Once Napoleon saw that Shy had made it in the building, he reloaded and began firing at the remaining two shooters. When one tried to sneak around to his right to catch him in the crossfire, Napoleon shot him, and then he turned around quickly and shot the other.
With the shooters down, Napoleon ran down the street and went to the building that he saw Shy go in. With the sound of police sirens approaching; he put away his gun and walked into the busy lobby.
Where is she?
Napoleon walked slowly through the area looking around for her. Not seeing her anywhere, and thinking that perhaps Shy might have gone to another floor to evade them, he went to the elevator bank and pressed the button.
When the doors opened, Napoleon came face to face with Shy’s pursuers. They had come from searching the upper floors for her.
When they saw Napoleon standing there and recognized him, both men hurried to reach their guns, but Napoleon was faster and fired one shot a piece to their heads. As the people in the lobby screamed hysterically and ran for cover, he put away his gun and ran out of the building screaming with the others and ran right past the police as they began to enter the building.
Napoleon walked quickly down the street, past the limousine and the car that it ran into, as well as more police. Then he found a cab, got in, and told the driver to take him to the Grand Hotel Villa Igiea to do the last thing that he wanted to do; tell Mike Black that he had lost his wife.
Again.
Meanwhile, back at the hotel, Black’s afternoon went exactly the way he had planned it. He had lunch at the Donna Franca Florio restaurant on the hotel terrace. Then he took a walk down to the Tyrrhenian Sea, relaxed, and breathed in the fresh air; before returning to the hotel to have a drink in The Des Arcades lounge. Black sat at the bar and ordered his usual Rémy Martin XO.
“May I make a suggestion, my American friend?”
“Certainly.”
“You appear to be a man of discriminating tastes; able to recognize and draw fine distinctions. Am I correct?”
Black settled back in his barstool. “Though there are some that may disagree, I would say so.”
The bartender raised one finger and turned to get a bottle from a cabinet. He poured a taste in a brandy snifter and placed it on the bar in front of Black. “Try that,” he said and he took a step back.
Black took a sip. “That’s smooth.”
“That my friend is Tosolini Fogolar Gran Riserva. A vintage Italian brandy, bottled in nineteen eighty-one,” he said as he refilled the snifter.
“Thank you.”
“When in Italy, you must drink as us Italians drink.”
“Believe me when I say, I’ve been drinking like an Italian for many years now.”
“Eccellente!” he said and moved on to his next customer.
As he sat there sipping vintage Italian brandy, a man approached him. “Mr. Black,” a man said with a thick Italian accent.
Out of instinct, Black put his hand on the gun in his pocket and turned slowly toward the man. “Yes.”
“My name is Enzo Antonelli. I am here on behalf of Maurizio Bellini,” he said and Black recognized the name immediately because he had heard it most of his adult life. He was a La Cosa Nostra boss in Sicily.
“Please, join me.”
“May we speak somewhere più privato, how you say…more private?” he asked.
Black stood up and attempted to reach into his pocket to pay his tab, but Enzo dropped a twenty Euro note on the bar and then he and Black went outside and sat on the terrace.
Once they were seated, Enzo explained that Anthony Collette had reached out to Maurizio Bellini to offer Black any assistance that may be useful to him and Shy in her new business venture. It was at the conclusion of that meeting that Napoleon arrived at the hotel.
“I need to speak to you, Boss.”
“Where’s Cassandra?”
“That is what I have to speak with you about.”
“Would you excuse us, Enzo?”
“Non è un problema. I must be going.” He stood up and they shook hands. “It was my honor to meet you, Signore Black,” Enzo said and left him alone with Napoleon.
“You lost her again,” Black said with a bit of a smile that very quickly dissolved as Napoleon explained how he lost Shy. Black’s first thought was, Colonel Mathis.
They went by cab to the last place that she was seen, when they got there, the area had returned to normal after the shootout earlier that day.
They got out of the cab and began walking toward the building that Shy ran in. As they got closer, Napoleon noticed a group of five men, who appeared to be Middle Eastern standing near the entrance of the building. When one of the men saw them coming, he alerted the others and they opened fire. Black and Napoleon quickly took cover and they returned fire with their own.
Black stood up, fired at the attackers with both of his guns, and hit one man and he fell to the ground dead. Another was badly wounded.
Napoleon kept firing his weapon until it was empty and then reloaded his weapon and came up firing again. “I’m out.”
“Out! What do you mean you’re out?”
“We are on vacation, Boss. I did not expect to get in two shootouts today.”
Black handed Napoleon one of his guns. “I’m gonna work my way around to that side of the street to get a clearer shot at them,” Black said and moved out, staying low behind the cars.
Napoleon stood up and began firing in the direction of their attackers, and then took cover while Black made it across the street. Now that he had a better angle, Black opened up on them. He shot one, then turned his weapon on the other and fired two shots to his head. When Napoleon rose up again and opened fire, he was hit twice and he went down.
When Black watched Napoleon go down, watching Kevon die briefly flashed across his mind, as he put in his last clip because he wasn’t expecting to get in a gunfight that day either. While he was reloading, Black didn’t see that a man had come up behind him. The man put the barrel of his gun to the back of his head.
“Drop it!”
Black put his gun on the ground.
“Now get up…slowly, and keep your hands where I can see them,” he ordered as the other two men came toward them.
Black put up his hands and slowly got to his feet. Once he was standing, Black turned and rammed his elbow into the man’s face and they began wrestling for his gun.
When one raised his weapon and was about to fire at Black, his partner stopped him. “Taavetti wants him alive. I have a better way.”
Black had backed the man against the wall, rammed his knee into his stomach several times, and was about to take his gun when the other two came up from behind. He grabbed Black around the neck.
“Hold him,” one said as he took a syringe out of his pocket and stuck it in Black’s leg and it wasn’t long before he passed out. They quickly put a bag over Black’s head, dragged him to their car, and drove away.
Napoleon regained consciousness to the sound of sirens approaching. He had taken a shot to the shoulder and a grazing to the head. Napoleon struggled to get to his feet as people began coming out of hiding. He looked around for Black, but he was gone.
“Damn it to hell!” Napoleon shouted and then he took out his phone.
It was a little before eight in the morning in New York when Monika’s phone began ringing. “Hello,” she answered.
“Monika, it's Napoleon. Mr. Black has been taken prisoner and I don’t have any idea where Mrs. Black is,” he said excitedly.
“What did you say?” Monika asked slowly coming out of her sleep.
“I said the Boss has been taken prisoner and I don’t know where Mrs. Black is, but she may have been taken as well.”
“Where are you?”
“Palermo,” Napoleon said and her first thought was, that’s where Colonel Mathis is. “Okay, Napoleon. I’ll be there as soon as I can,” Monika said calmly and got out of bed. “And don’t worry, I have a tracker on both of them.”
Monika ended the call and then she called to wake up Carla. “I hope this is important.”
“Wake up X,” she said and wished that Nick wasn’t on that damn cruise. “We’re going back to Sicily.”