Mafia Kings: Adriano: Chapter 42

It was a bit awkward checking out at the register afterwards.

The clerk – who I’d seen before on previous trips to the thrift shop – kept looking at me and Adriano out of the side of her eye as she rang us up.

I was pretty sure she knew we’d had sex in the changing room.

I noticed her gaze lingered a lot longer on Adriano.

I was irritated with the bedroom eyes she kept flashing him, but he barely seemed to notice her.

He wasn’t happy with the clothes he was wearing – ripped jeans, wife-beater t-shirt, a short-sleeved clubbing shirt unbuttoned along the front, along with some Doc Martins –

But at least he was pretty mellow after the sex.

I guess having an orgasm chilled him out.

We had also grabbed a nylon gym bag that he’d stuffed his suit, shirt, and dress shoes inside.

Just as the girl was finishing ringing us up, I saw the finishing touch.

“Add these,” I said, grabbing two pairs of cheap sunglasses and two baseball caps from a nearby display.

“NO,” Adriano said sternly.

“Yes,” I whispered, then pecked him on the lips. “Please?”

He grumbled, but he allowed me to put the shades and ball cap on him.

“There… now you look like a tourist,” I said happily. “Or a guy trying to make it in a local rock band.”

“Great,” he muttered.

The Doc Martins were the biggest expense and pushed the total up to 147 euros.

Adriano peeled two hundred-euro bills from his bankroll and handed them over. “Keep the change.”

The checkout girl looked shocked but happy.

As we walked out of the store, I put on my pair of sunglasses and tucked my hair up under the ball cap.

“These clothes feel fuckin’ weird,” Adriano muttered as we strolled along the sidewalk.

“Not used to anything besides designer suits, huh?” I teased him.

“Not really, no,” he admitted. “Although I gotta say, these boots would be great for kicking the shit out of somebody.”

“Wonderful,” I said sarcastically. “I’m glad you like something in your outfit.”

He chuckled as we reached the Mercedes, which he’d parked in a small lot for the train station. He popped the trunk, threw in the nylon bag, and shut it again.

“Are we going to use the car?” I asked. “Unless you want people to think you’re a drug dealer, you don’t look like you should be driving a Mercedes worth a hundred grand.”

“Try 400 grand.”

I stared at him. “What?!”

“It’s a Maybach. Plus the bulletproofing costs a lot more.”

“Um… is bulletproofing something we need to worry about?” I asked nervously.

“Not if we’re just going to low-end dives. I want to keep the car nearby in case we run into trouble, but we should probably walk.”

“That’s fine. The first place is just down the road.”

Five minutes later and we reached the first betting parlor.

It was off an alleyway – a basement-level complex at the bottom of a crumbling building. Steps led down to it from the street level, and there was a metal door with a speakeasy slide so they could look out and see who you were.

I knew about this place because my father brought me here when I was 11, during one of his most shameful phases. He was so deep into his addiction at one point that he would take me with him if Mama had to work late.

“Don’t tell your mother,” he would always plead.

So during my teenage years, I knew exactly where to check when he would disappear for days at a time. My mother had driven us around to all his familiar haunts, and we’d gone in to find him and shame him into coming home.

He would try to hide from us in the bathroom – but either his fellow gamblers would heckle him until he slunk out with his tail between his legs, or the guys who ran the parlors would kick him out.

“Hold on,” Adriano cautioned me as I started down the alley towards the door.

“What?”

He gestured with his head, and I followed him down the block to another alleyway. We walked until we reached a dumpster about 40 feet from the street.

He pulled out his pistol from the back of his jeans; the clubbing shirt hid it nicely while he walked.

Then he pulled three more clips out of his pockets. He wrapped everything in a crumpled piece of newspaper he found on the ground, then hid it behind some broken cinderblocks.

“Uh… wouldn’t it be a good idea for you to have that on you?” I asked nervously.

“Yeah, but the first thing they’re gonna do is frisk me when I walk in. There’s probably a couple hundred grand down there, if it’s the kind of place I think it is, and they don’t want anybody robbing them.”

“Oh,” I said, looking around to make sure no one was watching us. “Why’d we come over here? Couldn’t you have hidden it in the alley by the door?”

“They might have security cameras. Better to do it here where I know they’re not watching.”

We walked out of the alleyway and back to the betting parlor’s entrance. I rapped on the metal door and waited until the rectangular grill opened up.

A guy’s eyes peered down at me. Even with the limited view, I could tell he was heavyset.

“What?” he asked gruffly.

“I’m looking for Fabrizio Lettieri,” I said. “I’m his daughter.”

“He ain’t here,” the man said.

“Yeah, that’s what you guys always used to say – until Beppe let us in.”

‘Beppe’ was the name of the old codger who’d been running the place ever since I could remember.

The guy behind the door narrowed his eyes – and then he burst out laughing. “You Bianca? Little B?”

