Three weeks. It had been three weeks since Giuliana had been taken to the safe house. To say that she was going stir crazy was an understatement. She missed the little things, like being outside and taking a leisurely walk. David and Adamo were under strict orders to keep Giuliana inside of the cabin at all times and to keep the curtains drawn all day and night. Once a week one of the guards would pick up groceries and other necessities from the nearest convenience store. They would park several miles away from the cabin and make the trek back on foot, their arms loaded down with grocery bags. The two guards weren't talkative but they were respectful and polite enough, they also gave her vague updates on what was going on in the city.
Giovanni had only called a handful of times, mostly to ask about her wellbeing. He never divulged any information on his activities, not that she was surprised. He rarely, if ever shared the mafia business with her, only when he thought her safety was on the line. She had talked to her father regularly and could detect something odd in his voice, but she couldn't identify what it was so she chose to ignore it. Donatella had called twice and she too was behaving strangely, but Giuliana figured it was because everyone was under a huge amount of stress. Laura and Isabella had been permitted to call once, and Monica had not contacted her at all. It didn't bother her. If Monica was still giving her the silent treatment then that was her problem, Giuliana was not going to beg someone to talk to her.
The sun was hanging low in the sky, and because the cabin was surrounded by mostly trees it grew darker earlier. The curtains remained closed and the lamps were switched on. Adamo and David played gin rummy at the kitchen table after they had checked the perimeter of the cabin. This was how they typically spent their evenings, playing cards or watching television after dinner. Giuliana usually made dinner for the three of them. They had insisted that she didn't have to cook for them, but she thought that it was the least she could do, after all they were away from their families to tend to her.
The only thing to come out of this whole ordeal was that Giuliana was able to brush up on her cooking skills. She tried out recipes that she had saved on Pinterest, from chicken piccata to homemade cinnamon rolls. She was sure that she had put on a few pounds in the last few weeks. She hoped that she would be able to lose the extra weight before she saw Giovanni again.
"This had been one of the best assignments we've ever had," Adamo commented as Giuliana dried the dishes.
"Really? Why is that?"
David responded, "We usually collect debts off the streets. It's usually waiting and watching."
"Sounds boring," Giuliana placed a plate on the drying rack.
"It is," Adamo said in agreement. "At least here, we aren't tracking down lowlife drug dealers that skimmed from the Boss."
"People actually try to do that?" Giuliana was shocked, even though Anthony was not the face of the Graziano Family anymore, he still was the official Boss and was still to be feared by all that knew his name. Besides him, Giovanni was also known to be ruthless and would not tolerant anyone cheating him out of one cent. The stories that were told about Giovanni were legendary and had kept Giuliana up at night before they had married.
"People are stupid, especially desperate people," Adamo confirmed.
"The number one rule Giovanni had made us swear by, is to never touch the product. It'll only get you into trouble." David explained as he placed a card down. "Too many of the street guys have gotten themselves into trouble and had to pay for it."
Giuliana shivered at the implication of what David said. She wasn't naive enough to not understand what he was saying. The paid with their lives. They were used as an example, a warning to all those that even thought about stealing from the Graziano's.
Adamo kicked David underneath the table and nodded his head towards Giuliana, then the subject was dropped, obviously David had said too much. After all she was the pretty wife with her head in the sand, she wasn't supposed to know about these types of things. She was supposed to know about the latest gossip and fashion trends.
They continued on in silence until a sound came from outside the cabin. "What was that?" Giuliana asked. It sounded as if someone was trying to climb the side of the house. In the three weeks that she and her two guards had been hiding out at the cabin, there hadn't been any activity outside, other than the birds chirping and the odd raccoon scavenging for food.
"Go upstairs," David ordered. He grabbed the handgun fastened to his shoulder holster while Adamo clicked the safety off of his own gun. She stood frozen in place as David moved the curtain to the side so he could peer out of it. He turned around and saw her still standing there, "Mrs. Graziano you need to go upstairs and wait until we give the all clear. Now!"
Her feet finally moved and it was like her body was on autopilot as she raced up the wooden stairs and into her bedroom. She didn't know whether to barricade the door or wait it out. The house was eerily silent and it made a shiver run down her spine. She was mentally kicking herself that she didn't know how to shoot a gun, she had no way of defending herself. 'Damn it Gio, why didn't you teach me?,' Giuliana thought to herself. 'Of course it's not like I was begging him to.'
