Silent Whisper (15 page)

He shrugged, rubbing his chin thoughtfully. “Makes no difference to me, but then, it seems that I don’t have the same distractions as you.”

I cocked a brow, waiting for him to continue.

“It wasn’t a
good
idea, Nick. Pop is onto you. What the fuck were you thinking?”

I felt myself stiffen in anger. I didn’t like the fact that my personal life had been invaded. I didn’t feel the need to explain my actions to anyone.

“My personal life is just that…
personal.
I don’t have to explain it, justify it, or have anyone else approve what I do. Do you understand, Sal?”

“Hey,” he growled, “When it interferes with family business, or puts us at risk, then it goddamn well is
our
business.”

“Let’s table this for now,” I said, “This is not the place or the time.”

“Yeah, later. For
sure
later, little brother.”

Two days later, I was on the family jet, headed back to Camden. The elections had been completed amongst the ‘Transportation Cartel’ and Marco Trevani would be filling the open slot of the LCN-backed Secretary-Treasurer position with the ILA executive board effective January 1st.

My father and I had spoken and argued at length, neither of us coming to terms with one another’s expectations going forward.

For all of my life, I had done whatever possible to stay on my father’s good side, not necessarily to please him, but to walk that fine line of tolerance and adherence because it was in the family’s best interest to do so.

That’s not to say that I always
agreed
with his actions or approved of
his
methods for getting things done, but I always understood that my place was to respect and honor him as head of the family. Dissension had no place in our home or in the family business.

Until now.

“You’re putting your brothers at risk, Dominic,” my father had told me. “You’re putting the whole family at risk by keeping her. She knows, doesn’t she?”

“Knows what?” I asked, feigning ignorance.

“That you’re the one that went in and saved her that night.”

I wasn’t sure how he knew that unless he had guessed it, the same way that my mother had. I looked into his eyes, knowing somehow that he already suspected what my answer would be.

“Yes.”

“You’re a fool!” he shouted, turning from me as if I had disgraced him. “And for what? Some twisted sense of reparation for a deed you didn’t even
commit
?”

“It’s complicated,” I admitted, not backing down the way that Sal and Vinnie always did.

“Complicated?” he asked, incredulously. “What’s complicated my son is that you’ve neglected priorities, and it’s become obvious even to our associates. And the fact that you’ve admitted to being a witness to her parents’ elimination could put us in jeopardy.”

“There’s no jeopardy,” I said, my voice getting louder. “She knows better than that. Besides, we’re in love and we’re together and that is
my
private business and no one else’s.”

“Bah,” he spat derisively. “I’ve raised a fool for a son! It’s one thing that Anna Maria has brought humiliation to your marriage, but at least she hasn’t gone public with her affinity for her own gender. Whereas you? You are flaunting your mistress about, setting her up in a business and a home, and putting the rest of us at risk. You can get all the pussy you want Dominic without falling in love with it.”

“Stop!” I shouted; my fists clenched at my side. “I won’t discuss this with you or anyone else. I’ll leave the family first.”

And with that, I knew that I’d crossed the line with my father.

“That’s not a choice that you have,” he ground out, his dark eyes getting even darker. “We’ll table this discussion for now. We need a cooling off period—the both of us. For now, I need for you to continue on temporarily as counselor for the family, just until Franco is back with us. He’s doing a little time in Joliet.”

“How much time?”

“Six months”

Damn.

“If I agree, will you drop the matter of Karlie?”

“For now,” he replied quietly. “For
now
.”

“Agreed.”

“I’ll need you in Chicago in two weeks for some union negotiations.”

“I’ll be there.”

The rest of the trip was spent in silence, which was fine with me. I knew my father was not pleased, but for now, he would at least tolerate the situation in silence.

He had no issues with Sal or Vinnie’s indiscretions, but I knew damn well there was a difference. Still, I knew my Karlie; whatever she initially had planned to avenge the loss of her parents, had fallen by the wayside long ago. I not only loved Karlie, but I trusted her, and that was a rare thing for me.

For the next two weeks, she was mine. And we would damn sure be making up for lost time.

Dominic had been home for over a week now, and seemed a bit more relaxed than he was before he left. Things seemed almost normal again, but not quite.

Though he was back, he spent an inordinate amount of time on the phone, and he still had that friggin’ driver taking him everywhere. When I noticed one evening that his driver was parked out in front of my condo, I finally broached the subject.

“Dominic,” I said, turning from the window, “Why is your driver still parked out front?”

He looked up from where he sat at my dining room table, going over the latest figures of DBK Enterprises. “Because I asked him to,” he replied.

“Is he more than a driver?” I asked.

“Sit down, Karlie,” he instructed. “We need to talk.”

Uh oh.

I took a seat at the table, and he took my hands into his, rubbing my fingers with his gently.

“Do you trust me?”

I nodded. “Yes.”

“Then you need to know that sometimes I’m not at liberty to provide answers to your questions. This is one of those times, I’m afraid. What I can tell you is that you have no need to worry for your safety. I would never bring risk to you in any way. If I ever suspect that you might be at risk, I would remedy that situation immediately.”

“But what about your safety?” I asked. “You think I don’t worry about that?”

He raised my hand to his lips, kissing my knuckles softly, his dark brown eyes never leaving mine. “I don’t want you to worry about anything, angel. Listen, I’m going to be in and out of town for the next five, six months max. And then things will settle down a bit, okay?”

Six friggin’ months?

I nodded, but there was no way I was convinced of that.

