Page 3 of Vincenzo (The DiMaggio Crime Family #3)

AMALIA

“ S o, what’s the plan? We’ve been here for over two weeks now and have nothing to report back to your uncle,” Carlos says.

Setting down the breakfast burrito I was quietly enjoying on this cold-as-fuck winter morning, I stare at him from across the table.

My uncle sent us here to gather information we can use against the DiMaggios. I’ve tried reaching out to some of our contacts in the city, but they haven’t given me anything my uncle can use against them.

“I haven’t made a decision yet, but I think we need to make contact.”

Carlos chokes on his food. “I-I’m sorry, what?” he coughs out. “Manuel told us to keep a low profile, and you want to go against his direct order?”

“ Manuel also said to get him intel. Do you see us getting any closer to finding anything we can use against them?”

“Why don’t we just use Matteo DiMaggio’s wife? Or his sister? Kidnap them and use them to negotiate port access.”

“We’re not kidnapping anyone, Carlos.”

He leans back in his seat and gives me a smirk. “Oh, right, I forgot. La Sicaria is too good to do the work of us little people.”

Sometimes, I wonder why I fucked Carlos, then I remember it stemmed from a moment of stupidity and weakness.

It was right after I killed Felipe. I ended up seeing him at a bar that night.

One drink led to another, which led to Carlos’s pants around his ankles and my skirt up around my waist in the women’s bathroom. Classy as fuck.

The few times we’ve had sex have been fine—nothing to shout from the rooftops about—but after last night, I’m starting to regret ever letting him in my pants in the first place.

“You’re right. I am above kidnapping. I’d much rather confront the people in charge versus going after the weak and using them to get what I want.”

Carlos’s shoulders sag forward, and he raises his hands. “All right, all right. You’re in charge. No kidnapping it is,” he says, then goes back to eating his burrito.

I continue to watch him while I think about our plan.

My uncle sent us here and told us to stay under the radar, so we’ve been doing all the touristy bullshit while also trying to learn all we can about the DiMaggios, but this feels like a waste of time.

I’d much rather address the issue head-on.

The sooner we get this figured out, the sooner I can get back to Miami and figure out what Felipe meant by his haunting words.

“But haven’t you wondered who did it?”

The ding of the bakery door opening pulls me out of my thoughts, drawing my attention to its newest patron. If I wasn’t so well trained at concealing my reactions, my jaw would’ve dropped or I would’ve choked on my own spit.

Vincenzo DiMaggio.

The underboss to the DiMaggio family is in the same bakery as me.

What a coincidence.

Ensuring to continue my scan of the room so it’s not obvious I’ve locked in on him, I bring my attention back to Carlos who’s so clueless as to what’s happening while he stuffs the last bite of his burrito into his mouth.

As if finally realizing I’m watching him, he looks up at me and points to my burrito. “You gonna eat that?”

“Go ahead,” I say deadpan, and he quickly slides my plate over to him and dives into my scraps. Carlos might be one of my uncle’s best guards, but he can be a fucking idiot.

I take out my phone and put the camera on, flipping the screen so I’m able to locate the DiMaggio who escaped my line of sight behind me.

Finding him at the counter with his back turned toward me, I zoom in just a bit to get a better look at the man I’ve only ever seen in pictures.

He’s sporting a pair of charcoal slacks and a black wool peacoat.

He’s almost exactly like he was in the very few pictures we were able to locate of him, except he’s grown his facial hair out.

In the pictures, his nearly perfect-looking face was cleaned up and smooth as all hell.

Now he’s grown it out a bit, and I have to admit, it looks good on him.

“What’re you looking at?” Carlos mumbles, with his mouth full of the last bite of my food.

Without taking my eyes off Vincenzo, I say, “While you were stuffing your face, a certain someone decided to coincidentally bless us with his presence.”

“Huh?” Carlos grunts out.

I snap my gaze to his. “My five o’clock, Carlos,” I say, doing my best to mask my irritation with him.

His gaze drifts over my shoulder, and it takes a few seconds, but his eyes finally widen in recognition before snapping back to mine. “Oh, shit. Is that…”

“Yes,” I say, drawing my attention back to my phone. Vincenzo has just finished ordering and is now standing by the pickup counter.

“Damn, that is a coincidence,” Carlos says, and I raise a brow at him.

Setting down my phone, I say, “There’s no such thing as coincidences.”

Carlos furrows his bushy brows. “You think…”

Before I’m able to answer, I catch Vincenzo walking to the exit in my peripheral. Then he’s walking down the sidewalk with a coffee cup and a to-go bag, the steam from his hot breath filling the cold air around him. He disappears down the street as if he were never here.

“Yes,” I say, turning my attention back to Carlos. “There’s no way out of all the bakeries in the city, Vincenzo DiMaggio showed up at this little hole in the wall at the same exact time as us.”

“I don’t know, Amalia. They have fucking fantastic food here. And look around. It’s clearly a popular place with all the people they have here.”

Every seat is occupied, and there’s a line at the counter now. But even so, I have a strong intuition, and it’s telling me Vincenzo DiMaggio knows exactly who we are and him showing up here this morning was no damn coincidence.

“Come on, let’s get going,” Carlos says, and I give him a small nod.

We gather our things and put our coats on, and as we walk toward the door, Carlos says, “You really don’t think that was a coincidence?”

I pause with my hand on the door and look at him. “Not at all. The DiMaggios know we’re here, and that was them telling us to back off or step the fuck up.”