THE HIT BACK SERIES (Order From Chaos)

chapter two

Outside, an ash Chevrolet sedan pulled up opposite the building with the screech of tires. The driver, a man of average height and compact build jumped out from behind the wheel into the cold, winter night, looking sideways across the street at the onrush of oncoming cars before crossing the street in hurried strides.
For the black man dressed in wide-cut khaki pants and shirt walking snappily toward the snow-covered front porch of the detached house, today had been such a horrible nightmare. So much that he wished he hadn’t woken up today. So much that he regretted having flown from London and landing in JFK earlier to observe his family New year’s get-together rite. So much that he hoped all that has happened so far today was nothing but a dream, he could shake off just by blinking his eyes.
Just within the last twenty-four hours, his world had been torn into, and everything was taken from him. Since daybreak, almost every member of his family had been sporadically wiped off the face of the earth.
The strange cataclysm had begun with the death of his brother, Cobi, who was found dead with multiple gunshot wounds in an underground platform in Camden County, New Jersey in the early hours of today.
And had continued with him shortly after his arrival in the States in a drive-by shooting carried out on Long Island, Queens, New York City. He had been shot at three times from a minivan while coming out of a convenience store on 49th street and had close-shavely escaped the bullets, which had missed him by inches and lodged into windows nearby.
Lucky enough for him, he had come out alive from the situation, but not without a scratch as he had suffered a minor wound from a bullet that has slightly grazed his arm.
And being someone who believed so little in luck, it had taken lying down there on the cold pavement with a thin flow of blood in his wounded arm and scrambling back on his own feet after the shooting, for him to believe that a force greater than himself had intervened then and saved his ass.
Snapping out of the shock brought on by the incident, he had made a wild dash for his car parked some few paces away from the store’s front, fleeing the scene in his car, and breaking several driving rules on his way to his parents.
Fines, that had been the least of his problems then.
The vicious cycle hadn’t ended there. And worse still, had continued at his parents’ Georgian home sprawled across two acres on the southeastern portion of Forest Hills, Queens. There, he had found both his parents and younger brother dead, and swimming in the pool of their own blood after his narrow escape from the jaws of death.
Standing there in the midst of the shambles, body shaking convulsively with tears, it had occurred to him then, that there were none of his father’s men in sight. And this more than anything had him troubled the most.
My father had been sold out by one of his own, he had reasoned with a smarting pain in his heart, recognizing at once the strange pattern to the rather unusual occurrences of the last twenty-four hours.
It was no hard thing figuring that out for him since he was raised and mentored with the right knowledge to lead the treacherous microcosm of the underworld. And even though, he had chosen a path, world apart from his father’s in adulthood, he can damn well tell this was a hit carried out by the mob.
No witnesses. No survivors. Just the mob typical style!
But, by who amongst his men? He later wondered, searching for a possible name or face to put behind the whole thing in his mind.
It was while he was standing there listless and rooted to the spot in deep thought and shock, that the image of his sister; Angelina, who very much overlaps with him in strong will and spirit, and whom he hadn’t seen face-to-face in the past three years flashed in his mind. And quite later that it had occurred to him that she might be in danger as well, since she was family.
Driven by the urge to save the very last member of his family, he had snapped out of the daze and headed straight for his sister’s home in Brooklyn, which was just on the other end of Queens.
Now, drumming his fingers impatiently against the door, which leads to his sister’s detached home after several unanswered raps, the man in Khaki placed his ear against the shimmery walnut door and listened for any sound from within the building.
Hearing the sound of a TV playing from within the house, and afraid the worst might have happened already, he tossed an anxious look over his shoulders and gave the door a solid shoulder-shove and kick.
The door refused to budge at his first few attempts. Material resistance played a big role then and served as a major hindrance. But after a few more trials, the door eventually gave in, affording him a passage through to the living room.
The sight that greeted him upon his entry into the living room was a gory one. One which makes him sick to his stomach and wants to puke all at once.
There, lying crisscross in front of the TV in a slathered mess of grumous blood that runs every which way on the vinyl floor were three bodies, all stiff and cold.
Standing there breathless and motionless at the center of the literal slaughterhouse with a lone tear running down his cheek, he stared longingly at his sister, who laid still on the floor, with her arms and legs spread away from her torso. Rebellious even in death.
