“Marty. Curtis. Johnny.”
“Okay. And the guys who you would say are good? Aside from Albert?”
“The guys I went to school with. Um… Leon, Kyle, Carlos, Saint, and Jason.”
“Okay. Got that. We will put some faces to names with that. Anything else you know about how the organization works? Who is in charge of what?”
“Colin. Colin is like a dictator. When Cody ran things, he had more of a hierarchy. I guess like the mafia. You have the boss, the capos, then the… whatever everyone else is. There are tiers. But Colin doesn’t really have that. He is the be-all-end-all. Everything gets run past him. No one makes a move without his say so.”
“Okay. Now, if Colin and the enforcers were gone, who do you think is most likely to step up?”
That was a good question.
“Um… maybe Saint,” I said. “He had been older than me in school, but he’d been dealing even then. Anything he could get his hands on. He had that entrepreneurial spirit even then. I think he would be the first to recover after the surprise and get things reorganized.”
“Alright. And how would Saint handle you and your brothers?”
“I mean, it’s hard to say. I haven’t been in close contact with him for years, but he wouldn’t keep me prisoner anymore. And I doubt he would care if my brothers left. Especially if I gave him the contact that has been in touch with me, and the money.”
“Listen, I know that dangling the money is an easy way to get people to do what you want, but it might be smart to play that card close to your vest. Why offer them something that you could just as easily keep for yourself?
“Trust me, if Colin was gone, and Saint got to step into his shoes, he would be making bank. And fast. I’m not saying he would turn down your money, but he would be making more than enough right away. So don’t offer him something that could set you and your brothers up.”
“I… okay,” I said, head spinning a little at the idea.
Any plan I had for the future involved first giving over most of the money to whoever wanted to take over after Colin. I couldn’t imagine walking away with that money for myself.
I didn’t know the exact figures. I’d never counted the money myself. But I knew from some quick estimation that it was at least three million.
Three million.
I couldn’t fathom that sort of security. The opportunity it would offer us.
A home. Funds to go to college or trade school. Even to start a business.
We could finally live our lives without the threat of very familiar poverty biting at our heels, ready to sink its teeth in.
If I were being completely honest, that had been the draw to Cody when I’d been younger. He had more. More than I ever did. More than I thought I would ever have because while I wasn’t stupid, I also wasn’t a great student, so I didn’t think college was an option.
My plan had been to pursue some sort of trade, fully knowing it would still have me living paycheck to paycheck for most of my life.
Then there was Cody. Who wanted to take me out to fancy meals and buy me pretty things.
And for a girl who had never had a new piece of clothing in her life, and who thought a trip to a chain breakfast place was extravagant because there had never been money for that growing up, it had been appealing.
It had probably been what had kept me with him for so long even after the bloom was off the relationship, and it was clear the two of us weren’t heading to a happily ever after. In fact, I didn’t think either of us was happy in the moment with each other, but were both just too cowardly to end it.
I actually had a sneaking suspicion that the woman in a red dress at his funeral was the “work” that “kept him late” so often the last month of our relationship before his death.
But I stayed because his apartment was safe, because it had a fancy rainfall shower and all the streaming services and a full fridge.
That sounded absurd, but to someone who had spent her entire life opening up an empty fridge and bare cabinets, the idea of giving that up made me feel a little sick.
Then I went from that to Colin’s house where the fridge was never empty, but always stocked with the same things year after year.
The idea of my own stocked fridge thanks to the money I might not have to give up? God, I could just cry at the thought.
“Okay. Back to Colin’s operation…” Massimo said, which launched us into an hour-long conversation about the comings and goings, about my observations on who carried what weapons and where the security cameras were.