The Mafia King's contract

CHAPTER 17: "THE PORT

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Carla's club didn't look like a club at 10am.

It looked like a bad hangover.

Neon signs off. Chairs stacked on tables. Floor sticky even in the daylight. The smell of old vodka and lemon cleaner.

Carla herself was behind the bar in sweats, hair in a messy bun, no makeup, drinking what looked like straight pickle juice.

"You look like hell," Alessandro said fondly, sliding onto a barstool. He placed a small velvet bag on the counter. It clinked.

Carla looked at the bag. Then at him. Then at me standing behind him with the duffel.

"You're alive," she said. "Vincente said you were dead."

"Vincente says a lot of things," Alessandro said. "We brought you something. To clear your debt."

Carla opened the bag. Gold coins. Old ones. Heavy ones. Her eyes went wide. She tried to hide it, but her hand shook.

"This is... this is more than 80k."

"Consider the rest interest for putting up with his crap for three years," Alessandro said. "We need names. You said judges."

Carla poured herself more pickle juice, then poured two waters for us without asking. She was still staring at the gold.

"Judge Whitmore," she said quietly. "Judge Ellis. Both on payroll. Ellis is cheaper. Whitmore is meaner. Whitmore hates Vincente but takes his money anyway because his daughter has medical bills. Ellis just likes money."

"Addresses?" I asked, pulling out the notebook we bought at a gas station.

Carla wrote them down on a napkin. Her handwriting was shaky but legible. She slid it over with the gold.

"And Marco," Alessandro said. "At the port. You said he comes here."

"Every Thursday. Drinks gin. Cries about his wife. Thinks Vincente will kill him if a shipment is late." Carla snorted. "He's not wrong."

"What day is it?" I asked.

"Wednesday," Carla said.

Perfect.

"Tell him we want to meet. Tomorrow. Same time. Same stool. Tell him we can make Vincente disappear from his life," Alessandro said. "Tell him we pay better and we don't threaten his kids."

Carla looked at the gold again. "You two are going to get yourselves killed trying to be Robin Hood."

"We're trying to be landlords," I said. "Of a city."

Carla laughed, a real laugh that turned into a cough. "I like her. Keep her, Alessandro. She's smarter than you."

"Working on it," he said, standing up. "Burn the napkin after we leave. And Carla? If Vincente comes asking..."

"I've never seen you," she said instantly. "You were never here. The gold was always mine. I won it at poker."

"Good girl."

Outside, the daylight was harsh. Too bright after the club.

Alessandro checked his burner phone. One text from Leo: _Marco's shipment lands tomorrow 6am. Pier 9. Unmarked crates. Guns. You didn't hear it from me._

"6am tomorrow, Pier 9," Alessandro read out loud. "That's Vincente's monthly resupply. If that shipment doesn't land..."

"He has no product. No guns to sell. No leverage with the buyers," I finished. The business lessons were sticking.

"Exactly." He looked at me. "You want to steal a shipment of illegal guns with me tomorrow morning?"

"Is that a date?"

"It's a very illegal date."

"Then yes," I said. "But I need coffee first. Real coffee. Not laundromat coffee."

We found a cart that sold espresso for 2 euros. We sat on the curb like teenagers, sharing it, watching the city wake up. Normal people going to normal jobs, not knowing two people on a curb were planning to steal a mafia shipment.

"Whitmore," Alessandro said, looking at the napkin. "His daughter. Medical bills. What kind?"

"I don't know. Carla didn't say."

"Then we find out." He finished the espresso in one shot, winced. "We don't buy judges with just money. We buy them with solutions. Ellis likes money. Whitmore needs help. We give them what they actually need, they owe us, not Vincente."

"Better than us," I whispered.

He nodded. "Better than us."

We spent the rest of Wednesday doing boring, terrifying things.

We went to a library - a real library - and used their computers to look up Judge Whitmore. Public records. News articles. His daughter, 8 years old, leukemia. GoFundMe page with 12k out of 100k needed. Last updated 4 months ago.

Alessandro transferred 90k from one of the bearer bonds through three different accounts Carla's friend set up. Anonymous donor.

He didn't tell me he was doing it until it was done.

"You just gave 90k to a stranger," I said, staring at the confirmation screen.

"I gave 90k to a judge's daughter," he corrected. "The judge will find out. He'll know it wasn't Vincente. Vincente doesn't give. He only takes."

At 5pm, we went to the port. Not Pier 9. Pier 7. To watch.

Marco was exactly as Carla described. Late 40s, thinning hair, cheap suit, nervous hands. He was yelling at dockworkers about a crate that was crooked.

"He's scared," I whispered from behind a container. "He looks like he's going to have a heart attack like De Luca."

"Good," Alessandro said. "Scared men make honest deals."

We didn't approach him Wednesday. We just watched.

At 5:45pm, a black sedan pulled up. Vincente's men. Two of them. They didn't get out. They just rolled down the window and said something to Marco. Marco went even paler and nodded frantically.

"Tomorrow 6am," Alessandro murmured. "They're reminding him."

