Chapter 29: Dangerous Deception: Chapter 29

“You look exhausted.” Vito brings the car to a stop but doesn’t unlock the doors quite yet. “You sure you want to do this today?”

I fight a yawn and nod. “I’m fine.”

“Are you?” He gives me the same look he’s given me throughout the years, a look of tired disbelief.

“These past two weeks have been stressful. Adelina is throwing herself into her hospital project. I knew she was passionate after what happened to her mother, but at this rate, she’s going to buy the entire building and make everyone’s treatment free. So she’s been working hard, and I haven’t seen her as much as I’d like to.”

“It’s good, though,” Vito replies. “She’s back to her normal self, or a version of it, at least. Following her passions.”

“I just worry about her spending all her time around those sick kids. Not all of them survive.”

“I’m sure she’s aware of that.” Vito pops the lock on the doors. “She puts up with you so I imagine kids are easy as pie.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

Vito shoots me a withering look as we climb out of the car. “You know exactly what I mean. You’re carrying this weight about her father, and have been ever since the Irish attacked the manor. I really think you should tell her.”

“I can’t.” The office building before us appears to waver slightly in the humid August heat. “It would break her heart.”

“If you’re right, she’ll find out eventually.”

“I know. I want to make sure I have everything for her, all the info before I hurt her.”

“Who knew you were such a romantic?” Vito holds the door open for me and we trudge inside.

“Tell anyone and I’ll kill you.”

“Mmhmm.”

“So, how are things going with the Irish?” I ask as we walk toward the elevator tucked behind an unmanned desk.

“Well, Hector didn’t call anyone when he got the parcel. Which is really fucking odd. He hasn’t made a move, not even when we burned down three of his liquor stores.”

“You think he’s waiting for an opportunity?”

“Honestly? I’m lost. I’m hoping that waiting two weeks for this fucking official to get back in the country isn’t for nothing. He’s got to be the key to all of this. Dude nearly wet his pants when we snatched him from the airport.”

“You think?” My stomach tightens as the elevator carries us upward. “Mafia and government don’t mix.”

“And yet Carlos was calling this guy more than I call my own mother.”

“How is she, by the way?”

“As fiery as ever. When are you bringing a good girl home, Vito? When are you giving me grandkids? When are you going to visit?”

“You should, you know.”

Vito’s eyes widen. “Don’t tell me you’ve become a family man? Adelina has changed you.”

“I don’t know.” I chuckle. “Coming home to her and seeing her smile at me is…” Shaking my head, words fail me. “I honestly can’t describe how good that feels.”

“And that’s why you’re giving her a hospital.”

“That’s why I’m giving her a hospital,” I sigh.

The light conversation comes to an end when the doors slide open on the eighth floor and the sweating, purple-faced bound man seated under two armed guards immediately stumbles over himself to speak.

“Please don’t kill me! Please, whatever it is you need, I can get it for you. I know people. I can call the mayor! You need charges dropped? Consider them gone! Just please don’t kill me. I have a family. I know you don’t care, but my son is about to enter his last year and I want to see him graduate. I just put a payment down on a new house. Please don’t kill me, please!”

Vito and I exchange a brief, amused look, then I calm my face and walk forward. “Your name?”

“I–I’m Hank. Hank Breaker.”

“I want information, Hank.”

“Anything,” he splutters. “Anything you want, just please!” Fat tears well up in his eyes. “Please don’t kill me.”

There it is—the difference between people in my world and the everyday, regular Joe. Civilians value their lives, their families, and things like mortgages and graduation. In my world, it’s all about loyalty.

Hank clearly has none.

“A man came to see you,” I say carefully.

“Sure.” Hank nods, looking quickly at everyone. “I see lots of people. Lots of men. All the time.”

“Carlos Giordana.”

The color fades from the man’s face slightly, but he still nods. “Sure, I know Carlos.”

“What did he come to see you about?”

“I… listen, I was only doing my job, okay? I’m really not that high up in the grand scheme of things.”

“So you can’t call the mayor?” Vito remarks coldly.

“I can! I just can’t promise he’ll answer. I’m sorry. Are you going to kill me now?” His face screws up and tears leak down his cheeks. “I don’t want to die.”

“What did Carlos come to see you about?” I ask, unholstering my gun and resting my hands in front of me, interlocked at the wrist. “I won’t repeat myself again.”

“He came to see me about his sister. She, uh… she died and he had some questions.”

I tap my gun against my knuckles, signaling my impatience. Hank pales further.

“I’m sorry,” he says weakly. “Carlos was investigating his sister’s death. It never sat well with him that they said she overdosed because he claims she never did drugs. She never sampled the product or whatever. He was chasing rumors, mostly.”

“What rumors?”

“Toxicity levels in the city’s waters. He found… he found other people who shared the same symptoms as his sister. At a distance, it could look like drug use, but he was insisting it wasn’t. The city ruled her death an overdose and he was furious. I don’t know how he did it, but he got a private autopsy and learned that she didn’t overdose at all. He was right.”

“How did she die?” Vito asks.

