Rocco: To accompany the Fallen Angel Series Read online

  Rocco

  by

  Tracie Podger

  Copyright

  Rocco

  Tracie Podger

  Formatted by KBK Publishing

  © Tracie Podger 2015

  Kindle Edition

  Cover Designer: Margreet Asselbergs

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. This book contains material protected under International and Federal Copyright Laws and Treaties. Any unauthorized reprint or use of this material is prohibited. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without express written permission from the author / publisher.

  Chapter One

  The smell of lemons drifted through the evening air and a welcome breeze ruffled my hair—the heat had been consuming that day. I sat on a bench under the shade of a vine watching my mother pick the ripe lemons from a tree in the orchard. My father was walking back from tending the olive grove holding the hand of my younger sister. I loved my father, he was my hero, and the person I wanted to be. He was kind, loving and worked hard for his family. Little was I to know that would be my last happy memory of him.

  My name is Rocco and this is my story.

  ****

  My childhood had been idyllic. My brother, Enrico, my sister, Adriana, and I had acres of farmland to play in. Days were spent running around the farm getting dusty as I helped my father with the olives. We had a small farm on the outskirts of a tiny village in Campania, Italy; it’s population no more than four hundred residents. Children made lifelong friends; my father often took me to meet his after a long day tending the land. The men would gather together at the local coffee shop in the evenings, sitting outside with their espresso and wine debating the price of olive oil and putting the world to rights. Many had never left the village, they had married their childhood sweetheart, watched their children grow and leave for the bright lights of a city someplace. Although they always returned. The village had a pull, there was something magical every festival time when families were reunited, generations gathered together to celebrate Saint Rocco, my namesake.

  Parties were thrown in the piazza where local dishes of rabbit stew were served to all. Among the locals there would be a few tourists and they were always made welcome.

  But life started to change when I was in my early teens. A family, a Mafia family had decided the residents of my village needed their protection and that came at a cost. Who we needed protection from was anyone’s guess but each month a payment had to be made. I watched my father hand over his hard earned cash to thugs in smart suits and fancy cars. That payment would leave him short, meant he worked harder, longer and his happy nature started to be replaced with resentment.

  “Rocco, help your father with that crate,” I heard. My mother’s voice had brought me out of my thoughts.

  I stood and took the wooden crate from my father who straightened; his hands rubbed his lower back. He was getting old, too old to be carrying heavy crates of olives.

  “Papa, where do you want this?” I asked.

  “In the shed, Rocco. Tomorrow they go for pressing,” he replied with a smile.

  Our farm produced the most succulent olives, most were used to produce rich, virgin oil and some would be left in bowls and eaten. It was said the quality of our olives, of the lemons and fruits from our orchard came because my father would water the land from the River Sele.

  I was walking back from the small wooden shed, a shed desperately in need of repair when a large black car arrived leaving a trail of dust in its wake. I saw my father push back his shoulders and stand tall. He ushered Adriana over to our mother as he waited for the occupants to exit. I walked to my father’s side.

  “Rocco, take your mother and Adriana inside,” he whispered.

  “I’ll stay with you, Papa.”

  “Please, do as I say.”

  I sighed. I knew who the men were. I also knew that my father and some of his friends had decided they had paid enough and gained nothing in return. I’d heard them talk about standing together and refusing payment. It was with reluctance that I turned and walked away.

  “We need to go inside,” I said as I reached my mother. I could see the fearful look in her eyes and the worry lines deepen on her brow.

  “Who are those men?” Adrian asked.

  “No one you need to worry about. Now in,” I replied.

  Before we had made it to the door I heard raised voices. I spun on my heels and saw my father being dragged to the car. I ran, shouting as I did. My brother, just a couple of years older than me, had emerged from an outbuilding. He also ran to my father’s aid.

  “Leave him the fuck alone!” I shouted.

  One of the thugs laughed and I came to an abrupt halt as I saw what he held in his hand. A gun, a small handgun was pointing at my father’s head. My mother screamed, my sister cried and I looked at the terrified face of my father as he shook his head at me.

  “Go inside, Rocco. This is not your fight,” he said.

  Before I could respond, my mother was by my side, she pulled on the thug’s arm. He swiped his arm and knocked her to the floor. I had no chance to react before that gun was pointing my way. Enrico launched himself at the man. He wasn’t strong enough to knock the gun from his hand and soon found himself on his backside alongside my father.

  “Do as your father says. This is not your fight. Not yet anyway,” I heard.

  Exciting from the car was a man in a grey suit. He had a scar on his cheek, dark hair and in his hand he held a short wooden stick. He brought that stick down hard on my brother’s legs. The sound of my brother’s scream is one I will always remember. My body froze, my brain stilled, undecided what to do as my father and brother were dragged into the rear of the car and it roared back up the drive.

