The Don's Dying Wish novel · Chapter 27 of 32

Chapter 27: Paid in Full

On Monday, Marcello got on a plane for the first time in two years.

On Tuesday afternoon, he stood in a bank office in the Cayman Islands in my father's black suit.

On Tuesday night, he called me from the airport.

"Eleven million," he said. "To the penny. The rest stays frozen for the case. The fund's money comes home first."

"How did you get them to do that?"

"I told them it was widows' money," he said. "And I stood in their office in person."

On Wednesday night, the Families came to Guarino & Sons.

Not for a wake.

I'd set the chairs out in rows in the main chapel.

Across the front, under the altar rail, where the caskets usually stand, I put a long table.

Amalia put out coffee and three trays of cookies and a bowl of cigarettes nobody was allowed to smoke.

The old capo sat in the middle of the table with his cane across his knees.

The widows sat in the front rows.

The heads of the Families sat behind them.

That was the capo's idea.

Marcello sat at the end of the table with his father's ring on his hand and said nothing at all.

That was his.

"The fund was sixty years old when it was robbed," the capo said. "Ambrogio kept it. Her father signed it." He nodded at me. "Now it needs a keeper."

He didn't make a speech.

He looked down the rows.

"Guarino & Sons," he said. "Hands."

The pallbearer's widow put hers up first.

Then every woman in the front rows.

Then, slowly, the old men behind them.

I counted.

I didn't need to.

"The fund's undertaker keeps the fund," the capo said. "Like it used to be."

Then I stood up, because I had business too.

"For eight months," I said, "the fund's checks bounced. My father's funeral home buried thirty-one of your people anyway. Nobody got a bill."

The widows looked at their laps.

"Now the fund's back," I said. "So I'm sending it one."

I laid a folder on the table in front of the capo.

"Thirty-one funerals. Three hundred and seventy-one thousand, six hundred dollars. Oak and pine. No mahogany."

The capo opened it and read the first page.

Then he took a pen out of his coat and signed the fund's check himself.

"Paid," he said.

← Chapter 26 · All chapters · Chapter 28 →

Want to keep talking to characters like these? Chat with AI romance characters: AI Boyfriend · AI Girlfriend · Dark Romance · Fantasy Romance · BL (Boys’ Love) · Billionaire Boyfriend · Mafia Boyfriend · Possessive Boyfriend · Hockey Boyfriend · Older Boyfriend · K-Drama Boyfriend · Anime Boyfriend · Vampire Boyfriend · Werewolf Boyfriend · Demon Boyfriend · Fae Romance · GL (Girls’ Love) · Anime Girlfriend · Goth & Alt Girlfriend · Gamer Girlfriend · Tsundere Girlfriend · Fantasy Girlfriend