An Offer You Can't Refuse, Sal Bianchi [free ebook reader .TXT] 📗

Florida. I nodded nervously, my hands already trembling at the thought of taking something and walking away without paying for it. Up until now, Alessandro had been the one to steal everything we needed. This time, though, he’d reasoned that it might be better for me to do it. If we got caught, we could pretend I didn’t know any better since I was younger.

We’d been caught a few times before, but we’d managed to evade capture every time. Honestly, I’d never been afraid before. I trusted my brother and felt safe with him in charge. In fact, I actually had a lot of fun doing the things we did. It was like we were playing one giant game of cops and robbers. However, now that I was the one taking the lead, I couldn’t stop trembling in fear.

“I just grab a bunch quietly,” I mumbled as I went over the instructions he’d given me. “Don’t run. Just walk straight out the door. If someone catches me, I’ll start crying.”

“Right.” Alessandro smiled down at me. “And I’ll come and pretend to get mad at you and say that you didn’t know any better. Where do we meet up if we get separated?”

“Um,” I hummed as I tried to remember where he’d told me to go in case something went wrong. “The trees outside, on the other side of the parking lot.”

“Yup.” Alessandro smiled at me. “If something goes wrong, run there as fast as you can and hide until I come to find you, okay?”

“Okay.” I swallowed nervously.

Alessandro took my hand and led me toward the front registers. Once we were close, he let go of my hand and walked away by himself toward the bakery section by the entrance. I immediately felt completely exposed, as though all the people in the store were watching me and knew what I was about to do.

The registers on the right end of the check-out area were self-serve, and right now, there weren’t any other people around. Alessandro had chosen this store specifically because he’d read that they tended not to apprehend shoplifters for liability reasons, but I still felt unsettled by the idea of taking things that didn’t belong to me. I was hungry, though, and I knew that Alessandro must be even hungrier. He was bigger than I was, but he still gave me his share of the food a lot of the time.

With that in mind, I summoned up my courage and stepped toward the shelves lined along the sides of the register. I grabbed two fistfuls at random, barely even noticing what I was taking before shoving the candy into the pockets of my coat. The moment the deed was done, all the tension drained out of my body, and I breathed a sigh of relief. I was so thrilled that I’d managed to succeed in my mission that I completely forgot Alessandro’s instructions to stay calm and bolted for the front entrance.

“Hold on just a minute,” a gruff voice called behind me as someone took hold of my arm. I snapped around to face the man who’d just caught hold of me. His voice was familiar, and his face was too, but I couldn’t make it out. It was just a blur in my eyes.

“Nick, there you are,” Alessandro sighed in relief as he came to stand behind me. “You shouldn’t have wandered off like that.”

He was playing the part of the clueless and concerned older brother really well. He’d told me to cry if I got caught since that would make people take pity on me, but I was completely frozen.

“Nice try, boys,” the man sighed. He was young. He didn’t have any wrinkles like our father did. He looked like he was probably about the same age as the newest soldati in the Family. “I heard you talking back in the aisle. Come on. We need to go call your parents.”

My blood ran cold at those words. He couldn’t call our parents. One of them was dead, and the other was the entire reason we were here, shoplifting candy bars from a superstore instead of back at home and safe in our beds.

“You don’t have to do that, officer,” Alessandro replied frantically. That’s right, I remembered now. The man who’d taken us into custody that day had been a police officer. “We were just playing a game.”

“Listen, boys,” the officer sighed sympathetically. “I’m not going to drag you into the station for swiping a couple of candy bars, but I can’t let two kids be wandering around alone in the middle of the night. Why don’t you come with me, and we’ll call your parents to come to pick you up?”

I looked at Alessandro for guidance, just as I had always done. The frantic look on his face was gone, and he was staring at the officer with stoic clarity.

“Nick.” He addressed me calmly without taking his eyes off the officer. “Do you remember where I told you to meet me?”

I stared at him in confusion. Was this his way of telling me that something had officially gone wrong and I needed to go hide in the trees? I nodded in affirmation, but I couldn’t get my legs to move.

The officer frowned as he realized we were planning something, but before he could react, Alessandro moved. He lunged forward with savage brutality and kicked the officer hard in the thigh. He yelled in pain and surprise as his leg gave out, and he fell to his knees. Alessandro was quick to react and struck the officer in the side of the head with a roundhouse kick.

“Nick, go!” he yelled as he turned away from the officer to run toward the door. I followed obediently, but the officer recovered quickly and dove forward to catch Alessandro around the waist. I froze and turned to watch as my brother struggled to break out of the officer’s hold. As skilled as he was in martial arts, he was still