"Get the tools out of the trunk, Dre," Ragazzi barked at him.
Andre Walters gritted his teeth. Lord, he wanted to feel the crack of that man's ugly, pock-marked honker under his fist! He hated every last one of these dago bastards he was working for. They were all sneaky, arrogant pricks, tearing over each other, and anyone else who stood in their way, as they battled for power and favor from the boss. Not that any of these three clowns was likely to win his approval anytime soon. Andre knew the old man was too smart and had put too much of himself into his empire to let any of these fools crash it to the ground.
Even so, they each went around with an entitled, "boss' son" attitude, which only Angelo had legitimate claim to, as he was the boss' actual son. Not his favorite son, by any means, or even his most competent son. But his son, nonetheless, and that put him in charge of this crew.
Gianni was some sort of distant cousin, though he was clearly both the brains and balls of the trio. Both of them were first degree assholes that Andre would have loved to someday pummel into the ground, but Ragazzi was,by far, the worst. A newcomer from New York, rumored to have been sent to Chicago in disgrace by the family's cousins there, he had a relentlessly annoying habit of looking down on every possible attribute of the Windy City as being inferior to that of New York.
Not that he was wrong. In fact, Andre most certainly hated his hometown even more than Ragazzi did. But it worked his nerve the way the pompous outsider constantly went on about it. Andre had grown up in the city and had managed to scratch out an existence for himself, all while constantly being crushed under the full weight of its poverty, ruthlessness, and corruption. Meanwhile, this whining bastard was living like a prince on the boss' dime, only being asked to participate in an occasional chore, such as the one they were tasked with today. Yet he had the audacity to complain about how much Chicago failed to impress his ever-so-sophisticated self, while somehow maintaining obliviousness to the fact that while Chicago had been a corrupt, miserable hell-hole for a long time before he'd ever been thought of, the unsolicited arrival of his eastcoast 'greatness' had only served to drive the neighborhood even further downhill.
Angelo and Gianni didn't think much of him either, Andre could tell. He wondered how long before Rigazzi's attitude triggered the typically lazy heir-to-the-empire and his distant cousin to either kill the bastard or at least scare the man shitless so he went whimpering back to his beloved New York? Andre hoped it would happen soon, before he lost it and murdered the man himself!
No, as tempting as it was, he had to be smart. Andre was one of the boss' most valued hired goons, well on his way to being considered an associate. But he was still not family. He was only a hired thug and a black one at that. Andre had never been the brightest tool in the shed, but he was still not fool enough to believe that the boss or any of them cared the least bit about him. He knew what they thought of his people. They didn't even lower their voices in his presence when they talked trash about them. Rigazzi made sure to run his stinking mouth often and with a particular coldness in his smug eyes as he glared daringly at Andre. But if Andre were ever to lose it and go wild on Rigazzi's obnoxious mug? As much as the boss himself detested the little weasel from the Big Apple, such an act of insubordination and disrespect to a member of the family could easily be the literal end of Andre. And if he was floating in the river with a bullet in his head, how could he help Vanessa?
Vanessa was the reason he did what he did. That girl was smart. Not just street smart like him and Vernita and his boys, but scary smart like her mama. She was a straight 'A' student, and she had gotten herself such a high score on the ACT and Advanced Placement exams that she had been offered a big scholarship to the University of Chicago, to study physics. Not a crummy athletic scholarship like he had gotten. Just enough to get a dumb kid in the front door of a state college and soon have him begging the likes of Mr. Dragoni for loans that had to be paid off in lost integrity and broken bones. No, Vanessa had something special. She had the brains and persistence to get her education and get herself out of this nightmare. All she needed was the money to live off of until she graduated.
That's why he had gone back to the Dragoni's. Nessa's mama hadn't wanted her baby to have anything to do with her gangster-thug father. Not that he could blame her. But he was her father, after all, and he had to do something for his baby girl!
His other kids were, like him, cut out for the streets. The best he could do for them was teach them to be tough, survive in the wild, and promise them that whether it was gang-bangers, the crime family, or crooked cops, he would always have their back. But Vanessa was going to make it out. And if he had to lie, cheat, steal, and break every face in East Cicero to help her, that's what he was going to do.
So he was stuck with these three idiots, who were now prying open box car after box car with blow torches and crowbars, searching for the weapons shipment they were supposed to be picking up before the security guard returned in an hour. And Lord, they bickered like children. These gangsters presented a loyal, united front to the community. If you so much as forgot to say 'sir' to one of the capos, their thugs would mess you up like you beat up their little sister. But amongst themselves, they were ruthless cutthroats. There was nothing like the dynamics and rivalry of a crime family!
"Get at it, you dumb gorilla!" Rigazzi shrieked at him in his effeminate, nasal tone. Andre imagined it was Ragazzi's face he was working on as he forced open the door of another boxcar.
