An Offer You Can't Refuse by Sal Bianchi (best beach reads .txt) 📕

vague idea, of course. He’d basically begged me to reconsider and come back during that phone call, so he obviously wasn’t happy that I’d left. Still, he had made sure the mafia wouldn’t retaliate against me, so he obviously wasn’t angry enough to have me killed. Even people who didn’t know anything else about the mafia knew that you couldn’t just “leave” the mafia. The fact that I was alive and not buried in an unmarked grave somewhere was evidence enough that my brother didn’t completely hate me.

I pulled my phone out of my pocket and stared at it silently, unsure whether I should call Jase for backup. I spent just a brief moment thinking it over before I decided against it. I’d already pulled Jase into enough of my crap lately. I knew that if I called him, he’d be here in a heartbeat, but it wasn’t fair of me to keep putting his job on the line like that.

Furthermore, if things ended up going south tonight, it would actually be better for there not to be any witnesses. The mafia handled in-house disputes on their own, so even if someone died, it probably wouldn’t make it back to the authorities. The same could not be said if a federal agent was present.

I shuddered as I thought about what might happen if Jase actually did come. They would probably kill him. It was a morbid thought, but it fueled me back into the rage-filled state I’d arrived in. Before I could lose my nerve again, I shoved the car door open and stepped outside.

It was much cooler now. A light breeze whipped through my hair as I stalked brazenly toward the entrance of the bar.

The small bell mounted above the door jingled cheerfully as I stepped inside. For a moment, a sense of nostalgia flooded me as I took in the bright, happy scene in front of me. Every table was packed with men chatting or playing cards. The younger members gathered at the bar counter, already drunk and horsing around playfully. A new waitress I didn’t recognize was weaving between the tables to deliver food orders, rolling her eyes every time one of the drunk patrons made a good-natured comment toward her.

“What the hell are you doing here?” A voice roared at me, and just like that, the nostalgic illusion was shattered. Half of the heads in the bar looked up at the sudden exclamation, their eyes widening with surprise when they saw me standing at the door. I sighed ruefully and turned toward the source of the sound. It was one of the men who had been sitting with Domenico the other morning when I’d stopped by to see Colletta. He looked familiar, but I couldn’t place his name right away.

“I asked what you were doing here,” he snarled as he marched menacingly toward me. He was a big brute of a man, just like Domenico. All brawn with very little brain to speak of. His hair was sweat-slick and plastered against his forehead, and despite the snarl, his eyelids were drooping. A black tie hung loosely around the collar of the red shirt he was wearing, and it was clear that he’d already had several drinks.

He reached out as if to grab me, and I quickly stepped to the side and shoved him against the shoulder with one hand. He was drunk enough that even a slight push was enough to send his hulking frame off-balance.

“Don’t touch me,” I sneered. “I need to speak to Alessandro.”

“You’ve got a lot of nerve,” a different man laughed as he walked up to me. “You think you can just walk in like you still belong here? Demand an audience with the boss?”

I frowned as I appraised the new man. He wasn’t slurring his speech at all, and his gait was steady. It would be harder for me to deal with him if he was sober.

“So I need permission to speak to my own brother?” I scoffed. “From who, you?”

“You need to watch your mouth,” the new man growled.

I was about to retort when I caught a flash of red out of the corner of my eye. It was the first man again, moving rapidly toward me. I threw myself sideways out of the way and back against the bar counter. The man in the red shirt fumbled forward and accidentally knocked into one of the other members seated nearby.

I rolled my eyes and turned to look at the narrow staircase tucked into the back of the bar. Allesandro’s office was upstairs. Though he sometimes spent time at one of the more high-end bars or clubs the Family owned, most of the time he preferred to work in his small office here above the bar, probably so he could keep an eye on the Family.

I pushed myself off the bar and began to walk toward the staircase. I’d barely made it three steps before the second man stepped in front of me and shoved me backward.

“I’m not done talking to you!” he yelled.

By now, we’d attracted the attention of almost everyone in the bar. Rather than feeling nervous, however, for some reason I felt emboldened by the fact that I was creating a scene in the middle of enemy territory.

“Well, I’m done talking to you,” I replied calmly. “I don’t have time to waste on some nobody picciotto.”

His face went red at my words, and I could hear a few of the patrons muttering around us. A picciotto was the lowest rank of mafia officer there was. Basically, they were the grunts of the organization that were tasked with petty duties such as giving beatings. However, picciotto was also often used to describe a young, inexperienced, or inept member of the mafia who was unable to prove himself enough to become a full-fledged soldati. I actually had no idea who this man was or what his rank was, but making the implication that he was beneath me was enough to