“Good,” he replied, smiling. “By the way, the business is looking fantastic. Your revenues are over budget. Have you been taking your salary in cash withdrawals like we discussed?”

I was distracted, still trying to absorb the previous topic. “What? No. I haven’t taken anything out yet,” I admitted.

“Well, we’ll remedy that tomorrow. You need to draw a salary sweetheart, so that you have taxable income. I see you have a large order on the books. I take it things panned out with Abigail?”

“Actually, that order came in on its own after we received a quote request,” I replied. “I had to hire some additional temp help in order to get it out by mid-October. It’s going to Italy.”

He looked over at me. “Do you have the purchase contract?” he asked.

“Well of course, Dominic. I wouldn’t
start
a job like this without a purchase contract. It’s in the office. Vinnie looked it over before we acknowledged.”

Now he was starting to piss me off. I wasn’t totally clueless when it came to matters such as this.

“I’m not trying to insult you, angel. I’ll take a look at it when I’m at the office with you tomorrow. I just want to make sure the terms and conditions are acceptable since this is an international order, that’s all.”

He smiled, scooting his chair back and standing up. “Come baby, let’s go to bed.”

That night Dominic made love to me as if it might be the last time. I wasn’t grasping the magnitude of all of this. There was so much I didn’t know—didn’t want to know, but wasn’t allowed to know regardless.

The following day Dominic spent most of it in the office with me at West End/DBK. He studied the purchase contract with Corallo, a frown creasing his forehead.

“Is there a problem?” I asked.

“These shipping terms,” he replied, looking over at me, “They aren’t our standard terms.”

“Well it’s a huge order, Dominic. There will be a couple of large wooden crates going. It has to ship by ocean freight; air freight would’ve been too expensive and cut into our profits.”

“No, sweetheart, that’s not what I’m concerned with; freight pre-paid & add is not the payment term we use in our contract; neither is FOB: Destination.”

I didn’t know why he was making an issue. Vinnie had approved those terms when he reviewed the purchase contract. “Dominic,” I sighed, “I pointed that out to Vinnie, but he said it was fine. He’s arranged for the carrier and he said we’d simply add the freight charges to the final invoice. It’s not really costing DBK anything.”

His brow furrowed a bit in response to my explanation, but he didn’t make any further issue of it simply saying he’d talk to Vinnie about it later.

He must have done just that because later that afternoon I heard him on the phone, his voice raised talking to someone I presumed was Vinnie as I came into the office. I managed to hear him ask the party on the other end who Corallo was fronting for before he spotted me and immediately finished the conversation in Italian.

When the call ended, I took the opportunity to inquire. “Is there a problem with the Corallo order, Dominic? Is Vinnie up to something? I wanna know.”

“It’s been taken care of,” he replied brusquely. I don’t want you to concern yourself with the details, alright?”

I nodded, and remained silent. It was clear that he was agitated, but not with me. He must’ve read the uneasiness I was still feeling.

“Come here,” he ordered softly.

I complied, walking over to where he was sitting on the corner of my desk, and allowed him to encircle my waist with his arms, as he pulled me in closer to him. I felt his hand cup my chin, and as he tilted my face upward, I allowed the sigh I’d held captive to be released.

“I always stand by you, Karlie. You know that, right?”

“Yes, Dominic,” I whispered, losing myself in the dark depths of his eyes. “I know that.”

“Good girl,” he said, kissing my lips softly. “Now I have an appointment downtown so I will see you later, capisce?”

“Capisce,” I replied with a smile.

It was the tenth of October. Dominic had left on the 3rd, saying that he’d be back in a couple of weeks. He had given me his mobile number, but cautioned me not to discuss anything of a personal or business nature when I called him. What the hell was the point then?

He’d phoned me a few times and we did manage to talk about the weather and how the work was coming along on the big Corallo order. We were right on schedule and he was pleased.

He told me he hoped to be back before the shipment went out to make sure that everything was in place for an order of this magnitude. I didn’t fully understand why he didn’t trust me to handle it. I’d sent international orders out before to several of Abigail’s boutiques located in various European locations, at least this shipment, though very large, was going to one location. He was probably concerned about that, and the fact it was going ocean shipment, which required more intervention from outsiders. Sherry was handling getting the shipping supplies required. The order was scheduled to be dispatched to the freight forwarder on October 21st, which meant Dominic would be back a couple of days before that.

I was still uneasy about giving him the news on my pregnancy. Dr. Campbell had given me an April 15th due date. I realized the longer I procrastinated, the less there would be to tell. I was damn near close to being three months pregnant, though. If I waited too much longer, I’m sure Dominic—and everyone else would figure it out.

I was mulling it over in my head when Sherry popped in, carrying a cardboard box. She’d been spending more time here than at the boutique helping me with the details for the Corallo order. We had kept Lisa (another one of Vinnie’s assistants) on at the boutique.

“Look what was just delivered,” she said, smiling, “Earlier than expected no less.”

“No,” I almost screeched, “Really? How did that happen?”

The only thing holding up the final touches on the Corallo order had been the special shoulder pads I ordered for the suit jackets. I’d ordered two different sizes, and each one had a strip of Velcro sewn on the top, which adhered to the strip of Velcro that had been sewn inside the shoulder of the jacket. So each jacket came with two different shoulder pad sizes to allow customers to choose how much ‘power’ they wanted their shoulders to have, and to change sizes if they wanted, or not wear them at all. Sherry thought it had been a brilliant idea, and quite frankly, I was fairly proud of myself for coming up with it.