"Jackpot!" he muttered, eyeing the twelve boxes marked with Crayola logos, "Over here gentlemen!"
"Excellent!" Angelo observed in a satisfied tone, "Get 'em to the truck, Andre. We'll be back in time for lunch!"
"Yes sir, Mr. Dragoni," Andre replied, hoisting the box on his shoulder while Ragazzi sneered.
"You two help him," Angelo ordered, oblivious to the death glare he was receiving. Begrudgingly, the two others slowly pulled a box off the train, both staggering under the same weight Andre carried with little effort. With a smile, Andre piled a second box on top of the first and hauled them to the truck, where Angelo already sat, looking at his phone. Two trips later, Andre had returned to close up the doors of the boxcars, while the other men talked over each other in the distance, when he heard an unexpected sound. He slammed the door down, but then he heard it again.
It was distant, as if it was coming from another room or under the ground, but it was the distinctive sound of a child crying for help. Andre didn't have the best ears. Years of gunshots, loud music, and untreated infections had damaged his hearing in both, but he strained his ears and walked around stealthily, turning his head slowly to try to guess which direction the sound came from.
"Dre!" Ragazzi hollered from the truck, "You walking home or what?"
"Just a second Mr. Ragazzi,!" he called in the obnoxious sing-song voice that his employers seemed to expect from him.
"Help!" the voice cried again. He heard it distinctly now, and other voices seemed to have joined in, along with a clanging sound. He was getting closer!
"Hey, Andre!" called Angelo's voice from inside the truck, which he had pulled up alongside him, "Let's go, man!"
"Boss, I hear some kids!" he replied urgently, "I think they're trapped in one of these cars!"
"They ain't my kids!" Ragazzi replied with flippant impatience from behind his phone.
"Are you sure, goombah?" Gianni replied with a snort, "How would you know?"
Ragazzi looked at him with cold, calculating eyes, but didn't reply to the taunt.
"Let's go," he said curtly.
"Hey boss?" Andre quickly interjected, ignoring the fire in Ragazzi's glare, "I was thinking. Mr. Dragoni, he kinda likes kids, don't he? He's always raising money, taking pictures, and doing stuff to help them."
"OUR kids, you dumbass!" Ragazzi barked.
"And rescuing some lost kids from starving to death, trapped in a boxcar, that's a thing that's gonna make him look real good, you know, in front of the community?"
"He's got a point, Lino," Gianni conceded, "That kind of stuff is good public relations. It would remind the neighborhood about who's looking out for them."
Andre struggled not to let his disgusted sense of irony show in his face. Only these low-tier mafiosi could go around ravaging the whole damn southside the way they did, and still convince themselves they were some kind of philanthropists, serving and protecting the community. Angelo seemed to be pondering the situation at a level that was much higher than what his meager intellect could support.
"Well open it up," he said at last, tossing Andre the crowbar, "Let's see what we got!"
Up rolled the door to reveal the three children, blinking at the sudden flash of daylight after more than 24 hours trapped in darkness.
"What are you doing in there?" Angelo demanded sternly.
"Uhh. I'm sorry!" Orion stuttered awkwardly, "My sister was playing inside and we were trying to get her out, but they closed the door before we could."
"How long you been in there, lil man?" Andre asked in astonishment, eyeing the children's torn clothes and dirty appearance.
"I'm not sure," Orion replied hesitantly, not sure how much he should disclose, "More than a day."
"Well, come on down from there," Andre coaxed, "We won't get you in no trouble!"
"You're not the police?" Orion asked anxiously. He didn't quite know what to make of men in suits hanging out in a train yard. He was even more confused when the four men snickered at his question.
"Naw, we ain't the police!" Andre assured him, "You're safe with us!"
Orion thought this was a rather strange thing for the man to say, but he knew they couldn't stay in the boxcar any longer, so he motioned for his sisters to crawl forward on the pile of freight, and let the overdressed men help them down.
"Here you go, lil man," the stranger said as he offered Orion a thick, muscular arm to help him jump to the ground. Meanwhile, another man helped the girls.
"Ah! Tesoruccia!" he cooed as Bonnie and Lyra both leapt to his shoulder and were lowered to the ground, "Reginetta! Angelo, look at this little baby doll!" Andre noted that Gianni's smile seemed almost genuine, but he wasn't surprised. Gianni's youngest boys were around his own Vernita's age and the kids all hung around together. From everything Andre could see, and everything he heard from his shrewd and observant daughter, Gianni seemed to be about as devoted a father to his sons as one could expect from a career criminal. But, after the couple had borne six future capos in a row, it was no secret that he and his wife had been crazy for a little mob princess of their own. Production had slowed down in recent years, and it was assumed that Gianni's wife would have to make do with spoiling her little nieces in order to get her fix of bows and lacy dresses.
