When he was a teenager growing up in a mob family, Nicholas Cuccia listened carefully to the conversations among his father and his two uncles. All three brothers were captains in the Vignieri crime family and expected to one day rule the New York underworld.
As he matured, Cuccia also noticed how none of his uncles and father trusted each other. Conversations between any two always concerned the absent brother. It wasn’t until his father died in prison while serving a life sentence for murder and racketeering that Nicholas understood the distrust among the three brothers. It was a philosophy of mob life he would forever embrace.
Assume the worst. Never trust anybody. Me first.
This was why he didn’t trust his blood relations any more than he trusted the hired help. After putting up forty thousand dollars in cash for a hit on a civilian vacationing in Las Vegas, Cuccia was starting to wonder if maybe the last surviving brother, his uncle the underboss, had put a move on him. Maybe the government had made two sets of deals. Maybe the hit man who shook him down for an extra fifteen grand was whacking the money with Uncle Anthony instead of whacking Charlie Pellecchia.
Another day had passed without word of Pellecchia’s death. Cuccia was starting to think if he wanted the guy dead, he would have to do it himself.
He went down to the pool when he spotted the blonde without her black boyfriend or husband or pimp or whatever the fuck he was. Cuccia was surprised to see the blonde swimming laps. He stood at one end of the pool, waiting for her to finish. When she finally stopped, some fifteen minutes later, Cuccia handed her a towel as she climbed out of the pool.
“That explains your shape,” he told her.
She was wearing an aquamarine one-piece thong. He could hardly keep his eyes off of her body. She thanked him for the towel but ignored the compliment.
“You from around here?” he asked.
The blonde shook her head as she dried herself.
“Where you from? Because I think I may move there.”
The blonde looked up at him and pointed. “You’re drooling,” she said. “What’s wrong with your mouth?”
Cuccia could feel his facial expression change with his embarrassment. He wiped the drool from his mouth with the back of his hand. He looked the blonde up and down before saying: “I guess you just go for the dark meat, huh, honey?”
The blonde winked at him. &ldqu;I just like them big,” she said.
Cuccia stormed off, kicking empty lounge chairs on his way back inside the hotel.
Later, after he stopped at Joey Francone’s room to vent, Cuccia’s mouth was drooling all over again. This time it was from aggravation. When he saw the empty twin bed in Francone’s room, he immediately remembered Vincent Lano.
“Jesus Christ,” Cuccia said through his wired jaw. “What the hell is going on in this shit city?”
Francone combed his hair in front of a mirror. Except for royal blue silk bikini underwear, he was naked. “I think we can forget Lano,” he said. “The guy either flipped or he’s dead from cancer.”
Cuccia sat on the edge of what should have been Lano’s bed. The covers were untouched. “You see this motherfucker Pellecchia last night?”
Francone tightened his chest in the mirror. “Please. I sat in that fuckin’ lobby all night. Security come over to me it musta been a dozen times. ‘Can I help you, sir?’ ‘Anything wrong, sir?’ Yeah, you can help me. Yeah, there’s something wrong.”
“So the answer is no, you didn’t see him.”
Francone shook his head in the mirror. He turned to one side and flexed his arm muscles.
“Oh, quit posing over here,” Cuccia said. “You look to see he’s still checked in?”
“I did that. He’s still checked in. No answer when I call the room.”
“This is bullshit. I think I got stung by the old man.”
“Your uncle?”
“Between this bullshit and Lano taking off, yeah.”
“You think your uncle -”
“Go put a fuckin’ shirt and pants on,” Cuccia said. “I don’t get turned on lookin’ at your hairy ass.”
Francone went to the closet to pick a shirt. There were three polo shirts hanging inside; all were black. He grabbed one off a hanger.
“We could always get this fuck when he comes back to New York,” Francone said. “It’d be a lot easier back home.”
“Except I already paid for a hit out here,” Cuccia said.
“At least we know it’ll get done.”
Cuccia nodded. It made him think one more time about taking care of Charlie Pellecchia himself.