[center][url=https://www.roleplayerguild.com/posts/5509998][img]https://i.imgur.com/IPNLbt1.png[/img][/url]
[h3][color=e2b13c]Don Remo Lattanzi[/color][/h3][/center][sub][hr][color=e2b13c]Location:[/color] Lattanzi Estate, Regia Maria Territory, Red Light District
[color=e2b13c]Mentions:[/color] N/A[/sub]

A kettle whistle in that far distance, green tea for a sister at bed. The [i]click[/i]...[i]click[/i]...[i]click[/i] of a clock, hand at play lightly scolding. The muffled footsteps down the hall, socks on carpet smothered by walls.

Eyes slowly open. He could smell the coffee in that far distance; his father lacked any inclination at all to sleep to the reasonable time of five, it seemed, as artificial as that time might ever seem. His mother was nearly worse, though she had diverted her interests to retirement, it seemed, as much as a Don might. Remo could find her painting as often as he could find her getting information from a Capo, sending another out, and so forth. He rubbed his eyes briefly before sitting up in bed, sweeping legs out with some difficulty. Thick, honest blankets had smothered Remo away.

That look to the side, another shape huddled away under the red checkered blankets, black tresses crowning out from the edge. He couldn’t help but smile, leaning just a shade back to hook the edge of the blanket with his finger. Pulling it down slowly, cautiously, carefully, the man nodded with some semblance of satisfaction. Cora still looked just as beautiful as when he first met her, olive skin and all, snoozing away. A snore seemed to rock the room. Remo froze as it passed, moving the blanket back to where it once lay. She snored just as when he first met her, too. It’d been one of the great conflicts of life when they had been young, though now he couldn’t help but make jokes over it. Moving off the bed and into plushed slippers, the old man began his day in earnest.

In the shower, steam rising above the curtains, he thought through his day. Hot water cloaked him, waterfalling from a hung head as hour to hour was thought, shifted, considered. Remo had a schedule, true, and a man to manage a schedule, to manage meetings for business, but he still enjoyed the practice. It’d been something he’d come to get used to, a little practice of thinking the day at the day, not a week before the day. Things changed in a week, but this week…not so much. A thought, and he’d connected to the estate’s systems. News shifted here, there, news not from the Spire but from Regia Maria’s own information-movers, own reporters, own informants. Nothing shifted under red lights without his knowing, or at the very least without someone friendly enough to his knowing and speaking. It all moved behind his eyes as soap turned to lather, semi-abrasive particles scrubbing away any hint of blemish.

A man had died in the Spire, one of the Sk8te couriers who had taken a job but had been found with no job to show. It was interesting enough, true, and spoke something of the interior conflicts among the puffed pricks who sat there, but did not say much. Sparse details spoke who he was, save for those a surface search might find. A name, a relative age that was roughly correct, a contemplation to be sure. It did not say much, because he was inexperienced…he may have died before the job had even begun, the package - whatever it may be - not at all being in the hands of the murderer. Yet…if he had been murdered for it, and murdered at the Spire, that meant that one Heir moved against another, had a good enough tool for the job, and good enough in this instance meant that the crew would not be foolish to kill a messenger who had no message to steal. They would have waited, and if compromised there, killed him on the rooftops. Couriers were good, true, but Remo had not met many who outran bullets, drones, and worse…and that assumed the courier was good. This one had not been. The package would have been stolen. So, then…[i]interesting[/i]. A smile touched the corner of his face.

Remo looked closer. He had been Afterburn, people the Don had worked with before on one occasion or another for specific items…he knew that leader, too. Digging had been digging had been digging, yet he’d found enough information about that kid to know what there exactly was under the exterior. He was a scared little boy, would be the first impression Remo ever had, one who was in over his head. There had been some uses for him, though. Some.

More news…more news…there had been so, so much going on while he had slumbered. He would have a busy day ahead of him. He would have a very busy day indeed. A free hand grasped at a high speed razor as the man considered it all.

[sub][hr][color=e2b13c]Location:[/color] Vivian’s, E Street Territory, Spire District
[color=e2b13c]Mentions:[/color] N/A[/sub]

“Sir, I still don’t recommend this.”

“Why?”

The steps down the street weren’t taken in hiding, or behind the tinted, bulletproof windows of an armored vehicle, nor was Remo’s entourage exactly inconspicuous among the other crowds of the Spire roads. No, black suits strode the earth, and a path was carved before them as ancient sages once carved a path through an ocean for his own. Remo felt light on his feet, heavy coat shifting in the slight winds as he felt the gaze of those on the street. They were a great many types. The buzz of drones shifted overhead. The Don knew those cameras saw him, too.

Some knew him for what he was by image alone, by his face. He could see the flash of recollection in the eyes, that such was a Don of the Black Maria. Others took a moment, a click of a thought to access a database for a face, a motion, something or another, and they had that look of knowing too. They moved a shade quicker along the street, though Remo could see which ones considered their loyalties and which ones did not. The latter did not make to move to the other side of the street, the former simply moved about their day at that faster speed. They didn’t want to seem to concerned about the Black Maria. People would be watching.

Across that street, Remo could see shapes gathering, too. Some of them were agents from E Street, gold-gilded thugs who wanted to see if the man would offer any sorts of insults for them to act on who weren’t old enough to remember blood spilled before could always spill again. Others were men with cameras, vultures who haunted Heirs, who wanted their own little scoop about things. He was glad that reputation made them keep their distance. Such vermin would not be fit to waste bullets on.

“Because it’s not safe. Because you [i]still[/i] haven’t told me exactly the reason, sir.”

“Of course it’s safe. If I get killed, blood paints these streets, washes them red. They know that. If some thugs, off-shoots acting on their own who want reputation, begin after us you [i]can[/i] kill them and we’ll simply send condolences to the other side…along with a payment, true, but…[i]rendere pan per focaccia[/i]. But [i]they[/i] have every interest in keeping such off-shoots far, far away from me. I die and they pay more than they can ever afford.”

A moment passed as they walked. The Don knew Iacopo wouldn’t ask the second question again. It would seem too needy. The wind seemed to whistle between them as the group continued down that street. Finally, he broke the silence, smiling as he spoke.

“And I have heard things. People moving. Even the flies around here talk…and I want to meet someone here I have not seen in a long, long time. Memories, Capo, [i]memories[/i]. And some new ones to make.”

Color briefly drained from Iacopo’s face before he composed himself. The man had been old enough to recall when things had finally come to a close. Such early scars were rooted deep in a person’s soul, deep enough to still let fear grip you.

“Ah, [i]fuck[/i]. Sir.”

And there was the door.