I took off the ball cap and sunglasses so he could get a better look. “That’s me.”

“Shit, I remember you comin’ around here… what was it, six or seven years ago?”

“Yup.”

He looked at Adriano. “Who’s he?”

“My boyfriend. He came with me because my mom’s tired of dealing with my father’s shit.”

“Mm,” the guy grunted sympathetically.

The grill slid shut, and there was a metallic grinding sound as the door opened up.

I remembered the doorman now that I saw him, though I didn’t know his name. He was about 350 pounds, most of it fat, and was sweating through his maroon-colored bowling shirt.

“Little B,” he said, then looked me over lecherously. “You sure filled out.”

“Thanks,” I said sarcastically as I brushed past him. “Where’s Beppe?”

“He’s in the back. Hold on, tough guy,” the doorman said as he stopped Adriano and patted him down. “What’s this?”

Adriano pulled out his bankroll. “Just in case we need to pay off his debts.”

“Or maybe play a few hands, huh?” the doorman chuckled. “Alright, go on in.”

Adriano followed me through a hallway into the half-lit underworld of Florentine gambling.

The back room was hazy with cigar smoke. A dozen tables were packed with older and middle-aged men, although there were a couple of guys in their 20s. No women at all. There were also no windows, which kept the room in a perpetual state of twilight.

There was blackjack, poker, craps, even two roulette wheels.

Florence had casinos – gambling was legal in the city – but drugs were heavily monitored in them.

In the betting parlors, you could get just about anything you wanted: uppers, downers, cocaine, heroin, meth.

Not to mention the back-alley places would let you run tabs the casinos would never agree to… because the casinos wouldn’t send thugs to break your legs if you couldn’t pay up.

A man in his 70s with thick white hair and thick eyeglasses came over. “Hey, is that you, Bianca?”

“Hey, Beppe.”

“Holy shit, you sure grew up!”

“And you look just as young as always.”

He laughed. “Ah, you charmer.” Then he glanced at Adriano. “This your fella?”

“Yeah. Is my dad here?”

“Who, ‘Fabio Flambeur’? Naw, I ain’t seen him for weeks.”

I tilted my head to the side playfully, like Come on. “Seriously, Beppe?”

The old man held up his right hand. “I swear on the Virgin’s left tit. Ain’t seen him since a couple of Saturdays ago.”

“Alright…”

Beppe leaned in and whispered. “You should be careful, kid. The Agrellas got whacked last night.”

“Whacked?” I said, feigning shock.

Beppe drew a finger across his neck like a knife slashing his throat. “Took ‘em out. Word is some assholes from the countryside did it.”

“Really,” I said as I made my eyes appropriately wide.

“Yeah. So whoever comes collectin’ his debts might not be as forgiving as Sergio, you know what I’m sayin’?”

“Gotcha… thanks for the heads-up.”

“Sure thing, doll. If he comes by, I’ll let him know you’re lookin’ for him.”

“Thanks, Beppe.”

“No problem.”

I took Adriano’s arm and walked out with him.

“Don’t be a stranger,” the fat doorman said on the way out. I was pretty sure he was checking out my ass.

“That fuckin’ asshole,” Adriano growled as we stepped into the sunlight.

I smiled. “Is somebody jealous?”

“No… but he shouldn’t be makin’ his fuckin’ comments.”

“Have you met any Italian men lately?”

“Ha ha,” he said without laughing. “What was that about ‘Fabio Flambeur’?”

“Just my dad’s nickname. Fabio is short for Fabrizio – ”

“I got that part – but ‘Flambeur’ isn’t Italian.”

“No, it’s French. It’s slang for a high-roller or somebody on a hot streak… like flames coming off his fingertips when he rolls the dice. It was a joke. Because my dad was such a shitty gambler.”

“Huh…”

“They know about the Agrellas,” I said worriedly.

“And did you catch the part about the guys from the countryside?” he asked grimly.

“Yeah?”

“That would be my family. Our place is out in Tuscany.”

I stared at Adriano in alarm. “But you said – ”

“We didn’t do it. But whoever’s behind it is trying to make it look like we did.”

“But… doesn’t that make you look tough?”

“Yeah, but it also makes us look bad to the rest of the Cosa Nostra – like we stabbed the Agrellas in the back. And if somebody’s feeding that lie to the cops, they might come after us, too.”

“Oh shit…”

Adriano reached out and took my hand. “After I get my gun, I need to call my brothers – and we need to go check out the other places you know.”

I lagged a little behind him as he started walking.

He looked over his shoulder at me. “What?”

I looked down at my hand in his.

He realized that he’d taken it without thinking about it.

“What, you don’t want to hold my hand?” he said as he let go –

“No – I do,” I said with a big grin on my face, and latched onto his hand and wouldn’t let go. I stepped up on my tip-toes to give him a kiss. “I do.”

He kissed me back, then smiled and shook his head like I was crazy…

And we walked down the street, hand in hand.