Angelo was a different story. Having achieved for himself a varied assortment of progeny, from his own wife as well as the two mistresses he kept on opposite sides of town, he had failed to develop any notable paternal fondness or devotion toward any of his children. Rather, his parental aptitude seemed entirely limited to paying bills and providing a name that allowed his offspring to walk through most neighborhoods on the southside without fear. Andre was doubtful that the man could even spell all of their first names with any confidence.
Having not inherited his father's famous enthusiasm for the next generation, Angelo watched these three strange children climb into the extended cab of their pickup truck with that mild, calculating gaze that was meant to calm both victims and adversaries, but generally had the effect of making the recipient worry about how much their internal organs went for on the black market.
The boy seemed to have picked up on it, Andre observed. There was something off about him. He didn't look a day over twelve, but his arms and shoulders were as well-formed as Vernita's, after she and her friends had spent hours upon hours training in Mr. Dragoni's gym and on the obstacle courses they had built for themselves in the vacant lot across the block. Between his precocious build and the tattered polo with the fancy school logo, Andre guessed he was probably a student athlete of some kind at a prestigious school. But how does such a kid end up trapped in a boxcar in East Cicero?
And what was most unsettling about the kid were his eyes. They held a look of understanding that made Andre uneasy. Even as the mobsters made nice to him, called him 'lil boss', flattered his beautiful sisters, and offered them a cold bottled water from the small cooler under the back seat, he looked back at them with a stern, knowing gaze that didn't belong on such a young, freckled face. It was a look Andre knew quite well, as it used to be Vernita's trademark before she turned thirteen and got all eye-rolly and uppity. Some kids were like that. They peered straight right through all the adult deception to clearly see who and what you really were. He had hated that about Vernita, but he couldn't really blame her. The street life had trained and perfected the girl's bullshit meter. Andre wondered who this boy was and what kind of life had given him the same gaze?
"What do we do with them?" Angelo muttered to Gianni, clearly implicating that this was his idea and therefore his job to work out the details.
"Take em to the boss," Gianni replied, as if this answer was obvious.
"To the house?" Angelo replied incredulously.
"Sure, why not?" Gianni replied with a shrug.
"Cause we don't know whose kids they are and what they're doing here?" Ragazzi pointed out, hissing his words through his teeth as if he meant to disguise his menace toward the children. His efforts were futile.
"Maybe we could go to the police station?" Lyra suggested in a soft and cautious tone, that was met with incredulous stares from each of the four men.
"Hush child. We ain't going near no police station until the boss tells us it's alright," Andre informed her.
"But they could help us get home!" she protested.
"They would lock you up in jail for breaking into this railyard," Ragazzi informed her.
Bonnie gasped.
"They would?"
"Or they'd put you in foster care and your parents would never be able to get you out again. Hey! What's that you've got?"
Startled by Ragazzi's sudden crescendo into a threatening tone, Orion stuffed his hand and the cellphone he'd been nervously fiddling with into the pocket of his hoodie.
"It's just my phone," Orion replied.
Ragazzi raised an eyebrow suspiciously, "Your phone? You're telling me that you were in that railcar for over a day, with a phone, and you never thought to call anyone?"
"Well, at first I didn't have any bars, and then the battery went dead…" he explained sheepishly, "I was sort of hoping that I could just… figure it out…without getting the police involved. I didn't want to cause problems for my family."
Orion grimaced in embarrassment but, to his surprise, the gangsters all turned to each other knowingly and smiled with approval.
"Now there's a real wolf for you!" Gianni announced, patting Orion on the back, "Good looking out! Hop on in!"
"I'll take that," Ragazzi announced, snatching the phone from his hand, "I'll charge it for you."
"Uh, Okay," Orion replied, still extremely confused about being praised for actions that had nearly gotten himself and his sisters killed, "Thanks."
Orion squeezed into the fold down seat across from Andre, with Lyra next to him and Bonnie in their laps.
"What's all over your face, baby girl?" Andre asked her.
"Ummm? Chef Boyardee?" Bonnie replied with a tomato-pasty grin.
Angelo and Gianni's heads whipped around over the back of the seat and they looked at the children with an expression of mutual horror.
"We got really hungry and had to borrow some from the train car," Lyra explained awkwardly, "We can pay them back!"
"Chef Boy-ar-dee?" Angelo repeated in disgust, as if the girl had just told him that they'd had to survive by gnawing off someone's arm, "Let's get these little lost lambs back to the house and find them some real food!"
"Yum!" Bonnie exclaimed happily and Ragazzi snorted.
"Welcome to Chicago, kid," he told her, "You might not make it out alive, but you'll sure as hell eat well while you're here!"