“Prolonged toxic consumption,” Hank says hurriedly.

“Someone was poisoning her?” I raise a brow. “And you’re connected how?”

Hank drags a hand down his face, trying to remove the buildup of sweat. “He was following rumors about toxicity in the water supply that feeds into the city from the reservoirs up in the hills. Rumors like that don’t have much merit, but once he started asking, he didn’t stop. He was so persistent, and I felt so guilty about the whole thing.”

Hanks looks like he’s about to shake apart at the seams. He clutches both his hands together and rocks back and forth.

“He asked around about those rumors and something led him to you?”

“Yes.” Hank nods repeatedly. “He found my name on a few old documents and learned through asking the right people that anyone with a complaint about the water was directed to me. And… and it was my job to bury those queries and concerns. Anything about water quality concerns, I buried or–or destroyed. Including⁠—”

Hank chokes like the words are strangling him from the inside.

I step forward and lean closer. “Including?”

“Including concerns that people were getting sick and–and dying from the water.”

Slowly, the puzzle starts to slot together in my mind, like pieces falling slowly out of the box. “How many concerns did you bury, Hank?”

He shrugs and lowers his head. “A couple of thousand. I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.”

That many concerns? Vito and I exchange a look as the heat of anger licks at the fringes of my mind. “You told Carlos this?”

“Yes.” Hank nods, breaking down. “His concerns about his sister’s death was one–one of the concerns I buried.”

Shit.

“Is it true?”

Hank looks up at me with wide eyes. “Is what true?”

“The complaints, you fucker. The concerns. Is there something wrong with the water from the reservoirs?”

“Yes,” Hank sobs, crumpling before my eyes. “There has been for decades.”

Despite a few slaps, Hank knew nothing about Pascal. Given how easily he gave up all the other information, I chose to believe him with a promise to return if I were ever unhappy. The guy literally wet himself as I left after giving me the name of the doctor in charge of covering up the deaths.

He gave Carlos the same name.

Bryan Glow. In Hank’s words, he’d know more.

“What do you think this means?” Vito’s face pinches with tension as we stride down the bright, empty corridor toward the door marked Morgue at the end.

“Honestly?” I glance at him. “I’m not sure I even want to speculate.”

Vito nods solemnly.

“Our matters are private. I never once considered outside intervention. I mean…” I pause briefly and face him. “We handle our problems with our fists. All this sneaking around, whispers to people in office, and fucking toxic water is hardly in my wheelhouse.”

“What if this Bryan is just as useless as Hank? All weak information and no reason?”

“I might just kill him to make myself feel better. Besides.” I resume walking. “If this was Carlos’ last stop before he died, maybe he’ll deserve it.”

Someone, likely Hank, warned Bryan about our visit. He’s in the middle of stuffing papers into a tawny briefcase when Vito kicks down his door.

“Oh, no,” he squeaks and turns his attention to his desk where he wrestles with a drawer that catches on its hinges and squeaks as loudly as he does.

Vito reaches him before he can get the pistol out of the drawer and punches him swiftly across the face, sending him sprawling back into his chair.

“Wait—” he gasps through a bloody nose. “I wasn’t⁠—”

“Trying to get rid of evidence?” I ask, picking up a few stray sheets of paper on his desk. Most of it is foreign to me. I don’t know much about this line of work, so the names and data displayed may as well be in French.

“Was it Hank?” Vito growls, pinning Bryan by his collar to the chair. “Did he call you? Did he tell you we were coming?”

“Yes, yes,” Bryan splutters. “I didn’t think you were serious until I saw you on the CCTV.”

His computer monitor shows the CCTV for the entire building. Given the shabby look of the building and the stink of piss outside, I didn’t expect there to be any working CCTV, never mind one as in-depth as this.

“Pretty advanced for a shitty, back alley office,” I mutter, tapping the screen to switch between views. “Bit out of your budget.”

“I save,” Bryan gasps, not taking his eyes off Vito.

“Why were you reaching for a gun, Bryan?” Vito asks, shoving him deeper into the chair. “Guilty conscience?”

“The fuck?” Blood pours down over his flapping mouth. “Hank sounded weird. I thought he was drunk but when I saw you, I realized he was scared! Of course I’m gonna defend myself!”

It’s challenging keeping a lid on my temper when so much of this entire mystery is cloaked in shadow. The truth feels within touching distance, but how many more people like this are we going to chase?

“I’ll be brief, Bryan, because I’m really fucking pissed off at chasing my own tail. A man came to see you by the name of Carlos. Remember him?”

Bryan pales slightly and shakes his head. “No.”

“You’re a liar,” Vito snarls, shoving hard into Bryan and raising his fist. He punches him hard in the face again and again.

Bryan tries to fight back with some survival instinct, but other than managing to dislodge Vito’s jacket from his shoulder, he does nothing else. Vito hauls him out of the chair and slams him down onto the desk, then he pulls out his pistol and shoves it under his chin.

“Raffaele is going to ask you again and you’d better tell the fucking truth this time!”

