Page 28 of Reckless Sinner
Honestly? I wasn’t sure. But I could take a guess. “My brother who just got married, Vincent—he picked a woman from a small family, very little power, technically they answer to us. I’m not sure because I’m not in the loop but from what I recall growing up in that world, you make alliances through marriage like we’re some kind of old world royalty. Vincent’s the oldest, he’s from a powerful family, he’s valuable.”
“So marrying a random nobody could’ve pissed off a lot of people.”
This one actually had some brain cells that worked, congratulations. “Yes, exactly. I think everyone expected him to marry the daughter of another powerfuldon. The Petrovs were probably insulted. I know I was surprised when I heard he’d… as far as I can tell basically married for love.”
“That’s not how it works in the mafia?”
“Not when you’re as powerful as my family is,” I said, allowing some bitterness to come through in my voice. I needed this agent to think I truly disliked my family and harbored a grudge.
Kaminsky made another note. “So you think this could be a warning? Marry your second son to one of our girls or else? Or just petty vengeance for feeling slighted?”
“Something like that.”
“And you don’t know anything about it.”
“Only what I can guess. Look, Agent Kaminsky.” I stopped walking and turned to face him. “I’m honestly not surprised that an undercover agent was able to get so close to my brother. Marco is not what you would call the brains of the operation. If she was meeting with her handler when they were killed, it sounds to me like the Petrovs were watching them and found her alone away from my family the best opportunity. You might not believe me when I say this but I’ve had enough cases to know by now—in real life, coincidences, happenstance, and luck play a far bigger role than we like to admit.”
Kaminsky sure didn’t like that last statement, even though it was true. How did a murderer get caught, or get away with it? Sure, a lot of the times the murderer was a dumbass. But other times? Pure luck. A neighbor happened to come home during lunch break because she forgot some paperwork, and she saw something incriminating. A dog got away from its owner and in chasing the mutt down the person found the body much earlier than the murderer had thought. Or it went the other way around—construction happened and the evidence was destroyed or the body buried, a family member was sick so didn’t call and nobody knew the person was dead until it was too late…
Only forty percent of murder cases were solved. And it wasn’t poor detecting or insanely clever killers. Coincidence. Happenstance. Luck.
Kaminsky looked through his notebook again, nodded, and put it away. “I think that’s all for now, Mr. Russo. As I said we’re just covering our bases here.”
“And you can’t get close to either of my brothers,” I said, smiling thinly.
Kaminsky flushed a little with consternation. Law enforcement hated to admit when they couldn’t get near enough to any of us, literally or figuratively. “Well. Your insights have been valuable.”
He handed me a card. “If you think of anything else, or learn of anything else, give me a call.”
“Thank you. Best of luck on your case.” I took the card. Hey, never knew when it might actually come in handy.
Kaminsky walked off at a brusque pace, probably back to his car, and I pocketed the card thoughtfully. The explanation I had given Kaminsky was, I thought, pretty satisfying for anyone—if you didn’t know how crafty Vincent and my father were. Vincent was a chip off the old block.
An undercover agent turned out to be dating my brother. Her handler was murdered, and so was she, but only one body was recovered. The whole thing was blamed on the Petrovs, but would anger at Vincent marrying some nobody instead of one of their girls really be enough for them to murder someone? Someone who turned out to be an agent? Surely they would be more cautious than that.
I didn’t know how just yet, but this had my brother’s fingerprints all over it. He was playing a game, a long game that only he could see all the pieces of.
I had to find out what that game was before I became a pawn.
CHAPTER14
Delaney
Ihad to move fast. My father would never accept any dawdling on my part now. If he’d been impatient before, that was nothing compared to today after losing out on his plans to get Marco in on murder charges.
After breakfast, I went into the kitchen to bake something. I didn’t like cooking or baking, never had, but my father had insisted I learn.You’ll be rich enough you won’t ever have to cook if you don’t want to, but it’s important to know what’s quality,he would say.And even if you never actually do it, men like knowing a woman can cook.
He did sometimes ask me to cook or bake when a couple of people were coming over—it was one of his ways of showing me off. And I wasgoodat it. It was one of the few talents I had. Of course he wanted me to show people my accomplishments.
But boy, did I hate it. I had never been fond of it and the idea of doing it to impress people irked me even further. I thought Dante would appreciate the gesture, though, so I went in to bake some cookies.
I didn’t know his favorites but everyone liked chocolate chip, right? Couldn’t go wrong with a classic. When was the last time a high-powered lawyer had something as fun and simple as homemade chocolate chip cookies?
After making them I spent the rest of the day doing as much research on the Russos as I could. I even went to the local library and pulled up their microfilms from old papers so that I could view articles on Antonio Russo’s activities years ago.
By the time I finished, I was sure that my father was right. Antonio Russo had been a ruthless but clever man, suspected in manipulating other families, although a lot of what he’d supposedly done could never be proven. His son Vincent seemed to be much the same.
Did Dante know what his brother was planning? Or had already planned and executed? He’d sounded genuinely surprised and confused on the phone last night but he could’ve been acting for my sake.