Time seemed to stand still. She couldn't hear any movement inside or outside the cabin, all she could hear was her heart pounding. She hid in the closet, crouching down in a ball in the back. There weren't many places to hide in the bedroom, it was either in the closet or underneath the bed. At least in the closet she could get to her feet and would have some chance of defending herself. Suddenly the muffled sound of a door slamming sounded, Giuliana was unsure whether it came from the front door or somewhere inside the cabin. Then the pounding of footsteps came up the creaking stairs and down the hallway. Giuliana held her breath as the footsteps stopped in front of the closed bedroom door and the squeaking of the door knob told her that a person was close, hopefully it was the right type of person.
"Mrs. Graziano?" Adamo's voice sounded.
She cracked the closet door open a fraction, and peered through the crack, spotting her guard standing in the middle of the room. "Is everything okay?"
Adamo nodded, "Yes ma'am. We didn't find anyone out there, it must have been an animal. David is on the phone with the Boss to let him know we had a false alarm."
"The Boss, you mean Anthony?" Giuliana was confused as to why her father-in-law would want to be alerted in regards to her safety. In the six months or so that she had been married she could count how many times she had spoken or seen Anthony on one hand. He was never at church on Sunday with the rest of the family, nor was he present at Sunday dinner even though it was held at his home. Philomena didn't seem to mind, neither did Gio and his brothers, but Giuliana thought it was strange that the patriarch of the family was never around. She had to remember to question Gio about that once everything had settled down.
"No ma'am, I mean Giovanni," Adamo explained. "He's not the official Boss yet, but he's on the street more than Anthony is, so most of the men already refer to him as the Boss."
Giuliana nodded in understanding. The dynamics of the mafia world were complex to say the least, there were so many moving parts. All she knew was that her husband was going to be the official Boss...eventually.
"You can come back downstairs now," Adamo said. "We triple checked and there's nothing out there to be worried about."
Giuliana gave a polite smile, "Thank you but I think I'm going to go to bed now."
"Of course, goodnight Mrs. Graziano," Adamo said as he stepped out of her bedroom.
"Please thank David for me as well," she added.
"I will. David will be on guard tonight, he'll be stationed in the kitchen if you need anything." One of the guards always informed her of who was going to be on guard for the night. She appreciated that they let her know which one of them would be awake so she wouldn't be surprised if she happened to need anything in the middle of the night.
Adamo headed back downstairs to reconvene with David, leaving Giuliana alone. She expected to hear from Gio soon so she took her burner phone into the bathroom with her as she ran a bath. The false alarm had drained her of all of her energy, the rush of adrenaline that she had felt had quickly dissipated, leaving behind total exhaustion. 'I hope he calls soon,' Giuliana thought to herself. She washed her hair and bathed as she willed the cell phone to ring, or at the very least light up with a text message from her husband. By the time she was out of the bath and curled up in bed, Gio still hadn't reached out to her. For the first time since she had gone into hiding Giuliana felt a rush of anger. Perhaps she had been suppressing her anger to make this whole experience tolerable, but now she was livid that her own husband couldn't be bothered to at the very least contact her. 'He must know how scared I was.'
Giovanni had instructed her to wait for phone calls and text messages, she was not supposed to contact him or her family members first. But at this very moment she could've cared less what Gio wanted her to do and when he wanted her to do it. As far as she was concerned she had been put through enough, not just by him but by her father as well. She had gone along with Gio and her father's plans and look where it had gotten her, locked away in a cabin in the middle of the Catskills. She wasn't even allowed to go outside. She hadn't had fresh air in three weeks and maybe that she was beginning to mess with her mind, because before she knew it she had the phone pressed to her ear and was waiting for her husband to answer. It rang and rang and rang, she almost hung up but then she heard an agitated, "Who the fuck is this?"
"Who do you think it is?" Giuliana retorted.
"Giulia, I told you to wait for me to contact you," Gio let out an exasperated sigh. "What's the problem?"
"You, you're the problem!" Giuliana wiped away angry tears that she suddenly felt sliding down her cheeks. "You couldn't call or text to see how I am? I know that you talked to David, is there a reason why you can't be bothered to call your wife?"
"I was going to call you but I knew that it wasn't an emergency," Gio responded in a gentler tone. He didn't have to see her to know that she either was in tears or close to it. "Don't cry mi amore."
