Dominic
“It’s me,” I say into the phone when Frankie answers. “We’ve got some issues that need to be addressed.”
Alannah sits on the bed next to me with a pained look of apprehension on her beautiful face. She’s nervous, but I’m not. I’m going to make this work.
“Okay,” Frankie says first, then, “Where are you, Dominic?”
“I’ve been out and about all night, but a lot has developed and we need to talk. Nobody else needs to know shit, either. This is just for you and me.”
“Okay. What about Tommy?” Frankie asks, and my heart bursts into a frenzy.
I brush it off and move right past the mention of Tommy’s name. “Just you and me, Frankie. I’m gonna call you again in an hour to tell you where to meet me.”
“Okay, Dominic,” Frankie says. “But why all the secrecy? What’s going on? What happened?”
“Make sure you’re alone in an hour.”
I hang up the phone and Alannah is staring at me, wide-eyed.
“What’s wrong?” I ask.
“You think you can trust Frankie after what happened with Tommy?” she asks, revealing the cause for all of her concern. The thing with Tommy has her all shaken up.
“If I’m being honest,” I begin. “I don’t know if I can trust him or not. After all I’ve been through in my life, I know not to trust anybody in this lifestyle. Tommy proved that.”
“Then why are we involving him? Can’t we just move away?”
“You know we can’t,” I reply, making sure not to sugarcoat anything. She needs to know how real the threat is. “If we run, they’ll find us. The Commission would put a contract on my head as big and bright as the fucking sun, and every gangster in the world would be hunting us down. It just doesn’t work that way in Our Thing. I just got something deep down inside of me that believes Frankie just might be the only loyal guy in this family.”
“But how can you be sure?”
“I never can be, but he knew my dad. They were like brothers, and I think that means something to Frankie. If I’m wrong, so be it.”
“So be it? That’s it? What does that even mean?”
I look into Alannah’s eyes, and I know she knows what it means, but I’ll tell her anyway. She needs to hear it.
“If I’m wrong about him, I’ll have to kill him.”
Alannah’s shoulders slump when she hears the words, but she can’t be surprised, not after all we’ve been through. If we meet with Frankie and he turns out to be against us instead of with us, I wouldn’t have any other choice. Alannah just needed to hear the words so she can prepare herself for having to watch it unfold. Hearing about death is one thing, but seeing it is something completely different.
I see the dread on her face as I walk into the closet and start grabbing clothes, but she follows my lead and gets herself up to take a shower. The uneasiness is still lingering on her face as we finish up and wait for the elevator to reach us.
I stand next to Alannah wearing a white button-up with gray pants, and I can’t help but feel like she’s staring at me as we wait. I look over, and sure enough, her eyes are locked on my face.
“What?” I inquire.
“Are you bringing anything?”
I let out a chuckle as I realize what she’s talking about. “The guns are in the car, babe. Relax, I got this.”
I watch her breathe a sigh of relief as I lead her into the elevator, and it takes us down into the garage where all of our cars are parked. We make our way to my Challenger and hop in.
Time to go to work.
We pull out of the basement garage onto the busy streets of St. Louis, and my brain instantly goes into lookout mode. The tall buildings of the city tower over us and somehow look much more intimidating this morning. My eyes bounce from vehicle to vehicle, surveying the street for anything that looks suspicious. I take a mental note of everything I see so I can double check once we’re further down the road and make sure we’re not being tailed: Cadillac, Denali, Mustang, Civic, Cadillac, BMW, Taurus. I even try to glance inside each one to see if I recognize any of the drivers to be the suspicious faces of mob guys ready to make a move. Alannah is quietly looking around too, but neither of us sees anything that’s a cause for concern.
After about ten minutes on the road, I pull out my cellphone and call Frankie again
