Part Two
Aidan Jr
THE SUMMIT
When the four families who reigned over New York banded together, it meant shit had gone down.
Not justregularshit, either.
That was our stock in trade.
Extortion, thieving, drugs, prostitution, they were our shares. Our commodities. Our products, as it were.
Every man in this room was wanted by some law agency or another, and with the crimes we’d committed, we’d all be locked up for the rest of our natural lives if we were ever arrested—that was a given.
What was also a given?
Not one of the four leaders from the four families—the Irish, the Italians, the Chinese, or the Russians—would ever see the inside of a prison cell.
They’d never be punished for their sins.
And considering I was the heir to the Five Points’ throne, I wasn’t about to complain about that. I didn’t want to spend the rest of my life in a Supermax, jacking off to the sounds of people walking down the corridor outside my cell because that was as much human contact as I was allowed in a twenty-four hour period. Painting the walls with my shit just to havesomemethod of communication.
Even if the lower ranks did get sent to jail, we worked deals for them. No one ever served what they were supposed to—take the old Don’s heir. That cunt Gianni Fieri had died in prison, but not because of his sentence—he probably wouldn’t have served even an eighth of it if some clever bastard hadn’t broken his neck.
Until recently, the last few years, at any rate, I’d been quite happy with the status quo.
Then I’d been shot.
Then I’d nearly lost my mobility.
Then I’d become hooked on pain meds.
As I sat here, around a table with the four most powerful men in the state, their heirs and trusted advisors grouped around them, as we discussed a war that we were fighting on too many fronts, all I could think about was the Oxy.
It was there, a siren call in my head. A song that made me want to close my eyes to chase away the nausea that plagued me.
The shakes would come soon, the nausea shortly after. Sometimes, they mixed themselves up, and I’d find myself puking as I shook like I was having a seizure. Then I’d take a pill, and everything, all my worries, would disappear.
But this morning, I had to focus.
Especially when Rex, the Prez of the Satan’s Sinners’ MC, stormed into the warehouse where we were gathered, raised his guns and took his shots. It was like something fromKill Bill,only Rex wasn’t wearing a yellow catsuit.
His slaying of the Italian fuckers wasn’t a part of the official program, but the Irish were the only ones who knew to anticipate Rex’s arrival. We’d planned it.
The Italians had to suffer.
They had to be made to pay.
Their Don was dead thanks to my youngest brother.
Now his successors were dead, hisconsiglieretoo.
As I smiled at the bloodshed before me, satisfaction filling me at the sweet taste of vengeance which definitely was better when hot, I concealed my hands, which were starting to tremble, and for a while, I lost myself to the biting need to pop another Oxy.
The bodies were dragged away by two guys from the Chinese camp, and Rex took a seat after my father explained why he’d helped our ally infiltrate the Summit, sacred territory according to our unwritten laws, and why he’d allowed him to shoot the men from the Italian contingent. I managed to make a few comments, but I was well aware that I was wading deeper into the mire of the Oxy’s call.
Because the Italians were mutually loathed by the Chinese, the Irish, and the Russians, there wasn’t much concern about their brutal murder or the man who’d done the murdering. Business quickly took center stage, and it was then the New World Sparrows found themselves under the spotlight. And though the need was painful, I knew I had to focus, knew I was too weak to endure the siren song of the opioids that were taking over my life.