  We never saw them alive again.

  ****

  I knelt on the floor, my mother was sobbing when my uncle Geraldo came running towards the house. Adriana had been to fetch him. He gathered my mother from my arms and carried her into the house.

  I paced, my hands were bunched so tight by my side that my nails drew blood. I gritted my teeth together and my jaw ached. I had never felt such anger in all my life, and guilt. A crushing guilt washed over me. I should have done something; I should have fought them regardless of the consequence. I listened to my mother’s cries, to her curses and shouts. It wasn’t long before people began to arrive, friends and family had gathered after hearing the news. The women took my mother to her bedroom and the men got together to talk. I was left on the outside, deemed too young to be involved. In my head I knew though, I would kill that man one day.

  As I passed the kitchen I saw the men sat around the table in heated discussion. I wanted to join them, but as I made to sit, my uncle spoke.

  “Take care of your sister, Rocco.”

  I didn’t want to be excluded. I didn’t want to be pushed to one side and treated like a child. I had seen my father scared. I had witnessed him being dragged into a car and I knew he would never return. I wanted revenge. I was angry, so very angry.

  I slammed the door as I left the kitchen and headed back to the yard. I sat in the dark on the same bench I had sat no more than a couple of hours previous. I kept the face of my father’s abductor in my mind, wanting to memorise every little bit of him. I wanted it imprinted in my brain so every time I closed my eyes his face was all I saw.

  “One day, I’ll come for you,” I whispered.

  It was a couple of hours later that the men started to leave; my uncle joined me on that bench. At first we sat in
silence with just a pat on my leg as a way of comfort from him.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “This was my idea. I talked your father into joining us. I had no idea he would be the first they came for.”

  “You find their bodies and you bring them home,” I replied.

  Geraldo nodded. His body slumped and I placed my arm around his shoulders as he sobbed. I was yet to cry, no tears would leave my eyes. I would not grieve until I had sought revenge, until that man had paid a price for his actions.

  “You have to take on the farm, Rocco. Your mother is going to need you. Get those thoughts out of your head. We did wrong, we thought we could stand up to them as a group and look what happened. You can’t avenge your father on your own,” Geraldo said.

  How he knew what was going through my head, I had no idea. But he was wrong.

  ****

  It was two days later that my father’s body was found. He was placed in a sitting position in a ditch but on full view of the one road that led in and out of the village. It was a warning. He was used as a message to those that wanted to defy—this is what happens to those that do.

  His body was brought home and he was laid to rest a week later. There was no investigation, very little police involvement. A robbery, they had concluded. I wasn’t dumb enough to know they had no choice but to record that verdict, no doubt they worked for the family. We never found Enrico.

  The whole village attended Papa’s funeral. It was a blistering day and dressed in my black suit I was one of six who carried his coffin through the cobbled streets and to the church. Sweat ran down my back soaking my white shirt. Geraldo helped my mother, Adriana was to her side as they followed behind; she stumbled a little, her grief making her legs unsteady.

  It was after the service as we filed out of the church that I saw him. That same black car was parked on the side of the road; he was leaning against the rear door. I stopped and looked at him. He stared back. I might have been young, but he knew what I was thinking. He smirked at me before throwing his cigarette to the ground and casually climbed back in his car.

  “Keep moving,” I heard. My sister had arrived at my side. She had witnessed the brief exchange of silent communication.

  Adriana placed her arm through mine and we followed the party back to the piazza.

  “Please, Rocco, don’t do anything,” she whispered.

  “I can’t promise you anything. I’m sorry,” I replied.

  “Think of Mamma, of me. We can’t lose you too.”

  “You’re not going to lose me. Now, let’s get this over with.”

  I always thought it strange to hear laughter at a wake. I wanted people to mourn, to cry, to feel the rage inside that I did and to scream and shout. I wanted the sun to stop shining, for the birds to stop singing. Why should the world go on when I had just buried my father? Why should people be happy when my brother had no final resting place?

  Needing to be alone, I left the wake. I left my mother in the care of Geraldo and her sister, Elvira, and I made my way home.

  I shrugged off my jacket and undid my black tie, pulling it through the collar of my shirt as I walked. Rolling it into a ball, I stuffed it in the pocket of my trousers. Arriving home I changed into jeans, deciding to go shirtless, and set about to do all the jobs my father had planned but never managed. First on the list was repair of his storage shed.

  As the sun beat down, I nailed new planks of wood to the roof; I repaired the broken door and replaced the glass in the window. Sweat rolled from my brow and blisters formed on my hands. My skin glistened, coated with a sheen of perspiration. I worked hard all day and into the evening.

  “Rocco.” I heard my name being called from the house.

