Grinder by Mike Knowles Page A

food and pushed the plate away. He stared at me, and I stared back. Neither of our eyes moved, but under the table my right hand tightened around Johnny's gun in my waistband. Paolo spoke before I decided to shoot him.
    “You look like shit. You know that? You smell too.”
    I felt my face; my beard was long and my hair was scraggly. When I pulled my hand away I saw the dirt caked under the fingernails of my tanned hand. I didn't look like I belonged in the city, but just a day ago I had fit right in on the island. I didn't say a word — I just stared into Paolo's dark, mirthless eyes.
    “You know why you never went anywhere with me?”
    “I'm not a people person.”
    “You're not family, Wilson. Family is what's important. What we do is with family, for family. You, you were good, better than most, but you weren't family, so where could it lead?”
    “Did it ever occur to you that it led me where I wanted it too? It lead me to a paycheque.”
    “Bullshit,
figlio
. You like to fancy yourself the invisible man, and it's true you were hard to find, but you always turned up. You worked for me because you needed something, something concrete. You needed a family and we . . . we wouldn't let you in. So what did you do? You sold us out for a bartender.”
    I hated sitting across from a man who was trying to read me as though I were an animal on display. “That was always your problem, Paolo. You thought you were so fucking high and mighty that everyone wanted in with you. But you're half right, I did work for you because you were exactly what I needed. You and your organization had plenty of money, work, and paranoia. I worked for you for so long
because
I could never get close. Your whole set-up was perfect because I was an outsider to everyone and everything. I survived longer than most of your men and I made a hell of a lot more money because I played it my way, not yours or your family's. I never sold you out for the bartender because there was nothing to sell. I was never with you.”
    Paolo laughed at me then looked away. “Maybe I'm wrong,
figlio
. Maybe I can't see people like I thought, but that doesn't change what's important.”
    “And that's family,” I said.
    “Yeah,” he said, still looking away. “Family.”
    “What do you want, Paolo?”
    He sighed and then he told me.

CHAPTER EIGHT
    “My nephews are missing.”
    “Which ones?” I asked.
    “Armando and Nicola.”
    “Army and Nicky?” I said. The tone made it sound like I wasn't surprised.
    “What?” Paolo asked. I said nothing, so he yelled louder. “What?”
    I sighed. “Those two are idiots, Paolo. You know that. Everyone tries to cover up what they do so it doesn't get back to you, but you know about them. They walk around town like big-time gangsters throwing your name and your weight around. I bet they're real scary at that private school they go to.”
    “You don't think I know what they do? You think I don't fucking know?” His last words ended with his fist pounding the table. “I know what they are like out there, but they are family, and now they're gone.”
    “What happened?” I asked.
    “Week ago, their mother called me and said they didn't come home to the house. I said they probably were out with some girls, but they still didn't come back the next day. Their phones were off, their friends hadn't seen them. They were gone. The day after that, we found out Armando's car got towed. No one was in it.”
    “Where was it?”
    “Outside a club in Burlington,” he said.
    Burlington was a city outside Hamilton. The people were richer and the air was cleaner. “You call the cops?”
    “The cops got half the resources I got, and no one who knows the boys will talk to the law. The boys are gone.”
    “So why call me? I don't even know them.”
    Paolo looked me in the eye. “Someone took my nephews. Someone made them disappear. Someone . . .”
    As he trailed off, I understood. “You think one of your guys did it,” I