Mafia's Mistake

CHAPTER FOUR

LUCIA

My heart was pounding like a jackhammer as I watched Antonio Russo's broad back disappear through the battered exit door. Those cold, lifeless eyes seem seared into my brain, haunting me even after he’s gone.

I fumble with shaky hands to retrieve my digital recorder from its concealed pocket, my nerves still jangling from having that volatile, dangerous presence locked on me – if only for a few seconds. In that singular moment, it was as if Antonio could sense I wasn’t who I portrayed, didn’t belong in this foul circle of hell he presides over.

Clutching the recorder’s rewind button, I nervously replay the hushed confession I managed to capture – Antonio’s callous orders to viciously retaliate against this “O’Reilly” person and his crew. Brutal confirmations of assault, and conspiracy to commit murder, all spilled from his lips with the casual indifference of a man ordering takeout.

This is it, I realize with a shudder. The kind of condemning evidence that could finally topple this empire from its rotten core. But at what cost? How many more times will I have to coldly bear witness as these soulless butchers plot out their depravities in my presence?

How many beatings, executions, innocent, and bloodshed will I be expected to turn a blind eye toward my credibility? To have not just a single incident, but an overwhelming pattern of criminality that even the most obstructive officials can’t ignore or dismiss?

My churning doubts are interrupted by a loud commotion across the room – one of Antonio’s button men drunkenly pawing at a young server, her shrill cries and struggles to dissuade him. Just another typical night of debauchery and abuse to be expected in this depraved realm, I remind myself bitterly.

With no small amount of disgust, I slide the recorder back into its hidden pocket and stride across the room, adopting my best “cool and unaffected” bartender persona. Muscles I didn’t even realize were tense slowly start to uncoil as I snatch a tray of fresh drinks for the floor and settle into my undercover skin once more.

“You know the rules,” I mutter coolly as I brush past the goon still attempting to wrestle the screaming girl into submission.

“Take that s**t in the back room if you need to reestablish your dominance so badly.”

My words seem to penetrate the drunken haze as the brute freezes, shooting me a look of surprise and humiliation at being called out in front of the entire bar. For a split second, I expect him to turn his boorish aggression toward me.

Just as quickly, the tension evaporates as the lug releases the sobbing girl with a scowl of resignation and slinks off toward the back rooms. I can only wonder how many other nameless victims have met similarly brutal fates in those shadowy recesses over the years, with no one to hear their cries.

An unexpected pang of pity lances through my hardened shell as the girl frantically rushes past me toward the exit, dress askew and mascara streaking down her reddened cheeks in rivers of humiliation and terror. Reminders of the gut-wrenching realities of my misguided attempts at playing savior have been enabling me to observe night after night.

Gritting my teeth, I force myself to re-center and keep circulating with the tray of fresh drinks for the handful of discerning sociopaths surrounding me. Coming across as too shaken in the face of such casual atrocities could quickly lead to deeply unfortunate circumstances for one in my uniquely exposed position.

As I weave between tables and booths, steeling my nerves, I find my thoughts drifting inexorably back to Antonio’s recorded murder plot and my moral quandary. There’s no doubt in my mind that sitting on this bombshell evidence until I can gather enough to bury the family’s entire hierarchy would be unconscionable. Too many innocent lives are bound to be lost in the inevitable, escalating crossfire as they savagely try to defend their decaying empire.

My lieutenant’s face swims into view – her lined, no-nonsense features and patented

“Quit f*****g around” glare that warned me what I was about to wade into with this operation. I need to find reserves of mental fortitude and dedication to justice I never realized existed within myself.

Just as I find my fingers instinctively hovering over the burner phone concealed in my apron, ready to make the call and pass along Antonio’s self-implicating recording, a sudden unmistakable voice cuts through the din – ragged, authoritative, and dripping with serpentine menace.

“You. The new girl with the tray.”

I freeze mid-step as Antonio himself emerges from the back hallway, striding directly toward me with that trademark look of amused impassiveness. As if he’s stalking some kind of prey too dimwitted to realize the mortal danger lurking before it.

“We need to have a little chat about keeping a tighter leash on the animals around here,” he murmurs in that same dangerously silken tone as he draws nearer. “Why don’t you freshen my drink while you’re at it, doll?”

Every muscle in my body screams at me to turn and flee, to protect whatever remains of my tattered soul before it’s too late. But of course, such an impulse would be beyond foolhardy, instantly blowing my cover without a prayer of salvaging the vital operation.

Forcing what I hope resembles a polite, professional smile, I mutely nod and heel-turn back toward the bar to fetch Antonio’s requested scotch. Knowing full well that declining would likely constitute the gravest mistake of my brief, ill-advised life.

As I pour the drink with a steady hand belying my internal mass of roiling terror and nerves, I realize that any semblance of an exit strategy has been firmly closed off, at least for now. By openly beckoning me with that casually sinister air, Antonio has deftly eliminated any opportunity to report his recorded improprieties up the chain without first having to explain how they came about.

No, regardless of my intentions, I am now officially and inescapably ensnared in the Russo crime family’s strangling embrace. Stuck playing the insufferably long game on their home turf, at their skewed sense of reality.

Any pleas to the forces of light and justice will simply have to be put ruthlessly on hold for the foreseeable future as I suffer through this next unavoidable round of coerced depravity. Only the grim determination to persevere and see this unholy crusade through burns away the nausea momentarily.

Fetching the tumbler, I turn and ready myself to face the devil head-on, head-on with nothing but a tarnished badge and an ever-dwindling grasp on my reservation instincts. No matter how far into the abyss Antonio tries to drag me, I silently vow to keep fighting.

Even if it eventually means sacrificing my very soul to purge this scourge from humanity.