Virginia
I lack the eagerness I usually feel when I’m clocking in on a night I know Rafe will be in for dinner. I find myself going through the motions on autopilot. Fighting off memories of naked Rafe is my real full-time job right now; waitressing is just how I’ll pay my rent.
Not that I should struggle after that pay-off Rafe gave me. I know he insisted it wasn’t a pay-off, but it most certainly was. I didn’t even know what to do with $35,000 in mob money sitting in my apartment. I don’t think the lock on my front door is sufficient, knowing how much cash is inside it now. I had a mild panic attack just having it in my house. I don’t know if I’m more afraid someone will break in and rob me, or of somehow being found with that in my apartment. Talk about instant disqualification from ever joining the FBI.
Not that I’m going to. Drunk Virginia may have had some ideas about fleeing this whole lousy town and leaving the miscreants who live here behind. I don’t have to take down Rafe and his family. I could compromise on my dreams, move somewhere else, where the bad guys aren’t tied to the one I’m hopelessly in love with. I could still join the FBI and help people, which is what I originally wanted to do anyway. The Morellis became my hobby, my area of special interest, but it’s not like the feds know that. They can interview me, but they can’t see inside my brain. I never applied for their program, so I never talked to anyone in an official capacity, never had to admit to knowing anything. Really, I could make a clean break without hurting Rafe, and still pursue my old dream.
Unless they are looking into Rafe already. If they look at my prior life in Vegas and see how close I got, how close I am, it’s hard to imagine they wouldn’t want to use me. That was my whole plan to begin with—it’s just that my allegiance shifted once I actually got to know Rafe. They wouldn’t care about my misguided feelings, though. They would likely see my potential value and decide to assign me to it. I know they can do that. I’ve had the idea before of joining the FBI as planned, but just not working on anything related to Rafe or his family. You can’t do that. There’s no picking and choosing. If you turn down an assignment you’re too close to, you’re out of a job.
I would also have to watch myself if I alerted them to my nearness to Rafe. I’ve crossed some ethical lines helping Sin. Obviously, I haven’t been caught, and I don’t consider it likely I would, but considering my position in Rafe’s life, my brain is a weapon in and of itself. If the feds knew how much information I’ve collected about the Morelli family over the years and they had something to came after me for, they would, just to try to get me to talk.
At least, they would if they had any damn sense. That’s what I would do. I was careful when I helped Sin, but there is one man out there somewhere who could pick me out of a line-up. I don’t know if he would, of course, or if it would ever even come up, but he could, that’s the point. If he did, it would look like I work for the Morellis, and I would go to jail. Plain and simple, I would go to jail, because I certainly wouldn’t turn witness on Sin or Rafe. I know stuff about guys I don’t care about who work for Rafe now, but I couldn’t talk about them, either. Any of that could potentially lead back to him. It could be a domino effect. Any of them could talk, and God knows what they would say. There are enough missing persons related to the Morellis right now, they could form their own village. I wouldn’t chance it.
But after entertaining those passing thoughts of a clean break that would get her life back on track, drunk Virginia had dirty sex with Rafe Morelli. Today, sober Virginia realizes that there’s no way she will move away and move on with her life, because that would mean never seeing Rafe again.
Maybe when he starts bringing booth girls through again that will start to look more appealing, but as for right now, I am staying in Vegas, I am keeping my damned job, and I am going to do my best to get us back to where we were before I let Rafe talk me into spreading my legs for him.
Currently, that means slicing lemons and restocking olives at the bar. I’ve already done all my own work and I don’t have enough tables to keep my brain occupied. Lucinda is slower than Felix anyway, so she could use the help over here.
The waitress who spotted me here last night is working, and when she sees me over at the bar, she takes the opportunity to cruise over. She plants her arms on the counter and leans in, clearly in gossip mode.
“So, I noticed you hanging out with Felix last night.”
Stifling a sigh, I put the lid on the olives and push it back into place. “So? I was having a drink on a night off.”
“I was just wondering…” She hesitates, looking over her shoulder, then looking back at me. “I thought maybe you had the inside scoop on what happened.”
Thumb prints on the wine glasses. That’s sloppy. I grab the glass and a cloth and begin polishing. “Inside scoop?”
“Didn’t you hear what happened to Felix?”
My blood freezes, and my hand stops mid-polish. Horrifying mental images flash to mind—last night, Rafe’s gun against Felix’s temple. My ID-controlled inner drunk girl provoking Rafe with how I could fuck Felix if I wanted to. It was the truth, but I said it to piss him off, and it worked.
“Oh, God, no. No. No, no, no. What happened?”
Her eyes widen. “I can’t believe you don’t know.”
“Just spit it out, would you?”
“He got fired.”
Oh, thank God. My shoulders sag with relief. I mean, that’s terrible, but I was picturing a bullet hole in his head, and I couldn’t fix that. “What do you mean, he got fired? What did he do?”
“No call, no show. I guess he was supposed to bartend tonight.”
“No, he wasn’t,” I reply immediately. “Lucinda was supposed to bartend tonight.”
She shrugs. “I thought so, too. I usually remember the nights I work with Felix, but I must have messed up when I looked at the schedule and got my nights mixed up. It’s right on the schedule, you can look. Felix was supposed to come, and he didn’t. Thankfully Lucinda was available, so she’s filling in.”
Bullshit. Bull fucking shit. I finish polishing the glass I’m working on, put the cloth away, and head to the employee area to check the schedule. I already have it pulled up in my head and it’s very clearly Lucinda’s name—and written in blue ink, so it couldn’t have been erased.
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nbsp; Sure enough, when I pull down the schedule clipboard, it is not the same schedule. For one thing, Trent wrote this one in black ink—fucking sloppy. He can’t even pull off corruption; he should have at least used the same color ink. If anyone took a picture of their schedule on their phones—which we often do—it would be immediately clear the schedule was changed, since it’s not even the same color ink. The bar is in a different spot on the schedule, so it’s possible no one would have included Felix’s hours in their own picture, but this is sloppy work regardless. If he wanted to fight this wrongful termination, I could win the case, and I’m barely a lawyer.
Anyway, Rafe clearly wanted Felix fired, because everyone else’s hours are copied from the real schedule, but Felix is written in as working the bar tonight since they knew he wouldn’t show up—because he wasn’t scheduled to. But Trent has this abhorrent schedule as “proof” that he had all the reason he needed to fire him, if Felix objects. This is a set-up. A clumsy, bullshit set-up, but a set-up. Rafe probably knows Felix won’t fight it, since he knows who Rafe is. Much easier to get another job than to start a beef with a mob boss.
I cannot believe this shit.