Then at her high-school heart-rob turned husband—George, whom she had married against their father’s will and consent, who laid totally reposed at her side as if he was in a deep sleep.
His gaze lingered a little on a spot in his chest already stained red and hollowed out by the blast of the bullet. Before eventually darting over to the small boy just an arm’s length from his mother, who happened to be the first fruit of their union from five years ago.
He had been at their wedding, held on the shore of the Manhattan Beach and attended by friends and family. Save for their father, who had stayed true to his conservative nature and crab mentality, by forbidding the marriage of his only daughter to a Caucasian.
The wedding had come through without the presence or blessing of their father at the beach, which was chosen as the venue for both aesthetics and crowd-curbing reasons. And given both their atheistic beliefs and nature, they have both shunned the orthodox Church wedding, as well as the usual court wedding process. Opting instead for something simple, and frugal.
Thinking back on it now, he could have sworn he had never seen his sister happy as she was on that day throughout her entire life. She had radiated so much glow, beamed with so much joy, to the point that he had even made a solemn pledge to himself that very day that, if her husband so much as hurt her in their union, he would be the one to set his ass straight. And fortunately enough, the man had proven him wrong.
Now, all that seemed to him like it had happened to another at a different time in a different world, not only because of the distance and the time that had since passed. But because whatever clues and memories of the day that remained in his head were nothing but dead bodies floating in a coagulated lake of blood.
Standing there in what could actually pass as a daze, and preoccupied still with the thoughts, he heard a faint sound from somewhere in the house and quickly stood raptly at attention.
At first, it was hard to discern what the sound really was and the source of it. But after some time of pricking up his ears and attention, he was finally able to pick up the source of the sound and identify it as a cry.
However, at the realization of this, his face took on a rather bewildered and confused expression as he struggled to make sense of the situation. Could that possibly be the sound of a baby crying?
Of course, it is, he agreed to himself with some conviction the moment a staggering thought hit him right there on spot. How could I have forgotten about my sister’s other son so easily?
He was spurred into action an instant later just as a new wave of what he now assumed to be the boy’s cry floated into the living room once more, following the sound to the inner rooms.
Locating the room which the sound sprang from was no trouble for him, as was finding the boy, who laid thrashing around with both feet and hands in a crib.
Picking the crying boy up from the crib, he rocked him gently in his arms, trying to shush him and successfully doing so after a couple of minutes, or so, when the boy’s cries eventually eased into soft sobs.
Now, holding the boy closer to his face, he couldn’t help but notice the striking semblance between the boy and his mother—who also happened to be his dead sister. Nor, the thought that bobbed up in his mind at his sight. So, here’s finally the boy I have heard so much about.
“It’s alright now, boy,” he muttered surly, stroking the boy’s back. “We will both live.” He added much afterward, scanning the room blankly one last time.
Live! Well, that seemed the obvious thing to do when the heart still beats, he reasoned, before walking out of the room.
***
The man in khaki shorts and pants now stood before a misty sash window, his back turned to the partially furnished, partially lit ample space of the living room. Standing absolutely still and absent-mindedly, he stared at his reflection in the window sash, finding no noticeable resemblance between himself and his reflection in the pane, and concluding on the spot that, the man staring back at him was probably the shades of himself from a distant place in time.
Not only did the man that stared back at him in the pane have deep-set, red-rimmed haggard eyes, but his face had a rather palish, and ghostly look as opposed to the flushed expression of himself he had caught in the glass windows of that convenience store in Queens. Which can only mean one thing—this man can’t possibly be him.
No, this man was nothing like him, he contended within himself, sneaking yet another peek at his own reflection in the pane. This time, however, he didn’t miss the fleck of semblance the man in the pane shared with him, nor the fact of what a day’s worth of misery and crying could do to someone’s appearance and overall psyche.
Having decided to live through the harrowing ordeal of the last twenty-four hours with the poor boy, he had fled the shambles which was his sister’s home, coming straight to Rafael Visconti’s —the one place in the world he knew his safety and the boy’s was assured.
