According to his mother, the men who were doing all this were coming after him. For now, his greatest hope was that they'd continue jumping from state to state. The longer they spent going after the individual Raffair offices, the more time they gave him.
"I talked to Skins Moletti just like youse asked, Don Anselmo, sir," said the deeply reverent voice on the phone.
Holy Pauli Pavulla still sounded awed to be speaking personally to the legendary Manhattan Don.
The first phone call the day before had stunned him. Pauli had been pretty much shunned by everyone else in the Scubisci Family ever since the Miracle of the Cheerios. He thought they'd only come around once he heard back from the Vatican. But then, whammo! From out of the blue, a call from Don Anselmo Scubisci himself.
Such an important event was this in Pauli Pavulla's life that the letters and photographs he'd sent off to St. Peter's months ago were forgotten. After all, the Pope was all well and good, but Don Scubisci was the capo of them all. Pauli might be called crazy as much as he was holy, but even he knew which ring to kiss first.
"You tell Skins to get moving faster," the Don ordered. The more nervous he got, the more he rasped. "The way they're moving, there's not much time left."
"Sure thing, Don Anselmo. He says he can be ready for eleven tomorrow morning."
"Six," Don Anselmo insisted.
"Uh, Skins says there's a lot to do," Holy Pauli said.
"Tell him to get it done!" Don Scubisci snapped. His angry words echoed through the dark prison. Somewhere distant, a sleepy voice yelled for quiet. Don Scubisci huddled farther into the phone. He had bribed a guard for these phone privileges. Of all times, he didn't want to have them revoked now. "What did he think all that money was for?" Anselmo whispered sharply. "For this. Now you tell him to get it done, or I swear on my mother's eyes it'll be the last thing he doesn't do."
Holy Pauli gulped. "I'll let him know, Don Anselmo," he vowed.
"And you don't stop off at church first, Pauli," Scubisci warned. "You call Skins as soon as you hang up from me. Six o'clock sharp. I don't care how it gets done. You screw up on this, you join Skins, capisce?"
"Yes, sir, Don Anselmo, sir," Pauli promised. "But don't worry so much. Ain't the Gabinetto brothers down in Miami?"
Don Scubisci thought of the four hulking Gabinettos. They were throwbacks to some early stage of man. At any other time, Don Anselmo Scubisci wouldn't have questioned the outcome of a contest involving the Gabinettos. Now he only hoped they lasted long enough to buy him the time he needed.
"I'll call back in an hour," he said, his voice flat.
"Don Anselmo?" Holy Pauli asked before the Mafia leader could hang up.
"What?"
"Youse want I should say a prayer for you, Don Anselmo?" Holy Pauli offered hopefully. Anselmo Scubisci pictured Pauli Pavulla kneeling at his kitchen table, a dozen flickering votive candles arranged around a bowl of curdled milk and Cap'n Crunch. Eyes already dead, he hung up the phone.
Chapter 31
General Rolando Rodriguez of the Movimiento de Izquierda Revolucionaria had parked his great People's Combat Wagon in front of the darkened Raffair office. The PCW was an '88 Ford station wagon he'd borrowed from his brother-in-law, Alberto, a Puerto Rican exile living here in Miami.
His nervous sweat fogged the car's windows. He was forced to clean away the dew periodically with a grimy T-shirt he'd found on the floor in the back.
After the disaster at MIR headquarters back in San Juan earlier in the week, Rodriguez had been bumped from corporal to general. It was a battlefield promotion he was afraid he'd never live to enjoy. After his multiple failures to eliminate the man who had decimated MIR's ranks, he had but one chance left to succeed. Otherwise, she would have her revenge against Rodriguez himself. The general suspected he'd only lasted this long because she was distracted by other matters these past few days.
Their numbers were far fewer now. The men from the first attacks in New York and Boston were dead. The later assault near Raffair headquarters on Mott Street had resulted in the first MIA soldier in the history of the revolutionary organization. After that soldier was gone, there weren't many left. Which was why the general himself had been forced to lead the last of his troops on this final campaign.