"I'm not crying," she said stubbornly.
He let out a laugh, "I'm coming to see you in a few days."
"Really?" She perked up almost immediately.
"In the next two or three days I'll come visit you. Does that make you feel better?"
Giuliana nodded and swallowed the lump in her throat, "Yeah." She didn't realize how much she had missed him, she was surprised by how much she wanted to just see him face-to-face.
"You don't need to be scared. David and Adamo are trustworthy and capable soldiers, I wouldn't leave you with a couple of incompetent fools. I wouldn't do that to you.' Giovanni reassured her. He had been expecting for her patience to eventually wear out, so he wasn't entirely surprised that she had taken it upon herself to call him. "I'm sorry that I didn't contact you, I should have known that you would have been rattled."
"Alright," Giuliana whispered. It still shocked her how rapidly Gio could defuse her anger. She knew that her father had advertised her as a demure and quiet person, and Gio had learned rather quickly that that wan't entirely true. If anything her father had described her older sister Isabella, while Giuliana had a long fuse that would eventually end in a outburst.
"Now go to sleep," Gio said. "You'll feel better in the morning."
"Okay, goodnight Gio."
"Goodnight Giulia, I love you."
She blushed at his words, "I love you too." They hung up and she crawled into bed, willing herself to sleep and keep the 'what if' nightmares away.
Meanwhile, Giovanni stepped back into his office at The Granada Hotel, where he returned to his two brothers. He felt twenty years older, especially since two weeks ago, when his father had ordered for Enzo Santorelli to be released from the warehouse. He hadn't given a reason behind his decision and Enzo had gone completely underground, now the Graziano's had nothing to bargain with.
"Boy does she have you whipped," Dante commented. "You might want to keep that under wraps."
Giovanni leveled his younger brother with a glare.
"It's the truth," Dante defended as Gio continued to stare him down. "Whenever Giuliana's pissed off or crying you rush to smooth things over. If I didn't know any better, I'd say you came from a different family. Anthony sure doesn't act like that when Ma is upset."
"Well Anthony's a piece of shit," Vinnie joined in. "Of course he doesn't care about Ma, he's more worried about his whores. I'm grateful that Giovanni treats Giuliana well."
"I am too," Dante said. "Giuliana's a good kid. All I'm saying is that you should tone it down, Anthony's already gunning for you. If he thinks you've gone soft for a woman, then he might try to use her against you."
Giovanni nodded in agreement, "You're right."
"Really?" Dante was surprised, for as long as he could remember neither of his brothers ever thought he was right...about anything.
"He's already put me on his shit list, if he thinks I've lost my edge because of her then she and I are even bigger targets than we already are." Giovanni was frustrated to say the least, his father should've been one of his closet confidants but instead he was his biggest adversary. "I'm going to go visit Giuliana in a few days."
Vinnie nodded in understanding, "We'll cover for you."
"Does he know where she's been staying?" Dante asked. Anthony hadn't shown any interest in Giuliana's wellbeing, he couldn't even be bothered to ask about her whereabouts.
Giovanni shook his head, "No and I haven't told him where she's at. The guards that are with her are loyal to me, they won't say a word to him."
Giovanni was confident that David and Adamo would follow his orders over Anthony's. After all, Giovanni had been the one to recruit them when his father wanted to pass them up. David hadn't been born into the mafia, while Adamo's father had been a traitor that Anthony had relished in killing. Giovanni had kept that bit of information to himself. Adamo had told him that he wanted nothing more than to see Anthony six feet under, and Giovanni agreed with the sentiment. But he had to keep up the pretense of having respect for his father, even if he felt anything but.
"Where do you want to hit next?" Vinnie looked back down at the map of the city they had laid out on his desk. They'd already taken out over a hundred Santorelli soldiers, burned down several businesses, and captured two of their capos. The two capos were currently being interrogated and tortured in one of their warehouses.
"We could try their social club," Giovanni said. "Our guys on the street say they're still meeting as usual."
"Those are the guys of the old brigade," Vinnie shook his head. "They don't have anything to do with Enzo, most of them would be glad to see him get shot up in the middle of the street. The Santorelli's are more fractured than they let on."
"Maybe we should try to lure him out," Dante offered. "We could offer to meet and form a truce, then ambush him."
