“I… she wouldn’t have stayed had she known. Not mother. She loved you too much. She would’ve killed him!”
“Not back then, she wouldn’t have. She was enamored with him. In all those years, his manipulation of her was masterful. Either she didn’t know or did and didn’t care enough to jeopardize her lifestyle.”
“She’s changed, Jared. Our mother has become known as the iron lady in the Five Family regime.”
“Have you ever asked yourself why? Why would Marco allow a woman to disrespect him, if only in the privacy of their home?” Jared’s eyes darkened. “Believe me, Luca. She knew what he did.”
“No, she couldn’t have. No mother would ever…” His voice drifted off.
“But she wasn’t a mother raising her children in a normal family, was she? How did her attitude change towards you after I was gone? Think back and you’ll realize every action of hers was a direct reaction to Marco having killed her firstborn.”
Luca couldn’t dispute what Jared was saying. Isabella had changed immediately after the wake she’d insisted on for Angelo, who according to reports had succumbed to a shark attack in a freak accident when he fell off the boat. She’d become withdrawn and morose in the months after but they had all believed it was with grief. He couldn’t dispute that she had never gone back to the loving, carefree woman he used to know. In her stead a woman who had the ability to chill the most feared man in the U.S. with one searing look, resurfaced. The only time she showed softness or love was towards her three remaining sons… Stefano and Rocco more so than him.
“She did change,” he said, wondering if her actions towards him were driven by blame for Angelo’s death. “Over the years it had been subtle but the past ten years… it was almost like she was pushing me to act, to oppose Marco at every turn.”
“So, what I take away from this is that you don’t hate your mother.” Brock watched him closely.
“I could never hate her— not after how much she’d suffered.”
“Not even for allowing Marco to force you into a life you claim you never wanted?” Brock prodded.
“You don’t know my father, shithead, so shut the fuck up. She knew who and what he was when she married him. It was their way of life and she knew better than to stand in the way of a man with the drive to climb to the top of the Mafia ranks as fast and furious as he could. She was as much a victim as I was. We are a family. We weren’t given choices.”
“If you say so,” Brock taunted him.
“You better tell this asshole to shut his mouth, before I do it for him,” Luca sneered at Jared.
“Why? Because the truth hurts?” Brock straightened as Luca growled another warning. “See, I find it hard to believe you love your mother or that you believe she wasn’t aware Marco had killed Angelo— or tried to— especially since you linked the bank accounts to her name which implicates her as the main financial recipient to gain from the pedophile sex ring. You know… the one you claim to know nothing about?” He laughed at Luca’s shocked expression. “Didn’t think we’d find out, did you?”
Luca reined in his anger. He should’ve known they would find out about that. “You talk about riddles, Jared, but the two of you are dancing around me like cats on a hot tin roof. Have at me. What the fuck do you want from me?”
“You know what we want,” Jared retorted in a low voice.
“You want me to give you Marco on a platter.”
“Isn’t that what you were about to propose, Luca? If I read you correctly, you want Marco out of the way.” Jared sat down and leisurely crossed a leg. He was the epitome of relaxation. “The question I’m at war with is whether it is for revenge on my behalf or because you want him out of the way so you might succeed him.”
“Ah, yes, the duplicitous intrigue of the royal spawn all conspiring with and against each other in their selfish pursuit of wealth and power. One tyrant assassinating another. It’s a play as old as Rome.” Brock’s voice cracked sharply in the air.
“Don’t you fucking dare judge me, you bastard,” Luca exploded. “It’s my life! The only one I know how to live. In this world, it’s all about survival of the fittest. Always has been and always will be.”
“And you believe I’ll be so happy to end Marco’s reign to allow you to pick up where he’d left off? Or worse, build on the foundation he’d set up to become thecapo di tutti capi,not only of the Cosa Nostra but of all crime syndicates across the globe?”
“How the fuck is it possible that you know about that?”
“We’re not idiots, Boneiro,” Brock snapped. “It’s easy to put two and two together. Our invitation to Iraq came at a very convenient time. Yeah, we know you and Marco had a finger in the pie. Worse, that you formed a coalition with Ali Mohammed Fadhil.”
“Getting into bed with a known terrorist that is linked to ISIS sends a clear message, little brother and it’s something I’m afraid we can’t allow to happen.”
“If you believe you’ll be able to stop The Commission’s coalition, you’re even more naive than I thought.” Luca cracked a laugh. “You have been chasing after us for years, Jared. You should know by now that to cut off the head of onecapo,two new ones grow back. These are families whose history go back to the sixteenth century. The Sicilian Cosa Nostra, the Ndrangheta of Calabria and the Camorra of Naples are all ancient, with an inhuman ability of survival. No, brother, even if you manage to put Marco— hell, the entire leadership of the Five Families and me, behind bars it won’t stop the wave of reprisal that will follow.”
“I suppose you have a suggestion how to prevent that from happening?” Jared said dryly.
“I would prefer to call it a proposal.” Luca poured another drink. He sipped on it as he watched the two men, both equally intimidating, as they reciprocated his distrust.
“Well, are you waiting for an invitation?” Brock grumbled.
“I’ll give you Marco and three of the Five Family leaders,” he said with a poker face. “I’ll even throw in Ali Mohammed Fadhil to sweeten the deal.”