He placed another hungry kiss on her lips, but this time she withdrew getting off the frame to get herself together once and for all. "I have made enough bad decision for a day."
"And I haven’t even come close to my count, cara," he said in a low voice but didn’t pull her against him again. The restraint surprised her.
"Wouldn’t dare to think otherwise."
She sighed, making her way towards the bathroom. The day had already been too long, and she dreamt of going to sleep at last. Noah could see himself out.
CHAPTER 18
Leaving Inéz’s studio apartment, Noah got into his car and drove away towards the Strip. He had some unfinished business as far as the New York girl was concerned. Noah had let his Underboss take care of the matter for so long without worrying about it. However, now her mother had come to his city and had been placed in one of his high-security properties, and the Capo still wondered what to do with the daughter. Ifanything at all. He was a heartless bastard most ofthe time, but the girl hadn’t committed a sin. At least not against him, or enough to be bound for such cruel faith. But to make a decision he needed to finally talk to her himself.
He pulled out the phone, dialing his brother’s number. It was the middle of the night but Flavio rarely slept more than four hours anyway, so he wouldn’t mind. He answered after two rings.
"Get Anastasia to my penthouse as soon as possible," he ordered.
There was a moment of silence on the other side. "You’re planning something?" Flavio asked, clear disapproval in his voice.
"Just make sure she is at my place within an hour." Noah swiftly hung up.
He was never the one to dwell on something that had already happened, or that hadn’t happened yet. He lived in the moment as much as possible, focusing on the most important problems that needed to be taken care of.
When he got to his apartment, his brother was already there with the girl. Isaac and Drew were sitting by the table engrossed in the laptop, talking about something in hushed voices. Noah greeted them with a nod, about to move on to Anastasia but they stopped him.
"I pulled out the footage from the time of your Capodecina's death," said Isaac. As if on command, Flavio got up from the couch and walked up to the men. "Look at this."
On the screen, there was Andrea Gasparistanding in the middle of a warehouse. He was clearly nervous, shifting his weight from one leg to the other every other second. No one was there but him. So, it came as a surprise when after ten minutes the man reached out to his pocket and pulled out a little bottle. With a swear on his lips, he opened it and drank the contents. It actually had been alcohol as toxicology later showed. But as soon as he drank the liquid, he started to cough badly, choking, unable to catch his breath. He collapsed on the floor, throwing up so heavily that his insides started to slowly come out as well. Then came the seizures. Fighting to hold on seemed pointless, as he stopped moving after a minute, lying in a pool of his own blood and vomit. Eyes were sticking out and his face was drenched of color. Then the footage ended rapidly.
Noah glared at Isaac. "Why isn’t there more?"
"That’s all I was able to recover," Isaac said. He leaned back, angry. No matter how much he tried, there was always something preventing him from doing his job. Someone one step ahead of him. And it was starting to get to him.
"It doesn’t show who cut him. And why bother with it when he was already dead?" wondered Flavio, strolling back and forth.
He was a smart one. That’s why Noah always relied on his Underboss when it came to strategic thinking. The man was able to see things others missed on a daily basis, and right now his goal was to figure out the reason behind such way of killing. It wasn’t usual. At least not for the Cosa Nostra. The Bratva also would show their faces because they didn’t care and always took pride in the things they did. The Triad would never be their problem as long as the Seattle Famiglia was still going strong. There was no one that worked this way.
Andrea Gaspari had died from chemical gas exposure. One of the most common chemical weapons had been used - botulinum toxin. To kill this way was almost too dreadful even for mafia circles. They didn’t use poisons, and if the Capo was someone else than Noah, who always preferred to be careful and had ordered to carefully examine the surroundings before going into the warehouse, many more of his soldiers would be dead by now as well. The toxin was in the air in the closed warehouse while Capodecina had been unknowingly inhaling it.
"Pull out the photos from the restaurant massacre," said Flavio, getting an idea.
Isaac did as he was told and soon they were looking through the files. They usually wouldn’t leave evidence of their crimes anywhere that could be traced to them. However, the massacre was an exception because they already had Henderson by that time and he was able to seal the files from prying eyes until they solved the case.
The Underboss seemed to be the only one to know what he was looking for. "There," he pointed to the man who was missing both his hand and head. "It’s the only person who got his hand cut
