Chapter 6: Mafia Kings: Massimo: Chapter 6

Giotto was full of concern for his employer – probably faked.

But he did a good job of staring at the dead bodies on the ground and then looking at the Widow in disbelief.

“Signora, I just heard! This is terrible – terrible! Are you alright?!”

“Oh, you care about that now, do you?” she snarled, then gestured to her men on either side of Giotto. “Hold him there between the two of you.”

Two henchmen grabbed his arms and forced them behind his back.

Giotto shouted in bewilderment, “Signora, why are you doing this?! I have done nothing! I am innocent, I tell you – innocent!”

The Widow ignored his protests. “Who are you working for?”

“YOU, Signora!”

“I wonder,” she muttered.

To tell the truth, I kind of believed him. I was beginning to worry I’d gotten it all wrong.

The Widow held out her hand to one of the bodyguards standing next to her. The man placed his pistol in her palm –

And she aimed it at Giotto.

“Tell me who you’re working for,” she said in a cold voice.

“Signora, I swear – ”

The Widow sighed in annoyance, lowered the gun slightly –

BANG!

Giotto’s right kneecap erupted in a spray of blood.

I jerked back a little in surprise.

Jesus – this old broad isn’t fucking around…

Giotto’s shrieks echoed through the cavernous room.

I couldn’t blame him. I’ve been told by old-timers who experienced it that getting kneecapped is one of the most painful injuries you can suffer.

But the Widow was only getting started.

“I’ll repeat the question one more time,” she said crisply. “The next shot I fire won’t be at your other kneecap, but your balls.”

It was the first time I’d heard a crude word pass her lips.

When she threatened to shoot his balls off, though, it was chilling – because you knew she meant it.

Every guy in the room winced in sympathy – especially the two gangsters holding Giotto in place.

“Who paid you to betray me?” the Widow asked.

Giotto’s face was a mask of pain. He was sweating profusely; big droplets were sliding down his cheeks.

Or maybe they were tears.

“Signora, please – ” he begged.

BANG!

Every man in the room flinched.

Giotto shrieked and closed his eyes –

Then opened them slightly when he realized his family jewels were still intact.

“Missed,” the Widow deadpanned. “I’ll aim a little higher this time.”

She raised the gun about two inches –

“Fausto Rosolini!” Giotto screamed. “Fausto Rosolini paid me to do it!”

My guts twisted inside me and my blood ran cold.

It was the first confirmation – the first real proof – of Fausto’s treachery.

It’s one thing to think that someone you love has betrayed you, but not really know for sure.

A part of you holds on to a speck of hope that it’s all just a misunderstanding – that maybe you’ve made some terrible mistake –

But now my last bit of hope was gone, incinerated by Giotto’s words…

And the cold, awful certainty of Fausto’s betrayal closed around my heart like a fist made of ice.

This was my uncle –

My father’s brother –

The man who had bounced me on his knee when I was a child.

Who had given me candy out of his pocket…

The one who had comforted me when my mother died and my father was too overwhelmed with grief to speak.

My uncle – a man I had loved and looked up to my entire life – had tried to kill me.

Not just once, but multiple times.

The hit in Florence when I was with Alessandra and Valentino –

The Turk invading our house –

Mezzasalma –

And now this attack on the Widow.

Fausto was my flesh and blood –

And yet he’d paid strangers to try to take my life.

He hadn’t even had the courage to do it himself.

The Widow seemed shaken, too, though not nearly as much as I was.

She lowered the gun and asked, “When?”

Now that he’d broken, all the fight had gone out of Giotto.

Maybe the Widow lowering her gun made him think he was out of danger if only he told the truth.

“I’ve been taking money from him for months,” he sobbed. He glanced down at the corpses of the black-clad mercenaries. “But then Aurelio called out of nowhere and wanted me to let them in.”

And there was the proof of Aurelio’s treachery, as well.

It didn’t sting nearly as much as Fausto’s betrayal.

Partly because I already believed what Bianca had told us in the study…

And partly because I’d always hated my cousin.

Aurelio was a vicious, arrogant bastard, and I’d despised him since we were children.

Now I was beginning to wonder how far the apple had actually fallen from the tree.

“Was it because Signor Rosolini came here today?” the Widow asked brusquely.

Giotto nodded. “Yes.”

“How much?”

“…Signora?”

“How much did he pay for you to betray me?”

“Signora, he swore to me they wouldn’t hurt you – they only wanted to take you captive – ”

“Oh, then that’s not betrayal at all,” she said in mock sympathy. Then her voice went back to cold, hard steel. “How much.”

Giotto winced. “A million euros.”

“A million,” she murmured in disgust. “That’s all your honor was worth to you.”

Giotto seemed to sense that something had shifted for the worse.

“Signora – I could be a double agent for you – I could tell him that – ”

The Widow raised the gun and fired.

BANG!

Giotto’s throat erupted in red, and the back of his neck blew out in a gout of crimson.

He stared at her, his eyes wide in horror as he tried to breathe – a series of gurgling, choking sounds –

And he slowly went limp as he drowned in his own blood.

The Widow’s expression never changed the entire time. She just watched, dispassionate and detached, as he died.

When the light had gone out of his eyes and he’d slumped over, supported only by the two men on either side of him, the old woman held out her gun to the side.

The same bodyguard who had given it to her took it back and holstered it.

“Remove this piece of garbage from my sight,” she ordered.

A bodyguard bent down to grab one of the mercenaries –

“Take Giotto, but leave them for now,” she snapped. “I want to talk to Signor Rosolini alone.”

“What about our men?” another suit asked.

“They’re dead,” she said curtly. “They’ll still be here in ten minutes. Now go.”

No one questioned the wisdom of leaving her alone with me.

They just hauled away Giotto’s body, his legs sliding limply behind him, and dragged him out of the room.

Then it was just me… the Widow… and a dozen dead bodies lying all around us.