Fucking Frankie. Sal had tried to apologize, but Frankie was having none of it. Sal sent over a beautiful basket to his house—prosciutto, bresaola, soppressata, abbruzze, auricchio, Cerignola olives, Biancolilla oil, a bottle of Ruffino Chianti—but it came back unopened.
The hell does Frankie want?
The guy has some balls on him, going around saying I’m a fag. After I do Marvin, I might decide to do Frankie.
Problem is, Marvin ain’t playing by the rules. If you know a contract’s been taken out on you, there are certain ways you’re expected to behave—you’re supposed to go to ground, keep your head down, even leave town.
But Marvin ain’t doing any of those things. Exactly the opposite: he’s showboating, making himself conspicuous, going out to clubs, to dinner, hanging on the corner and in the parks, shoving it in Sal’s face.
Like You want me? I ain’t hard to find, am I?
Part of this hide-in-plain-sight bullshit is tactical, Sal knows: you stay in public because your would-be killer doesn’t want to do you in front of witnesses. But still, it’s showing Sal up, making him look bad.
Especially when Marvin sent a pound of fudge to Sal at American Vending with the note Heard you liked packing this. Sent it there deliberately, knowing it would humiliate Sal in front of the guys, force Peter’s hand.
People are supposed to be afraid of Sal Antonucci.
He loses that fear factor, he’s lost a lot.
Some wannabe might take a run at him.
So if he has to hit Marvin in front of witnesses, Sal’s going to make sure they’re witnesses who won’t talk.
Marvin’s own boys.
He could gun Jones down in plain sight in front of all of them and not one would dime him to the cops. They’ll come after him themselves, because—Black or white—that’s the code.
He decides to do Marvin on the ball court.
Do it the way the moolies do it.
Drive-by style.
Everything that Sal knows, Marvin knows.
And as bad as Sal wants to do Marvin, Marvin wants to do Sal. Because he’s heard whispers, too. About himself. That he’s getting soft, that as he’s climbed up the ladder he’s forgotten what it’s like to be on the ground. Street cred is like any other commodity, you got to refresh it every once in a while or it loses its potency.
So he sets up every opportunity for Sal to come at him.
To remind his people why Marvin is Marvin.
“Even the moolies know Sal is a fag,” Paulie says, sitting at the office. “Everyone’s laughing at us now.”
“They don’t know anything,” Peter says, looking at the box of fudge on the table. “They only know what they’ve heard.”
“That’s what I mean,” Paulie says. “Everyone hears. And how is that going to play in Peoria?”
“What?”
“It’s an expression,” Paulie says. “Like, what are people going to think. ‘How is that going to play in Peoria?’”
“Where the fuck is Peoria?”
“I dunno,” Paulie says. “The fuck difference does it make?”
“Because why the fuck would we care what people there think?” Peter asks.
“We don’t.”
“Then why . . .” Peter gives up.
“We care,” Chris says, his head starting to throb, “about what certain people in Boston think. About what people in New York think. That we have a gay captain in our family, that we can’t finish off a bunch of micks, and that now even the ditsoon are giving us the finger.”
Maintaining a separate family in tiny Rhode Island has always been a problem, Chris knows. Stuck between Boston and New York, both of whom would like to take over and make us just a crew, the Rhode Island family has always had to be tougher, stricter, more violent. If the guys in Boston or New York think we’re weak, they’ll be looking to take advantage.
This war trying to take a little turf from the Irish is going to cost us our whole thing.
“So what do you want to do?” Peter asks.
“Sal has to take Marvin out—”
“On a date?” Paulie asks.
“Yeah, funny, Paulie,” Chris says. “Then we’ll see what we have to do about Sal.”
“What do you mean?” Paulie asks. “He’s a fag.”
“Marvin says he is,” Chris says. “If Marvin is gone, he don’t say it no more. Frankie V says it, so . . .”
“So you’re saying we should whack Frankie to cover up for Sal.”