Chapter 1
Mal
His name was Dario. Number seven on my list.
He leaned over a half-drunk beer and stared at the stained wooden bar top. His clothes were too big, and the elbows of his denim work shirt were worn through. Speakers hidden in the ceiling played old honky-tonk music and a drunk local couple swayed together, both dressed in leather and denim, both sweating in the night heat. I pulled up a stool beside Dario and sat down. He looked at me, did a double-take, and grinned.
“Well, holy shit, Mal. Where’ve you been?”
“Prison.” I nodded at the bartender. “Beer.”
“When did you get out? I haven’t heard about you since—” He stopped himself. I knew what he wanted to say. My fingers clutched the edge of the bar so tightly my knuckles turned white. He trailed off, not finishing the thought. Probably noticed the look on my face.
“Not long ago. Been wandering around and keeping to myself lately.”
The bartender put the beer down in front of me. I paid him in cash and left a tip. A table full of tired-looking guys in coveralls laughed loudly, cutting through the stillness.
The place was a dive. Dirty floors, rotting walls. Windows covered in grime. The bartender looked like he’d been birthed in this room—and they hadn’t bothered to clean up the mess.
It was hot as hell. The cold beer helped. San Antonio in the summer was brutal, and the dive either didn’t have air conditioning or the AC was broken. Stale humidity hung like mist.
“Here’s to freedom then,” Dario said, grinning.
He was a middle-aged guy. Balding, overweight. Didn’t keep himself in good shape. Never needed to, back when I knew him.
“What have you been up to since I went away?”
He shrugged a bit, turning the glass in circles. “Been on my own since everything went down. Met a woman. She keeps me busy, mostly.”
“Working?”
“Not at all.” He nodded to himself and slugged back his drink. Gestured for another. Paid in cash. “Thinking about retiring.”
“Retiring? You’re still young.”
He grunted and smiled at me. “Not young anymore, I’m afraid. You’ll understand one day. You hit thirty, things get tough. You hit forty? It’s all downhill.”
“Good thing I’ve got time.”
“That’s all you’ve got. Here’s to time and youth.”
We toasted. I wanted to slice his throat open and watch him bleed like a pig. I steadied myself and sipped the beer. I needed to learn a few more things first.
“What about everyone else? You know, Carmine’s old crew.” I watched the beads of sweat on my glass while I said it. Couldn’t stare into his eyes. He’d see the rage in me.
Dario went still. Real still, like something big stalked him from behind.
“You really don’t know?”
“Just got out of jail. Nobody called. Nobody wrote.”
“Typical. Make a guy do time and forget about him.” Dario shook his head. “That’s the sort of shit that made me want to walk away.”
I doubted it. I suspected it was money. Didn’t matter.
“So what happened?”
“Half of them are dead,” he said, shoulders slumping. “Other half left town. The new guys, the Balestras? They’re running things. I saw the writing on the wall and got out.”
“They let you go, just like that?” I glanced at him then. He met my gaze, and for a second, we let it hang between us.
Crime families didn’t let their lieutenants walk. Nobody retired. You either earned until you couldn’t earn anymore, or you died. Dario still had earning years in him, and he was still walking and talking. For now.
“Transfer of power wasn’t smooth,” he said, showing teeth. I smiled back to ease the tension. “Lots of guys drifted away, and last I heard, the don was letting them go.”
“Lucky you then.”
“Yeah, lucky me, I guess. Twenty years working for Falsone, then this happens. I don’t feel too lucky.”
I shrugged and drank my beer. He tossed his back and swallowed half at once. Poor bastard was drenched in sweat.
I reached into my pocket. He flinched as I took out a fat spliff, thick with weed and pungent.
His eyebrows raised.
“Interested?” I asked.
He nodded. “You know me.”
That was right. I knew him.
“Come on.” I finished my drink and stood. He finished his and followed me outside.
San Antonio was a typical Texas city. Spread out, wide streets, lots of cars and single-family homes. Not a whole lot of grass. Gravel, stones, cacti. That sort of thing. Very southwestern.
We were in an ugly neighborhood south of the pretty downtown area, away from the river and the tourists. I took Dario down a side alley that jutted in behind the bar. The building was a ramshackle thing made from wood and looked like it might fall over any second. Half the town looked that way to me.
“I remember you boys used to have the best stuff,” Dario said, grinning as we stood alone in the grimy alley. “Carmine and you and that girl, what was her name?”