get this desert.”
I’m surprised to hear him opening up without me prodding. My training tells me the best way to get him to keep talking is to say nothing, so I just watch him, listening intently, waiting through the silences.
“Coming here always makes me think of them,” he says. His eyes find the candle and stay there, as if he’s transfixed, mind traveling to another place. A clattering plate a few tables over seems to snap him out of the spell, and I can practically see him closing up. “But that’s the past.”
I could ask him more, but I sense that he’ll shut me out if I do, so I try something else. “My parents could never afford a place like this, but I used to love it when my mom would take me to this little run-down ice cream place near my dad’s office. It was her way of rewarding me for putting up with the long drive to drop him off at work, I guess, but I have so many memories sitting outside on the splintery wooden bench, eating ice cream with her and laughing over the dumbest things.” A tear rolls down my cheek and I wipe it away, looking at it in surprise. “Sorry, I don’t know what—”
“She’s sick now, isn’t she?” he asks.
The question would normally irk me or offend me, but something in his tone softens the blow, making it intimate, almost as if he has been in the same place.
“Yes,” I say.
He nods, not asking for more details or asking what’s wrong with her, and I find myself relieved when he doesn’t. “I lost both my parents, one to violence and one to illness.” He laughs humorlessly, looking down briefly before meeting my eye again. “I wouldn’t recommend either, but having my dad there one day and then being gone the next was actually easier. Watching my mom…” He thinks and then seems to fail to find the words. “It’s not easy.”
A silence hangs between us, and though I can’t quite put my finger on how, I can’t make myself see him the same way anymore. He’s not just a dangerous, sex-crazed Adonis. He’s a person, too. A damaged person, broken, probably even more broken than I am.
He raises his eyebrows and sighs. “Anything else you want to know?”
I’m still dealing with the little he has told me and don’t know that I can handle much more for the moment. “How about another date? and we’ll go from there.”
“I thought this wasn’t a date?” He asks, laughter sparkling in his eyes.
“Fine. How about we go on a date. I pick the place this time.”
36
Leo
“I’ve never seen you like this over a girl, bro,” says Angelo. He sits in the passenger seat of my car. Carlito and Luca Bianchi are in the backseat. Luca is like a parasite, forced on us by the bosses because they want someone they trust keeping an eye on us. If only they knew how spineless Luca was, they probably wouldn’t bother.
We’re parked outside an Italian restaurant downtown. The owner owes the bosses protection money, and they want me to put the squeeze on him.
“Like this? What the fuck am I like?” I ask Angelo.
He grins. “Shit man, you turned down that perfect pair of tits that tried to get with you at Benito’s earlier, for one.”
I wave him off. “She looked like a bitch.”
“That’s never stopped you before.”
“If you’re done with the girl talk, I have to go in there and scare the shit out of this deadbeat.”
Angelo punches me on the shoulder. “It’s a good look on you is all I’m saying. I like seeing you happy for once.”
“Yeah, yeah,” I say, getting out of the car and patting my side, feeling the reassuring weight of my piece strapped beneath my arm, inside my suit jacket.
“Hey, Leo,” says Luca. “The bosses wanted me to remind you to get the interest he owes, too.”
I ignore Luca, slamming my door and heading toward the restaurant’s front door. Get the interest? Does he really think I need to be reminded?
The restaurant is pretty deserted, but a guy in a dress shirt undone enough to show his flabby, hairy chest comes out to greet me. I can tell by the way his eyes dart around the room that he knows exactly why I’m here.
“Good afternoon, sir. What can I do for you?”
“Let’s talk somewhere private,” I say.
He smiles shakily. “We can sit at the bar.”
“More private,” I say.
He swallows. “Yeah. Okay, we could talk in the back.”
He leads me past concerned looking servers to the back of the restaurant and gestures at the ground in front of the dishwasher. I motion for him to follow me into the walk-in freezer. He follows me hesitantly. Once we’re inside, I hit the lock on the inside of the fridge. I learned a long time ago that intimidation is a lot like sex. It’s more about the foreplay than the actual act. People are most likely to talk before I’ve ever touched them, and it’s a hell of a lot less messy that way.
I cross my arms, locking my eyes on him.
He licks his lips. “I’ll get Marco his money. I just need a few days.”
I hook my thumb in my jacket and pull it back so he can see the pistol holstered on my side.
He looks at the pistol, eyes widening. “I can have it tomorrow.”
“With interest,” I say.
“Interest? I’m already—”
I silence him by taking a single step forward.
“How much interest?” he asks.
“Why don’t you tell me how much interest you think you should pay for being late?”
He smiles nervously. “Five percent?”
I say nothing, staring down at him.
“Seven percent?”
“These are pretty thick walls in here,” I say. “Does much sound get through?”
“Thirty percent,” he says quickly.
I smile, clapping him on the shoulder. “Glad we could come to an agreement.” I leave him slumped in the walk-in, probably counting his blessings. I don’t enjoy scaring the shit out of people, especially when the “protection” they are paying for is a total scam. It’s the same assholes collecting money from them who will be coming by to break their legs if they don’t pay. Just like the only bully on the playground charging a kid three bucks a day to make sure no one takes his lunch money. But hey, the weak get fed on by the strong. If they don’t like it, they can get the fuck out of town for all I care.