Mafia Kings: Adriano: Chapter 17

When I spoke to my mother over the phone, I didn’t want to scare her. My mom’s kind of high-strung anyway, and I didn’t want her to freak out – so I didn’t tell her about what had happened at the hotel.

I just told her that the Agrellas’ thugs were heading back to the apartment to look for Dad – and if she wasn’t out before they came, they might hurt her.

That freaked her out enough.

She agreed to go down the street to Romano’s, the bar where everybody in the neighborhood hung out.

She didn’t like bars, though, so that was its own little battle.

“Mom, you have to be around people, okay? Lots of people – and there’s always a ton of people at Romano’s. And don’t bring anything but your purse. The Agrellas might be watching you, and we don’t want them to know you’re trying to run. There’s a guy I’m sending to pick you up. I’m going to show him your picture so he’ll know who you are.” I covered the phone and spoke to Vincenzo. “Can I send her your picture, too?”

“No – but tell her I’ll say, ‘I have a dozen red roses for you in the car.’ Tell her not to leave with anybody unless they tell her that.”

I relayed the information.

“I love you, too, Mom. Leave now, okay? Okay.”

As soon as I showed him a picture of my mother and he had the address, Vincenzo took off – and I was left alone with the two men who had been shot in front of the hotel.

We were in the ratty offices of a warehouse, but the rooms had been converted into a makeshift living area. There were folding chairs, card tables with abandoned poker hands, and a dozen rickety metal cots.

One of the guys who had gotten shot lay on a cot, bleeding all over the threadbare sheets.

I winced as I watched him. He looked and sounded horrible: glassy eyes, waxy skin, raspy breathing.

I asked the other guy – who had gotten shot in the arm and seemed okay – if there was anything I could do.

He tried to smile, but it was more of a painful grimace. “Thanks, but the doctor should be here any minute.”

Suddenly there were hurried footsteps clack-clack-clacking up the stairs.

“That’ll be him,” the man said.

A guy swept into the room. He was about 35 and dressed in jeans, a white shirt, and a black leather jacket. He was handsome, but he had a worried look on his face. Nothing about him screamed ‘doctor’ – no white lab coat, no stethoscope, nothing. However, he did carry a black leather satchel in one hand and a food cooler in the other.

“Elio,” he said by way of greeting. “How bad is it?”

Elio – the guy hit in the arm – gestured to the man on the cot. “See to Cosimo first. He got it worse than I did.”

The doctor glanced at me. “Who’s this?”

“She was at the gunfight,” Elio said. “Adriano got her out.”

“Interesting hair.”

I realized I was still wearing the metallic blue wig.

I pulled it off and tossed it away, then pulled the clips out that had been keeping my hair in place.

“It’s a wig,” I said as I shook out my hair.

“Yeah, I can see, thanks,” the doctor said sardonically. “Can you handle the sight of blood?”

“Yes,” I replied, then added hesitantly, “…I think so.”

“Then come make yourself useful.”

I followed him over to the cot, where the doctor used scissors to cut away Cosimo’s shirt. There was a single hole in his skin a few inches below his ribcage. Blood trickled out of it slowly.

“Cosimo, can you hear me?” the doctor asked.

The man groaned weakly.

“Hang on,” the doctor said, then shook his head. “He should be in a hospital.”

“No hospitals,” Elio replied.

“I know, I know,” the doctor said bitterly. “We wouldn’t want to make this easy.”

He opened up the cooler. Inside were gel ice packs and several plastic medical bags filled with blood.

“There’s an IV stand in the closet over there,” he said to me. “Bring it here, please.”

While I was retrieving the metal stand, the doctor swabbed a patch of skin on Cosimo’s abdomen with alcohol. Then he uncapped a syringe from his medical satchel, held it upright, flicked it, and squirted some fluid out of the needle.

“This’ll sting a little,” he said, then added with a bit of gallows humor, “Not nearly as much as when you got shot, though.”

While he was injecting Cosimo, I put the metal stand next to the cot. “Here?”

“That’s good.”

“Is this… normal?”

“You mean, me making house calls?” the doctor joked. “Only for my most wonderful clients.”

“I meant… is this an average Friday night?”

“Hasn’t happened in six months, actually. I was beginning to hope my services wouldn’t ever be required again.”

“Too bad for you, doc,” Elio joked.

“Yeah… too bad for everybody,” the doctor muttered.