American Mafia Miniseries – Part 4
Fabrizio walked back into the ballroom where the dance floor was filled with jubilant party goers. He smiled as he watched Giovanni’s daughter and the groom partake in their first dance together. It reminded him of his wife and him on the day they were married; very similar to this wedding, the crowd was full of friends and family. Smiles filled the faces of everyone watching. Fabrizio continued to help his don over towards the dance floor as Joseph followed close behind greeting several different friends and family members that he hadn’t seen in a long time.
As Giovanni approached the dance floor, his daughter met him at the edge. She reached out her hand and her father took it. As they began slowly dancing around the floor, other couples began forming and joining the Don and his beloved daughter on the dance floor. Fabrizio watched with a wide smile on his face as his boss laughed and kissed his daughter on the forehead… He turned over his shoulder and met eyes with Salvatore, the Don from Detroit… Salvatore was talking to the groom. He shook the grooms hand, then kissed him on the cheeks as he turned and walked away. Salvatore then noticed Fabrizio looking at him; he smiled, winked, and continued to walk to his car… Fabrizio then turned to the groom who looked scared out of his mind… His cheeks were red and sweat was pouring from his head…
“Whatever Salvatore told him, it scared the mess out of him…” Giovanni thought.
Fabrizio turned back around towards the dance floor and saw Giovanni walking towards him.
“How are you doing, Son?”
Fabrizio cracked a smile, “I’m fine. Where’d you learn to dance like that?”
“Ah, yes… My wife and I would practice dancing in the living room of our home before she passed away… She would love to see this moment for her daughter…” A tear fell from Giovanni’s eye as he stared back at his daughter.
For once since Fabrizio met Giovanni, he saw the wall of security around Giovanni’s personal life tremble… He saw the fragility of not only the physicality of his don, but the emotional fragility as well… On top of that, he was now the Capo Di Tutti Capi and a lot more responsibility would ensue…
A week after the wedding ended, Fabrizio was meeting with Giovanni and Joseph to talk about current situations in New York. “I want to know who is behind all this!” Giovanni yelled at Joseph as Fabrizio walked through the door. The smell of cigarette smoke greeted his nostrils with a mixture of alcohol and ash… “Ah! Finally someone who has some common sense!”
“What’s going on?” Fabrizio curiously inquired.
“What’s going on? I’m losing control of this city. The eyes of the family bosses are watching me and I can’t control a few business owners. They have the balls to say that someone bigger,newer, and better is in town now! Well where are they?” Giovanni rapidly and repeatedly banged his fist down on the table that stood waist high to him.
“Which business?”
“It’s called, ‘Barkers Baked Bites’ over on 4th and Main…” Giovanni looked at Fabrizio like a father would look at a son… “Go check it out, Fabrzio… Make me proud.”
Fabrizio rushed over to the bakery; he busted through the double doors and looked for the owner. He took a baseball bat in case anything got out of hand… He locked eyes with a large Italian man who stood nervously behind the counter.
“C…Can I help y…you sir?” His hands were trembling and a bead of sweat rolled down his forehead.
“Yeah, first you can give me your money you owe Mr. Giovanni, then you can point me in the direction of your boss. He owes me two knee caps…”
“Mr. Salvatore is protecting this store now sir… Maybe Mr. Giovanni would like a cake…? Or a strudel…?”
Fabrizio sat and stared blankly at the storeowner… “Mr. Salvatore, you said…? He’s protecting this place?”
“Y…yes sir…” Fabrizio began looking around the store…
There were a bountiful amount of dough and pastries on display. He got his baseball bat ready and began swinging like Babe Ruth around the store. With each swing the crash of glass and plop of dough on tile floors followed soon after. Fabrizio made his way to the counter and busted the display case and the cash register. He began taking the money out of the register and made his was to the door…
“Some job Mr. Salvatore is doing at protecting you, huh?”
He rushed back to Giovanni and Joseph. Fabrizio busted through the doors as was met Giovanni screaming on the phone… He sat and waited for his boss to get off the phone but was trying to get him to move along in the conversation.
Eventually his boss hung up the phone, but before Fabrizio could speak he said, “That’s the sixth business today that has refused to pay our cut of the money… We are losing revenue hand-over-fist…”
“Don, It’s Salvatore… He’s muscling his way into New York…”
As Giovanni heard this news he got up, lifted his office chair, and threw it across the room which amazed Fabrizio and Joe because at the wedding Giovanni needed help to get around. As soon as Giovanni calmed down he looked at his brother and Fabrizio, “What else can you two tell me?”
