Chapter 1.1 - Matteo

Enrique doesn't rip them off, and the total comes out to 10.1kg, which is good enough for Matteo. They let the guy leave through the back because people are already starting to fill up the driveway. He can see familiar people from the window overlooking the driveway. He sees Vinnie climb out of the car with Eddie, their sister and two other girls he doesn't recognize. The one in the red catches his eye first, before he looks at her friend and recognizes Aleksi's sister, Raisa.

They only had sex at the end of the school year, before Matteo flew to Palermo for the summer and she did god knows what (Matteo doesn't really text any girls because most of the time it feels like a waste of time). Only when he doesn't have anything to entertain himself with is when he opens messages.

Aleksi is not with them though, which means Matteo will just have to wait a little bit longer. A text comes through from the pilot, saying that they've just departed from Capo d'Orlando. He descends down the stairs to go greet his friends.

The pool area is packed already, and he goes straight to the bar by the pool where he knows he'll find Vinnie. He grabs a drink from the kitchen upstairs first, just to make sure his throat doesn't dry up on the way down to the pool.

Sure enough, he's there, toasting with Raisa and the girl in the red dress. "We didn't bring our bathing suits with us." The girl says and takes a sip of her drink.

"It's not the end of the world." Matteo interjects just for the fun of it, before he greets his friend. "Vincenzo, how are things? I haven't seen you in weeks, you sonofabitch!"

He has really missed Vinnie. They're used to being around each other all the time, ever since childhood, and he's also in on the fact that their fathers are "business partners".

The two girls don't slip his mind though, so Matteo turns to look at them. He studies Raisa's face for a second, and she doesn't look like she's carrying any resentment. Then he looks at the other girl.

She has deep brown eyes and her hair falls over her bare shoulders in a way that makes her look very sensual. She's also looking at Matteo confused, like she doesn't even know they're at his place. And even though Matteo knows for a fact that they both went to the same school before he graduated, he has no idea what her name is or any other information except for the fact that she likes to party. He has seen her around before, that's for sure.

"Cheers." He says at toasts with the girls, just as his phone starts ringing. It's Aleksi. Without saying anything else, he winks at Vinnie and then walks away, answering. "Where are you?"

"Just landed, I'm in the car now."

"Just come through the back." Matteo tells him, then stops in the middle of the garden to look around for either Marco or one of the Barone brothers. He sees that both his brother and Vinnie are coming up towards him, sensing that he's doing something shady.

"Aleksi is coming in fifteen, one of you has to get him inside through the back."

One of the things their father taught them early on is that shipments don't go inside the house. If they do, they go through the back. The back is usually a door in the back of the garage that no one should ever notice except for the people who know it's there.

Matteo and the Barone brothers go upstairs to his bedroom to wait for Marco. "How's it going with Sophia?" Matteo asks Vinnie.

He knows Vinnie and Sophia have always had an on-again-off-again relationship, so the answer to this question is always like a kinder egg surprise.

"We decided to take a break over summer. She's in Spain with her parents."

"And you haven't seen her since the semester ended?"

Vinnie shakes his head. "She's just...exhausting, man. She thinks I cheated on her because I went out with you that night and didn't invite her."

Matteo snorts, crossing his arms. "And you're okay with that?"

He shrugs. "I don't know. I'm definitely happier and have more energy when she's not around, that's for sure."

"I think you need to hook up with someone new." Matteo places a hand on Vinnie's shoulder, looking towards the door to the suite, waiting for Aleksi to come in at any moment.

Finally, the door opens and in comes Aleksi, followed by Marco. He has a backpack, in which he holds ten baggies of two grams each. Matteo never knows where he gets it from on such short notice, whether he keeps it in his house or if he's got a guy, or if he's mafia too.

He's a nice guy, doesn't mind when people call him "Alex", and always has interesting opinions about the people Matteo knows if they ever come up in a conversation.

Matteo hands him 2000 euros cash in 500 euro bills. They have this thing where Aleksi names the price he buys it for plus the dealer's 25% cut, and Matteo just rounds up the number. Aleksi usually comes to him, not the other way around, from other cities even, so the service should be rewarded.

"How was the flight?" Matteo asks him as they warm up a plate with a lighter before spreading two whole baggies onto it.

"Short." Aleksi laughs, looking around. "Can I use a bathroom? I need to make a phone call."

"I have one in my room, it's the door by the door, but you can also use the other bathroom right across the hall."

Aleksi nods and leaves.

"Ariana is coming up with Isabella and a friend." Vinnie says, looking up from his phone.

"Ariana Milanesi?" Matteo asks, surprised.

"Yeah. She texted me at the beginning of summer because she heard I was single again."

"Have you had sex?" Eddie chimes in, surprised.

"Not yet."

"We're going to go into the bathroom then, give you some space." Marco says, grabbing another plate.

The two of them leave, so it's just Vinnie and Matteo now.

They grew up across the road from each other in Palermo when Matteo was little and Vinnie's parents, Paulo and Diana, were also his godparents. They would come into the Giudice restaurant almost every day for dinner.

They were the only kids in the restaurant, so they started playing while their parents had 'adult' talks, and so it never actually occurred to them that their fathers were almost always absent from the dinner table. Nor that their mothers talked to each other in hushed tones so that their children wouldn't hear.

Matteo always thought his classmates in Italy had very strict parents because they couldn't hang out after school; their parents made them do their homework or go to extracurricular activities. Matteo was always going to the restaurant after school, where he could do whatever he pleased and eat whatever he wanted.

If he wasn't feeling like hanging out there with his brother and the Barone kids, he would go out by himself or with a girl. He thought everybody was doing the same.

Sometimes he would do his homework because Mathematics and Economics came easy to him, and sometimes he would get in trouble at school for not doing the mandatory assignments. His parents would get called in and his father would have a private talk with the principal before it all went away. At some point, he stopped getting in trouble for his actions. First in Italy, and later in New York.

And it wasn't even like he was doing anything wrong; he was just using his privilege to do whatever he felt like doing and never once having to say no to himself.

"Never say no to yourself. Then, never let people say no to you." His father used to tell him. He had come home one day, upset that his Spanish teacher wouldn't let him go on the school trip to Barcelona. (He did end up going to Barcelona, and he knew his father had something to do with it. But he never asked.)

Matteo walks over to sit on the bed and pulls out a bill from the pocket of his shorts.

Ariana Milanesi and his best girl friend since childhood enter his room, and Matteo smiles. Every time he gets to spend some time with Isabella he feels better afterwards. He used to have a small crush on her when they were younger but that went away with time, even though they both loved each other.

The sexual attraction and the romantic chemistry simply weren't there, nor any type of desire. But they understood each other and being around one another was easy. They grew up together and developed a very close brother-sister connection.

"We're here."

She sits down next to him and places a kiss on his cheek.

The girl in red behind her catches his attention. She doesn't look like she doesn't know where she is, nor is she naive about what's going on. She looks directly at the coke, like she's trying to check whether it's the good kind or not from staring at it.

"You want one?" he asks and holds up his bill.

"Sure. Can you stand up and hold it so I don't have to lean down?" she asks, holding her hair back with one hand.

Matteo is taken aback by her question. She wants him to stand up and hold out her plate so she can do lines? He's never had any girl demand anything from him like this.

Before he can even react, she takes the plate from his hand and asks Isabella to help. "Here you go."

The girl in red looks at Matteo for a second before she bends down and snorts the line.

"Good shit, right?" Ariana asks her and takes the plate.

The girl doesn't look impressed.

Which sort of impresses Matteo.

"What's your name?" he asks her.

She crosses her arms. "Valentina."