Codes of Betrayal by Dorothy Uhnak Read Free Book Online

something. He nodded abruptly, gestured broadly. “Go. Enjoy my party. See some old friends, Nicholas.”
    Some of the people Nick had grown up with looked very much the same as when they were children, only bigger. Junior Caniello, now a large man but who still looked like a hulking boy whose mouth always seemed to be rimmed with crumbs, waved at Nick with a smile. He held up a plate laden with food and looked very happy. In spite of the thinning hair, expensive suit, aviator glasses, despite the fact that he was an attorney, he was still chubby, sloppy, nice-kid Junior Caniello.
    Nick’s eyes locked on Funzy Gennaro and he felt all the hatred that had never been resolved between them. For whatever reason, they had fought constantly as children, bloodied and bruised each other with punches and kicks at every opportunity. Funzy nodded at Nick. After all, they were grown-ups now. Funzy had a partnership in a woolen goods factory. He had three daughters and led a respectable life. But when their eyes met, for one split second, they were two boys in the schoolyard again, wary, eager, and ready.
    He watched Kathy, a breath of fresh air among the women who huddled together outside the entrance to one of the tents. They kept checking on their kids and catching up on gossip. Richie’s wife, Theresa, was still a pretty girl. She stood next to her three lifelong best girlfriends and they looked remarkably alike. Nick had known all four of these women when they were kids. Now they obviously shopped at the same dress shops, visited the same beauty salons. Each had married a neighborhood boy. They all lived within a cul-de-sac in Massapequa, Long Island, and they all knew very little about what their husbands did for a living.
    Nick glanced around the room checking out the various groups of men in their twenties, thirties, and forties. They were wire-tight guys wearing fifteen-hundred-dollar suits, Egyptian cotton shirts, silk ties and socks, and two-hundred-dollar shoes. Despite all the care and money and expert grooming, they were all a little out of whack. Just a little off. There was something primitive just under the surface being held in check. These guys were not very high up on the evolutionary scale. At any minute, they might forget themselves and begin to eat with their hands.
    Many of the younger guys wore dark glasses, indoors or out, so that no one could see where the hell they were looking. They glanced around constantly without seeming to move their heads. They rarely made eye contact with each other. To do so would be to lose the advantage by a split second. Even in a safe place like a celebration for Don Nicholas Ventura, it was important, maybe even vital, to see who was talking to whom, off in a corner, trying not to be seen; who was shaking hands just a little too long with someone not known to be a special friend or ally. Were things changing? Alliances being formed or destroyed? Nobody trusted anyone else completely; if you did, you were a fool. Their world was in a constant state of flux, slow, tentative—someone might be trying out something new—or in an explosion of open violence, for all to see and think about. Those who didn’t pick up the correct lessons rarely survived.
    Nick watched Richie work his way through the crowd to his side. He put his hand on Nick’s arm, ran it up and down. Nick stepped back, spread his arms.
    “Wanna check me out, Richie? No wires. I do have my gun. Required, you know that.”
    “Hey, c’mon, Nicky, why the fuck would I check you out?” He butted his chin at the guests. “Brings back old times, all the neighborhood people being together like this, to honor the old man, huh, Nick?”
    Nick glanced across toward the private dining room. “Not all old neighborhood people, Richie. Some guests traveled a long way.”
    Richie’s smile was tight. “That’s what they made the airplane for, Nick, so old friends get together from far away.”
    Nick dropped it. “So