The decision to come over to the great and fearsome crime boss—Rafael Visconti, who happened to be his father’s homeboy and childhood friend from the ’60s, and as fate would have it remained so even in the treacherous world of organized crime had been quite an easy one, one which he had made since deciding to raise the boy a better, stronger man, and not as a weakling as his sorry self. And to achieve this, a name—which happens to be the last name of fear in the underworld had leaped out to him twenty minutes into his getaway from his sister’s home in Brooklyn, and he had headed straight for Manhattan, which had been the Visconti’s residence for as long as he could remember.
Although he had gotten cold feet at some point on his ride to the Visconti’s crib, he had made his strongest and boldest move yet, by carrying through with his earlier plan, even against his reservations and better judgment of raising the boy in the Made Man’s ways. And though, he knew in doing so, he was forging out a cold, ruthless, weapon out of the boy, he wasn’t so much as bothered, or afraid of raising a cold soul as much as he was of raising a weakling whelp. He had decided such fate shouldn’t await the boy by turning to the old Don for help.
Looking into the street beyond covered in the foggy haze of dawn through the window, he exhaled sharply through his nose, rubbing his moist eyes with the back of his palm. And spun around quickly at the creaks of both feet and metal on floorboards that came from behind him.
Even in the scant light of the room, it was no hard thing recognizing the short, stocky figure and posture of the man standing on crutches only a few feet away. And while staring at him from there with the little distance between them, he couldn’t help but notice that nothing had changed in the man since he last saw him. His black shock of hair was styled and permed as he remembered. His face remained distant and impassive, and his eyes were cold as ever. And even though dressed in just pajamas, he can very much tell the touch of elegance in his appearance and sense of fashion was not in any way lost on him. It appeared the man was invincible that not even the hand of old age and time had touched him.
“My God! what wind has blown and brought little Jerry upon my door?” the old man said, chuckling hard. “C’mon, have a seat, boy.” He offered much later and eased into the nearest armchair.
Jerry, the short man in khaki did as the old man requested, walked across the room and sat opposite the older man. “How’ve you been old boy?” he asked few minutes after settling into the seat.
“Good, I’ve been just good, boy. In fact, I feel hearty and strong these days, that I think I could use a new hobby like mounting the Everest.”
Jerry, despite himself and his current condition, could do nothing other than chuckle at the old man’s light banter. And as well come to grips with the paradoxical fact that, the old man was fearsome, and at the same time a clown. Who says a leopard could change its spots?  
“You skeptic of that, son? Dare me to climb?”
Jerry chuckled back a response. “No, I won’t dare do that. You won, and I lost.”
“Good then. So, what has brought you here Jerry boy?” the old man asked, patting his thigh. His face turned dead serious. “It’s been three years now, when did you get back in town?”
“Just today,” Jerry answered crisply and added in response. “I came for your help, Don.”
“Tell me now, what help can an old geezer like myself render to you, son?” the Don asked, his lips parting in a small smile.
At that, Jerry bolted from the chair to his feet and walked over to a go-cart stationed at the northern wall of the living room. And with a little shove, pushed the cart to the center of the room.
“You know you’re so funny, son. Don’t tell me you want me to babysit for ya?” Rafael Visconti asked, his expression taking on a puzzled look.
Jerry, who had tried so much to keep the commotion of emotions inside of him in check and locked in until now, lost it then, crying and sobbing in a spastic fit on the spot.
Rafael Visconti, who also had noticed the gleaming tears on his face through the soft glow of the only visible light in the room scrambled to his feet and demanded. “What’s wrong with you son? Why are you suddenly tearing like a wimp?”
“My world has been torn into, Don,” Jerry explained intermittently between sobs. “I have lost every member of my family within the last twenty-four hours.”
“What? Don’t tell me, my old-time friend, Jenny is dead?” Rafael Visconti asked with sudden alacrity, all humor drained from his face and voice.
“Pop, momma, Cobi, Chris and Angelina, and even her husband, and their older son. Every one of them has been murdered, Don.” It took a considerable amount of exertion for him to get those words out. “It’s a hit, a mob hit. That much I’m certain of, Don.”
Jerry watched through tears as the old Don nodded in approval before he added. “I think there’s bad blood between the families, and someone from amongst my father’s men must have sold him out. The signs are all there, you gotta trust me on this, Don.”
“If there’s a bad blood among the families, there’s none that I know of.” Rafael Visconti admitted in a hushed tone. “And I must say it to your face that I never saw this one coming, son.”