I lean over the two of them and meet Bryan’s wild, terrified eyes. “Carlos. Why did he come and see you?”

“Because—” Bryan chokes and gasps, tossing his head back and forth. “Fuck, I can’t. They’ll kill me!”

“And I’ll kill you if you don’t,” Vito growls.

I’m curious about they but I’m not going to detail whatever information Bryan has. Not yet.

“Fuck!” Bryan knocks his head back against the desk and screws up his beaten face, then he sags like all the fight has deflated out of him. “Carlos… he came to see me about his sister.”

“And?” I prompt tiredly.

“He wanted to know how she died.”

“Was it a drug overdose?” I ask, daring him to lie to my face.

Bryan’s eyes roll in defeat and he sniffles thickly. “No,” he mutters. No, she died from overconsumption of a toxic component.”

Vito and I lock eyes, then Vito releases Bryan and steps back, but he keeps his gun trained on him.

“Tell me everything you told Carlos.” I lean closer. “And if I get even a hint that you’re lying to me, I’ll have Vito bury you alive out back. Understand?”

Bryan nods, slowly pulling himself up from the desk and sorting his rumpled shirt. “He wanted to see the real autopsy report.” He speaks stiffly, like some kind of old wind-up toy. “I couldn’t really lie to him after Hank told him about the water supply so I showed him the truth. I just thought he wanted fucking closure.”

“But he wanted something else, didn’t he?”

“Yeah.” Bryan wipes his bloody nose on his sleeve. “He wanted to know why I covered it up. I told him exactly what I’ll tell you, okay? I have a family to feed and protect. This job? It’s thankless. The state barely pays me shit and I have to deal with tired, arrogant cops all day intent on pinning every death on a gang shooting. So when I was approached with a deal, I took it.”

“How many?” Vito speaks up suddenly, and by the look on his face it’s clear he’s realized something. “Carlos wanted to know, didn’t he?”

Bryan nods meekly. “Yes.”

“So how many? How many deaths have you covered up from drinking tainted water, huh?”

Bryan slumps down in his chair and begins typing on his computer with his head hanging low. “A lot. But you have to understand, I only buried the ones I saw. I can’t speak for any other place.”

With a few clicks, he pulls up a long list of file numbers, all of which have names attached. Turning the monitor toward myself, my chest tightens like I’m caught in a vise. There are far too many to count and more pages than I care to look at.

“You cataloged them?” Vito sneers.

“I had to,” Bryan answers. “I needed to know whom to lie about if anyone came asking, and then I wanted something to use in case… in case something like this happened.”

Sure enough, Carlos’ sister is on the list.

This is beyond me. Deaths are common in my line of work. Wars spill out onto the streets and people get killed all the time, but there are sections of the city under my protection. And under the protection of every other Mafia head with some kind of following. We can’t have this much power on threat alone. We help people. Protect them. Care for them.

How the fuck do I protect people from toxic water? The names scroll and scroll as Bryan continues to ramble on. “Those people were dying anyway and most didn’t even get a cause of death. Some were listed as having a heart attack. Some just died. It’s difficult to prove toxic poisoning without very specific tests.”

“And you test everyone, don’t you?” Vito growls. “How else would you know the real reason Carlos’ sister died?”

“Yeah.” Bryan’s head sinks further. “There are a few signs I look out for, but I run the tests and then bury their cause of death.”

Each name is like a drop of gasoline on the already raging fire inside me. So many people. “What else did Carlos want?” I ask, glancing up from the screen. “What else did you tell him?”

Bryan’s answer is lost to me because the moment I look back at the screen, a name stands out like a glaring beacon.

Lucia Castiglioni.

Adelina’s mother.

No.

I click on the name and a picture of her flashes on the screen, complete with all the details of her death. Frailty, coughing, and limb weakness. Headaches, unexplained nosebleeds, and more. It was listed as cancer with a few unexplained notes beyond my understanding.

My blood runs cold and before I can stop myself, I type a name into the search bar.

Serena Monroe.

One result pops up.

My blood turns to ice and I react without much thinking. Rage consumes me as I fly over the table and tackle Bryan right out of his chair. We crash to the floor, and his yell of fright is cut off by my fist smashing into his face again and again. Fire burns in my joints, blood pounds in my ears, and a painful tremor takes over my entire body.

Not Serena.

Not the woman I loved wasting away from a mysterious illness.

I never, ever would have considered poisoning, and even if I did, I would have blamed the Russians or the Irish.

And Lucia.

Adelina’s mother.

Dead.

“Who paid you to bury this?” I roar, punching him again and again.

Bryan’s face becomes wet slop as skin and muscle split under the repeated impact of my fist. Teeth fly loose, bone fractures and cracks, and his face swells like a beach ball.

“Who the fuck paid you?”

“Cast—” Bryan croaks when I finally halt my furious onslaught. He coughs and blood pours out of his mouth. One eye swells shut, and the other is glazed and dull.

I grab him by the throat and bring him close to my face. “Who?” I demand with a cold, empty voice.

“Castig—cough—scal… pas… oni…”

“Who?”

“Pascal.”