Joe got a glass of scotch from the liquor cabinet and offered everyone else in the room a drink but both Giovanni and Fabrizio didn’t want one. “Well I heard he’s been shaking down local shops, but his major step into New York City is a huge hotel that is a front for a casino and a brothel.”
Giovanni moved over to sit on his couch in his office since he threw the chair and broke it into a million pieces, he reached into his pocket and got his cigar and lit it and tried to calm down. “Alright, I want to send Sal a message. Fabrizio I want you to get your crew and blow up that hotel.”
Fabrizio was taken back how large he wanted to make the message so loud and what was even more shocking how calm Giovanni send it.
“Boss, are you sure? That might start a war.”
Giovanni sat up and looked directly at Fabrizio “Listen I have to defend not only MY city but I also have to DEFEND MY TITLE! AND I REFUSE TO BACK DOWN TO SOME PUNK FROM DETROIT!”
Fabrizio walked over to sit on the couch with Giovanni, “Listen Giovanni I understand you have to show that you’re in charge. But you can’t blow up a hotel! Do you know the kind of heat that will bring down?!”
Giovanni put down his cigar into the crystal ashtray he had at the end of the couch and took a deep breath and asked Joe to bring him a glass of water. “Alright Fabrizio, I understand what you’re saying. Alright I’ll send my nephew Giorgio to meet Sal.” Fabrizio looked puzzled by Giovanni’s decision to send not only a “civilian” but also his own nephew.
“Why him? He’s not part of this ‘thing of ours’.” Giovanni began to explain that he thought if he sent either Joe or Fabrizio if Salvatore was planning to make a foothold in NY he might try to kidnap and or kill either one of them, so if he sent a civilian to give the message to back off NY it’d be safer.
“Alright its your decision.” Joe and Fabrizio had said that at the same time which made Giovanni smile,
“I guess you guys think alike.” All three laughed.
The next day Giovanni, two bodyguards, and his nephew: Giorgio.
“Listen Giorgio, when you go in there show respect, and only say what I told you to say nothing else. Understood?”
Giorgio was only nineteen at the time and was completely nervous because the only stressful event Giorgio had was to make sure his paper he had for his English teacher was sent in on time. Giorgio wanted to be in his uncles business so this was his chance to make his way into his uncles business. “Alright uncle I understand, you can count on me.”
Giovanni put his hand on the boys back and patted him lightly. “I know you’re nervous, but I need you to be calm. And when you finish this there might be more work for you.”
Giorgio wanted to smile from ear to ear but kept his cool and a straight face. One of the bodyguards opened the door for Giorgio to get out of the car and led him into the building where an ambassador for Salvatore and the Detroit Family was waiting. That night at 9 pm Giovanni was pacing back and forth waiting for Giorgio to get back. Giovanni got his overcoat and was about to leave his office with Fabrizio and Joe plus all their bodyguards following them, but before he left he heard a woman screaming. It was his maid she had opened the door and saw a package on the front step. Normally all packages went to the rear of the house to be checked by guards but this time it came to the front door, plus it was soggy so the maid was curious so she opened it. All the guards in the house ran to the front of the house. With all the guards it was thirty-five in total, normally it was only five but after the recent events Giovanni turned his estate into a fortress. After all the guards got there Giovanni, Joe and Fabrizio finally got the okay to go out of the office the package was the right hand of Giorgio missing all the fingers except the middle finger. Everyone looked at Giovanni’s face that showed no emotion but his eyes looked like he would’ve killed everyone in that room if he were younger.
“Listen the both of you,” Giovanni was looking at Joe and Fabrizio with his cold black eyes that Joe thought looked like the eyes of a great white shark. “ I want you two to blow up that hotel and kill any person from Salvatore Carbone Family! YOU UNDERSTAND ME!?”
As Giovanni stormed back into his office and slammed the door, which shocked everyone, Joe looked at Fabrizio and sighed. “Do you know what that means?”
Fabrizio took a second but to him it felt like a lifetime, he was thinking about what Joe said. Was Joe clueless to what Giovanni said? Joe loved Giorgio more then Giovanni because Joe was never married and had children so he sort of adopted Giorgio so he took the death of Giorgio really hard so he might have heard what Giovanni said but might not have understood it. Was Joe checking to see if Fabrizio was paying attention? Or was Joe making sure they both knew what Giovanni said? Fabrizio finally stopped thinking about all these scenarios and let out a sigh which sounded like a horn from a ship because it was so silent in the house. “The Boss, your brother, my mentor, wants a war.”
Submitted by The Dubliner