We went back to the laundromat room. We repacked the duffel. Counted what we had left. Still so much.

"Tomorrow," Alessandro said, laying out the plan on the stained bedspread with sugar packets as boats and bottle caps as crates, "Marco's crew unloads at Pier 9. Four men, plus Marco. Vincente's two men watching from the car. We need Marco to look the other way for 10 minutes while we move the crates to Pier 7, where Carla's cousin has a truck. Carla's cousin thinks he's moving restaurant freezers."

"And the two watchers?" I asked.

"Leo will be on patrol. He owes us. He'll pull them over for a 'random check' at 5:55am. Gives us a 15-minute window."

"And Marco?"

"We offer him a new job. Port manager for the new owners. Us. Double pay. No threats to his kids. And we already cleared Carla, his friend. He'll say yes."

"And if he says no?"

Alessandro looked at me. "Then we leave the crates and we leave. No guns. No shooting. We're not Vincente. We don't force people."

It was such a small sentence. But it was everything.

We set three alarms for 4:30am.

We tried to sleep. We didn't really. We just lay there, listening to the laundromat dryers rumble below us.

At 3am, I woke up to Alessandro whispering.

"What if this doesn't work?" he said into the dark. "What if we take his guns and he just buys more?"

"Then we take those too," I said sleepily, curling into him. "Until he has nothing left to buy."

He kissed my hair. "When did you get so ruthless, Mrs. Russo?"

"When I married into this family," I mumbled.

He laughed quietly. "Best bad decision you ever made."

"Best bad decision ever," I agreed.

At 4:30am, alarms screaming, we got up.

Black clothes. Beanies. No jewelry. Guns - just in case, but we both hoped we wouldn't need them.

Pier 9 at 5:30am was foggy. Cold that bit through our jackets. The river smelled like oil.

Marco was already there, pacing, smoking a cigarette with shaking hands.

Leo's patrol car was parked two blocks down, lights off.

At 5:55am, exactly as promised, Leo's lights flashed on and pulled over the black sedan that had just arrived.

We saw the argument. The two men getting out, hands up, annoyed.

Alessandro squeezed my hand. "Now."

We walked up to Marco. He saw us and nearly dropped his cigarette.

"You," he whispered. "Carla said—"

"We're here to offer you a job," Alessandro said quickly, quietly. No gun showing. Hands visible. "Double what he pays you. No more threats. Your kids don't get mentioned ever again. And you help us move those crates from Pier 9 to Pier 7. Right now. Ten minutes."

Marco looked at the crates - big, wooden, stamped "MACHINERY PARTS." He looked at Leo arguing with Vincente's men. He looked at us.

"What's in the crates?" he asked.

"Things that should not be on our streets," I said.

Marco took a long drag. Then dropped the cigarette and ground it out.

"Pier 7, you said? My cousin is there? No, not my cousin, Carla's cousin?"

"With a truck for freezers," Alessandro said.

Marco laughed, a hysterical little sound. "Freezers. Sure."

He whistled. His dockworkers - four tired men who clearly hated Vincente's guys too - looked over.

"Change of plan, boys!" Marco shouted, voice cracking but loud. "These are new owners! Move crates 1 through 8 to Pier 7! Now! Double pay today!"

No one questioned it. Double pay is double pay.

We moved. Eight crates. Heavy. Wood splintering. We pushed, we pulled, we didn't speak. Fog covering us. 6 minutes. 8 minutes.

At 10 minutes, the last crate was on Pier 7, loaded into a truck that said "Tony's Seafood - Fresh Daily" on the side.

Tony's cousin - a huge man named actually Tony - gave us a thumbs up and drove away. Like he really was moving freezers.

At 5:59am, Leo let Vincente's men go. They drove to Pier 9.

Empty pier. No crates. No Marco. No workers.

We watched from behind Pier 7's containers as they got out, looked around, made phone calls, shouting.

One of them kicked a piling.

Alessandro's hand found mine in the fog. Cold fingers, warm palm.

"We just stole a mafia gun shipment with a seafood truck," I whispered.

"We just bought a port," he whispered back.

Marco came up to us, sweating despite the cold.

"Did I... did I just quit my job?" he asked.

"You just got promoted," Alessandro said. He handed Marco a stack of cash - not gold this time, just cash, 10k. "First week's pay. And Marco? From now on, you work for us. We don't shoot people who are late."

Marco looked at the cash. Then at us. Then he started to cry. Actually cry, there on the pier.

"I have three kids," he said.

"I know," Alessandro said gently. "Go home to them. We'll call you tomorrow."

Marco nodded and walked away, clutching the cash like it was a life preserver.

We stood there until the black sedan sped away, probably to tell Vincente his guns were now... seafood.

Alessandro turned to me, fog in his hair, eyes bright.

"One shipment down," he said.

"One empire to go," I said.

He pulled me in and kissed me right there on the cold, oily pier, with the river behind us and a stolen gun shipment driving away in a fish truck.

"Better than us," he whispered.

"Better than us," I agreed.