Rodriguez checked his watch. They should be in place by now. If the men he was after showed themselves here-and according to the information she had supplied, they would-the brave soldiers of MIR would be ready for them.
The window had fogged up again. Grabbing the torn Jennifer Lopez T-shirt, General Rodriguez wiped himself a squeaky tactical display field on the front windshield of Detroit's finest People's Combat Wagon.
"HE STILL THERE?" the gruff voice demanded.
"Yeah," said another from the shadows beside the office window. "He's wipin' off the window again."
Inside the Miami Raffair office, the three men were piled against the shadow-drenched wall. Thanks to Holy Pauli, they'd already gotten the word out of New Orleans. With another three Scubisci soldiers dead, the Gabinetto brothers were taking no chances.
The Gabinettos were hulking brutes with broad shoulders and massive fists. Unlike their fellow paisans, there were no nicknames for the four sons of Francesca Gabinetto. A distinctive sobriquet for any of them would have been redundant. To say "Gabinetto" was to say it all.
Their dark, looming shapes were throwbacks to some primordial time in Earth's history. In fact, many who met them thought the Gabinettos looked as if they'd be more comfortable splashing around a Cretaceous swamp. Even their normal mode of communication, which involved a great deal of shouting and hand waving, seemed to be from another age.
This night, the shouts were silenced, the hand gestures stilled. This night, their primitive silhouettes moved with silent purpose within the confines of the warm office.
They peered out the window at the dark shape that sat behind the wheel of the battered station wagon.
"You think he's waiting for this guy?" Emilio Gabinetto whispered. As he spoke, he nodded across the room.
A body lay on the floor near the open door to the rear storage room.
Mark Howard's hands had been tied clumsily behind his back. Dried blood darkened a spot on his light brown hair. His chest moved up and down rhythmically under his blue sweatshirt. He was unconscious, but alive.
"Don't matter," replied Fabio, the oldest of the Gabinetto brothers and therefore their leader. "I figured if that was the guy what's been whackin' everybody, we'd give him to Don Scubisci for a parole present. Now there's two of 'em, it's too complicated. We'll just kill 'em both."
"Shh!" hissed Jennio Gabinetto. He was still peering out through the miniblinds. "He's almost there."
The other two behemoths peeked outside.
A huge figure was sneaking up on the parked station wagon from behind. They watched in satisfaction as Mario, their youngest brother, crept up to the driver's door.
"We whack him, den dis guy, and maybe we can finally get outta here," Fabio grumbled. He jerked his head toward the sleeping man across the room.
Outside, their brother had reached the car door. A hand as big as a small snow shovel reached for the handle. With a wrench, he tore the door open, swinging up the gun he held in his other massive hand.
Through the picture window, the three waiting Gabinettos heard a muffled pop. Their brother was still standing at the car's open door as Fabio turned to the others.
"Okay, one of youse guys aerate him," he said, pointing to Mark Howard. "I'll get on the phone wit Holy Pauli and tell him it's done."
Fabio hadn't taken a single step toward the telephone when he heard a stunned gasp from one of his brothers. He twisted back to the window just in time to see the big shadow that had obscured the station wagon tumble over backward.
"Dey popped Mario!" Jennio Gabinetto said, shocked.
As he spoke, a figure emerged from the car. The man had pulled on a ski mask. As he stepped over the lifeless body of the youngest Gabinetto, they could see the rifle in the masked man's hands.
"Dammit!" Fabio growled. "Ma's gonna kill me."
The armed man was heading for the front of the office. Fabio was about to order his brothers to shoot through the window when he noticed another figure slip from the shadows behind the car. This one was followed by four-no, five more. All carried rifles braced against their chests. Each man wore a ski mask and jungle camouflage.
"I taut dese guys din't use guns," Emilio Gabinetto hissed even as he pulled his own weapon from his holster.