“Myself and the boy, we’re all that’s left of my family.” He explained, his eyes darting over to the boy sleeping in the cart. “For now, no one knows about the boy's existence. And one thing I figured out is, whosoever is ordering the hit wants my entire family wiped out.”
The old Don spared the boy sleeping snugly in the cart a brief regard and asked. “Angelina’s little boy?”
“Yes,” Jerry nodded in affirmative and quickly added. “I know it’s not in my place to make any demands of you, Don. But you gotta grant me this one request, ‘cause I got no other choice.”
“And what’s your request gon’ be, sonny?” the old man demanded.
As if spellbound, Jerry became tongue-tied and hesitant all of a sudden, failing at his every attempt to get a word out of his mouth or move a limb. And as he stood there transfixed and nervy, he couldn’t help but wonder if this was as a result of the request he was about to make of the older man, or, perhaps the man himself.
The old man noticing his hesitation decided to help him just then. “C’mon boy, just spill it, already.”
“I want this boy this boy to grow up a better, stronger man that I couldn’t be, and can’t make him be.” Jerry released a sigh of relief soon as he got that off his chest.
If the old man knew what he was driving at, he made no show of it, and instead gave him a puzzled look, which forced him to look anywhere but at the old man.
“What I am asking of you is to please raise the boy for me, Don.” He explained more explicitly this time.
“What are you doin’ boy? Are you outta your goddamn mind?” the old man asked, fixing him a cold, impassive stare. “This kid here is your sister’s for Christ’s sake, Jerry boy. And you gotta raise him as your own.” He added in a yet sterner voice, bearing down on him slowly with his crutches.
Jerry didn’t know from where exactly he had the courage and grit to look the older man in the eye as he inched nearer, but he did anyway, since he saw the need, forcing emotion into his words as he spoke. “No, I can’t make him a weakling like myself, Don. He’s gotta be strong and tough. He’s gotta be raised the right way, the Made Man’s way. That’s why you’ve gotta raise him for me.”
He paused a moment and sniffled before he continued. “I’ll get away from here as fast as I possibly can, never to return again to the States. Do this for me, Don. For my father, for my family.”
In what was one of the rarest sights, Jerry saw the old man give the faintest show of emotion as he squeezed his face, and at the same time ran a hand through his hair in what was seemingly a frustrating gesture. 
“Alright, I will for my old friend; Jenny.” The Don maundered resignedly with a sigh.
Jerry, if anything seemed glad to hear this. And before he knew what he was actually doing flung himself into the arms of the much older man, pressing him into a bear hug.
Even though older by two score years and more, and supported on crutches, the old man bore his weight and the brunt of the impact well, careening back only a step, and wrapping his arms around him. 
“Thank you, Don Visconti.” Jerry breathed against his neck, while still enveloped in the embrace. “Pop would really be glad for this.” He added, finally disengaging from the embrace.
“So, where would you go this time?” Rafael Visconti asked, his voice showing the slightest hint of concern his face has refused to reveal.
“Paris, Moscow, Berlin, Madrid; anywhere I can hide and be safe from the enemy’s hitmen.” He rattled off, turning away from the old man and heading straight for the door. “I will try as much to stay off the radar. Will probably get a new identity and start all over from scratch.” He said over his shoulder this time, as he took one last glance behind him.
“Hey, wait up!” the Don called after him. “What’s the boy’s name, son?”
At that, Jerry stopped mid-stride, halted right at the doorway, and whipped his head around to meet the older man’s gaze. The boy’s name? He hadn’t thought of that until now. But as he thought of it now, the blended feeling of guilt and shame washed over him.
The Don on the other hand seemed to catch the puzzled look on him at once and asked. “Don’t tell me you don’t know the name the boy is being called, sonny?”
How am I supposed to know his name when I can barely remember his existence? Jerry wondered there on the spot, discarding the thought as quickly as it took form in his mind.
Now is not the time to dwell on thoughts or dally, he reminded himself there and then, knowing he had to think up something on the spot, and fast. He couldn’t afford to look any worse in the eye of the old Don.
“Paul. The boy’s name is Paul, Don Visconti.” He said at the first idea that pop into his head. And was gone.