Chapter 8 - THE SIEGE
By nine o’clock that night, the living-room window was covered with two sheets of three-quarter-inch marine plywood, bolted directly into the brick framing with four-inch masonry anchors that Jamal had helped Silvio drive with a pneumatic hammer.
The house smelled of sawdust, oil, and Dante’s beef stew.
It was an old family recipe—shin meat, dark wine, carrots cut thick as thumbs, and enough garlic to kill an ox. It had been simmering in my twenty-quart stockpot since four o’clock, and the rich, thick scent had completely driven out the lingering ghost of the kerosene smoke.
The dinner table had been extended to its absolute limit, with two folding card tables jammed against the end to make room for fourteen chairs.
Dante sat at the head.
He had not put his jacket back on. His holster was snug against his ribcage, visible to everyone in the room, but nobody was looking at the gun anymore.
They were looking at the bread.
"Pass the loaf, Nico," Caleb commanded, reaching across the table with a fork.
"Use your fingers, idiot," Nico snapped back, slapping Caleb’s wrist with the flat of his butter knife. "You're going to drop it in the gravy."
"Both of you stop before I take the bowl away," I said from the foot of the table, though there was no real heat in my voice.
Between us sat seven other children, three of Dante’s men, and enough food to feed a platoon.
Luis was sitting on Dante’s right. His small bowl was already half-empty, and he had three fresh bottle caps—clean, shiny ones that Rocco had apparently brought him from a soda fountain in the North End—lined up in a neat, geometric row beside his water glass.
"Dante?" Matteo asked from the middle of the table. He had his notebook open next to his plate, a golf pencil clutched in his left hand.
"Matteo," Dante acknowledged, cutting a piece of beef with his knife.
"The guy with the broken nose," Matteo said, pointing his pencil at Silvio. "He told Jamal that if three cars come down the street at thirty miles an hour, you have to hit the first one in the radiator to stop the column. Is that true?"
Silvio coughed into his napkin, his face turning a dark, mottled red.
Dante didn't smile, but his eyes narrowed with that dry, quiet amusement I was beginning to recognize.
"Only if the street is narrow," Dante said seriously. "If the street has room to maneuver, you take the rear vehicle first. Otherwise, the third car backs out and calls for reinforcements. You always cut off the retreat before you engage the front."
Matteo nodded solemnly, writing: *Rear car first (if wide street)* in his notebook before taking a massive bite of carrot.
"You're teaching an eight-year-old urban ambush tactics," I said down the length of the table, raising an eyebrow over the rim of my cider glass.
"I’m answering an engineering question," Dante replied smoothly. "A man should understand traffic patterns."
Across from Matteo, Talia sat with her arms crossed, her plate untouched. She had been staring at Dante for two hours with an expression that could have stripped paint from an old fence.
"You're going to get us killed," she said suddenly.
The table went completely silent.
Caleb’s fork stopped halfway to his mouth. Bibi stopped chewing her bread. Even the clinking of Luis’s bottle caps ceased.
Dante set his fork down. He didn't look angry. He turned his head slowly, his gray eyes fixing on Talia’s sharp, pale face.
"Talia," I warned softly, but Dante lifted a single finger, silencing me without looking away from the girl.
"Go on," Dante told her.
"You think because you have money and guns, you're the biggest thing in the city," Talia said, her voice trembling with that fierce, desperate rage that only children who have been promised everything and given nothing can manage. "The Russians aren't going to stop because you put plywood over the window. They’re going to come back with more men. They’re going to come back when you aren't here, and they’re going to burn this house down with Mari inside it."
She stood up, her folding chair screeching against the floorboards.
"You don't care about us," she hissed, tears finally spilling over her dark lashes, hot and angry. "You just want to win. You want Luis because he’s a Moretti, and you want Mari because she didn't roll over like everybody else does when you walk into the room!"
She turned to run toward the stairs.
"Talia."
Dante didn't shout. His voice was low, heavy, and cracked across the dining room like a rifle shot.
Talia froze three feet from the archway. Her shoulders were hunched, her fists clenched so tight her knuckles were white as chalk.
Dante stood up. He walked down the side of the table, his boots unhurried, his tall frame blocking the light from the kitchen chandelier. He stopped two feet behind her.
"You're right," Dante said.
Talia’s head jerked around, her eyes wide with shock.
"I am a violent man," Dante told her, his voice quiet enough that only the table could hear. "I have done things in this city that would make your skin turn cold. I came here because of a debt and a name. That was the truth on Monday."
He stepped closer, looking down at the fourteen-year-old girl who had spent her whole life waiting for the next blow to fall.
"But you are wrong about one thing," Dante said.
He reached out, his large, scarred hand resting gently on top of her head, his fingers curving around her dark hair with a steady, unyielding pressure.
"I don't leave my people to burn," Dante said. "And as long as there is breath in my lungs, Talia, you are my people. The Russians will not come back to this street. Do you know why?"
Talia swallowed, her throat working, unable to speak.
May you like
"Because tonight," Dante said, "I am going to them."
***