"He might not be wiling to form a truce," Vinnie pointed out. "We could always bypass Enzo and reach out to his father. Lorenzo is the Boss, just because Enzo is a loose cannon doesn't mean that Lorenzo still isn't calling the shots."
"Besides we are supposed to be men of our word. What would that tell the other families if we offer peace and kill him instead?" Giovanni said. Decorum was of the utmost importance to the Five Families of New York, if you were going to be a respectable Boss then you had to be a man of your word, you had to be honorable. That's exactly why Enzo wasn't respected among his men or the other four families, and he never would be.
"I want the men to keep watching Lorenzo's house and Enzo's apartment," Gio ordered. They had round the clock surveillance to keep an eye on the father-son duo, and they were getting hour by hour updates on the comings and goings of both residences. Unfortunately, Enzo had not returned to his apartment since being released by Anthony. He had virtually disappeared, even his favorite strippers couldn't entice him out of his hiding place. Oddly enough the attacks from the Santorelli Family were standard for a mafia war, they certainly weren't the type of attacks that came as retaliation for holding the Boss's son captive and beating the hell out of him for weeks. The elder Santorelli was either planning something catastrophic or he wasn't going to bother to avenge his only son. If Giovanni and his brothers had a better relationship with their own father, it would have been easy to assume that Lorenzo was going to launch an attack the size of which had never been seen in New York before. However, they could also easily believe that Lorenzo was saving face, his son was not supposed to be on Graziano territory and was caught encroaching on their place of business. Maybe Enzo's insolence had angered his father so much that he didn't care to seek revenge on his behalf.
"What is we used someone as bait to lure Enzo out," Dante glanced between his older brothers as he returned to his earlier idea.
"If you're going to suggest my wife then you're going to have your jaw wired shut," Giovanni spoke in a deadly calm voice. "I hope you enjoy having your dinner through a straw." Everyone knew when he used that tone he was not to be messed with, it had made grown men vomit and shit their pants simultaneously. His dark brown eyes had gone completely black, and his stare was locked on the younger man.
Dante held up his hands, "I'm not talking about her. I would never suggest that Giuliana be involved, I was going to say that Monica would be the perfect bait."
"Why Monica? She hasn't had any dealings with Enzo, as far as we know." Vinnie leaned back in his leather chair. "She's only interacted with Tiffany."
Dante still eyed Giovanni wearily as he spoke, "From a distance she and Giuliana resemble each other. Enzo seems to have this obsession with Giuliana, if we make him think that we're careless and she's roaming around the city it'll draw him out."
"But we still don't know why he's obsessed with her," Vinnie pointed out.
"She's mine, that's why he's obsessed with her. He's a typical spoiled, overgrown child, he wants what he can't have." Giovanni gazed out of the floor-to-ceiling windows that overlooked New York City.
"Do you think using Monica as a decoy will work?" Vinnie asked Gio.
Giovanni shrugged, "As long as he doesn't get close enough to realize he's got the wrong sister. But Salvatore won't ever go for it. He kept his daughters locked away for a reason, he's certainly not going to dangle one of them in front of an unstable madman."
"Back to the drawing board," Dante muttered.
"We hit their strip club on 27th street in Brooklyn, in the back it doubles as a brothel. We'll send in a few men to act as patrons and right before closing we'll attack." Giovanni declared after several minutes in deep thought. "At the same time, I want their dealers in the Bronx and Queens shaken down, roughed up. Tell the soldiers to take their dope and money. We'll find out when their next shipment of cocaine is coming in and take it over."
Vinnie and Dante nodded in agreement as they listened to Gio's plans for the next few days.
"Fill the Bellucci's in on what we're doing," he told Vinnie. "I've got another plan that I'll need your help with." Gio then spoke to Dante, "Keep an eye on any gun shipments the Santorelli's might have coming in and have a plan of attack ready."
Giovanni looked at the framed picture of himself and Giuliana, she had insisted that he put it on display in his office. In it they were outside in their backyard, both smiling at the camera. She had been recovering from the car crash and was spending all of her time at home. Their faces were pressed together and they were holding onto each other. It was a time that Gio was anxious to get back to.
He turned back to the two other men, "I want this done in two days. The faster we kill the Santorelli's the sooner this will all be over. I should've killed Enzo like I wanted to, but I listened to Anthony and kept him alive." He gave them a sinister grin, "I won't make that mistake again."