I grab the handle of the door, only now realizing how flimsy it actually is. Not bothering to unlock it I yank it free from the lock, the door breaking free from its hinges as I see a scared bitch standing in front of me.
“What I was saying, sir,” he trembles.
“Was nothing,” I finish his sentence for him and then finish his night, with a right cross right across the bridge of his nose, blood spurting everywhere.
I reach for my baby girl’s hand, ready to guide her over this cazzo, but instead, I scoop her up, remembering she doesn’t have panties on and doesn’t need to be exposed to any of the other customers, who are luckily focused on what’s happening on the main stage.
I try and move quickly toward the front door so I can get Gabriella out of here without her dad seeing, but it’s too late. He catches sight of us and his chin drops to the floor. I motion him over, knowing he needs to come with us now before the bouncers find out what happened and all hell breaks loose.
“What’s going on?” Tim asks, staring at Gabriella.
“She went trick or treating and got lost. Now let’s go,” I say, grabbing his shoulder and forcing him into the front of a taxi, leaving the back for me and his daughter.
After what she just saw, the violence I needed to dish out, she needs to know I’m here for her, to hold her tight.
“So we meet again,” A voice over my shoulder cuts through the crisp night air, just as I’m carefully helping her into the cab.
I turn and see the prick from the waste management place earlier today.
“And so I’m not interested again,” I say, about to step into the cab.
“You know, Mr. Gallo,” he begins with a shit-eating grin, proud that he knows my last name. “There’s a price to pay for taking the girls out of my club.”
“Oh yeah?” I question, cracking my knuckles and stretching out my arms. “And there’s a price to pay for being a human trafficking scumbag,” I throw right back at him before I throw a haymaker right into his ugly face.
He goes down like a ton of bricks, and I just stare at his single security guard. “What the fuck you gonna do?”
He takes a step back and raises his hands before saying something into a microphone headset.
“That’s what I thought,” I add, before sliding into the cab. “Drive,” I command, and we’re gone into the night, but all the problems I thought were gone, left back in Italy, are surely about to come right back.
But I’ll be prepared because nothing will stop me from keeping her safe. Nothing…because she’s mine.
6 Giovanni
“Good morning…Daddy.”
I run my hand over my face and squint out of one eye.
“It’s almost time for lunch. Time to get up. Or maybe you need some help with that?” Gabriella asks, grabbing the groin of my boxer briefs with her hand.
“What the hell’s wrong with you?” I say through gritted teeth, trying to keep my voice down as I grab her by the forearms and get her off me.
“Somebody woke up on the wrong side of the bed.”
“Where’s your dad?” I ask, trying to get a hold of the situation as my mind is still waking up after a long night.
“You didn’t hear the news?”
“Listen to me, little girl. Tell me what’s going on right now or,” I pause, lowering my voice, “I’m going to spank you silly.”
“Promise?” she moves back toward me. “Because I promise to like it.”
“I promise you won’t this time,” I counter.
“Dad went to work.”
“Work? I specifically told him not to. Those guys are going to be coming for us, which is why I stayed up all night trying to secure the house. Your dad is supposed to be on watch duty right now.”
“I don’t think we have much to worry about when it comes to them anymore?”
“You don’t understand how these guys operate.”
“They’re not going to be operating for a long time.”
She holds up her phone and I read the headline. Apparently the feds had been building a case against those guys for the last six months. Human trafficking. Money laundering. The list goes on and on. And last night, after I decked the bastard that was their cue. The story is accompanied by a picture of the ‘security guard’ who was protecting Marroni. Seems he was actually with the federal government, in combination with the Italian government, to bring down an international crime ring that was bigger than any in history. And all that happened here, in this little town?
I passed out thinking two steps forward and one step back. I’d left Italy after turning in another scumbag who was trafficking only to find another one here. I would say what bad luck, but in a way, it’s good luck because I’ve been able to help a lot of people…and get to know Gabriella in the process.
“What did your dad say about last night?”
“He blamed it on my mom, said I was acting out because my mom ran off with some guy and that he was lucky you were there to spot me and save me.”
“So he thinks…I’m the good guy in all of this?”
“You know how much he likes you,” she says, running a finger over my cheek, but this time I don’t resist her advances.
“What about his business?”
“He’s too naive to understand how these guys were laundering money. Not only that but they were laundering most of it to Italy, via fake construction projects, so how could he have verified any of that information.”
“He is naive, that’s for sure.”
“That may be true, but his daughter’s not, and