  Packing up the tools and leaving them in the shed, I made my way to the house. My mother and her sister were sat in the kitchen. She looked up as I entered and held out her arms for me. I took a seat beside her, pulling her into a hug.

  “Where have you been?” she asked.

  “Working. I needed to work.”

  “You need to eat. Let me fix something for you.”

  “Mamma, you buried your husband today. Let us look after you.”

  By us, I meant Adriana and Elvira. No man was getting close to the counter tops in that kitchen. They busied themselves preparing figs and meats, cheese and olives, which they placed on the kitchen table. A carafe of red wine was set down in the centre with four small tumblers and we drank a toast to my father while we ate.

  Chapter Two

  Day after day I toiled the land, I fixed the house and the outbuildings. I worked like a horse. I noticed my body change, develop. Muscles were defined across my shoulders, down my arms and stomach. I needed to work to forget and to build my strength for the day I would need it.

  We needed supplies and Geraldo had borrowed a car to take us to the city. It was an hour drive and something we did once a month. Most of what we ate we either grew, bought from neighbours or the small local shops in the village, the same local shops that bought our produce.

  As a child I always enjoyed the family day out. Two families would pile into the beaten up truck my father owned, the kids generally in the back and hanging on for dear life as Papa cornered too fast. There wasn’t the need for much driving in the village, other than to take the crates of olives to the press.

  We parked and each went their separate ways. Sandwiched between the hardware store and a butchers was a small glass fronted shop, a shop I hadn’t seen before. Its windows were dark but the sign caught my eye. I smiled as I entered. The smell of antiseptic hit my nose and the most decorated person I’d ever seen greeted me.

  “What can I do for you?” he asked.

  “I want a tattoo,” I replied. Until that moment I had never wanted a tattoo.

  “Any idea what kind of tattoo?”

  “No, do you have any designs I can look at?”

  He handed me a folder of photographs, each image was of a body part and the most amazing tattoos. I stopped flicking at an ornate dragon snaking up the arm of a guy.

  “You won’t get that done in one sitting, unless you’ve got a few hours to spare,” he said, looking over my shoulder.

  “I have a few hours but I want something added to it.”

  I settled into the chair and looked at the clock on the wall. I had the whole day to spare. The supplies I wanted could wait if needs be and the rest of the family would take the day to shop, lunch and catch up with friends.

  Three hours later I looked at the dragon. More importantly, I looked at the words written underneath.

  Strength and Courage

  That dragon snaked up my arm, its head coming to rest on my shoulder as if looking at me. Piercing eyes stared at mine—it was perfect.

  With instructions on after-care given, I pulled on my shirt, paid and left. The tattoo had taken most of my money but I’d make that back. I had started to do odd jobs for the neighbours, the elderly ones that were unable to keep up with the maintenance of their farms. I was earning enough to provide for the family with a little spare for me.

  “Where have you been all day?” Adriana asked as I met her back at the car.

  I lit a cigarette before I answered.

  “And when did you start to smoke?” she added.

  “Nowhere and none of your business. Where have you been or more importantly, who have you been with?” I asked.

  I had heard a rumour that she had a friend, a boyfriend of sorts and I wanted to know more. She was too young to be out with boys unaccompanied.

  “Nowhere and none of your business,” she answered with a smile.

  “I will find out and if he’s no good, you’ll stop seeing him.”

  “Oh, Rocco. You’re not my father,” she protested.

  “I am head of this family, just warning you.”

  The months that had followed my father’s death had been hard. We were all still adjusting and I had ignored Adriana sneaking out at night, allowing her a little freedom because
I felt she needed it. However, it was time for that to stop. Her safety was more important than her freedom.

  Although the thugs no longer visited our house, I knew my uncle paid the hefty sum required to ensure they stayed away. I also knew he was struggling to do that.

  ****

  Geraldo joined us for dinner; his wife had passed away in childbirth, both her and the son they were to have gone in a heartbeat. He never remarried, he looked after his farm on his own and he was getting old. It was a struggle for him.

  After dinner, as was customary, Geraldo and I moved to the yard. We sat at the small wooden table with our wine and cigarettes.

  “Rocco, you’re a man now, you need to find a good woman to look after you,” he said.

  I shook my head. I had no need for a good woman, it was the bad ones I had recently discovered—they were the ones I liked at that point in my life.

  “I see you, you sow your oats, and all men should before they settle down. I know your mother is concerned for you. You work all day and, shall we say, party all night. It’s not healthy.”

  For the past couple of weeks I had left the house each evening, met with friends in the piazza for wine and ended up in a back alley with any woman I could. I fucked—I fucked a lot. It was fun to see how many women I could have. My friends mocked me, jealous of course because they couldn’t compete.

  “I have no desire to settle down, Geraldo. There’s no one in the village I’d want to marry,” I said.

  “This village, this life, it stifles you doesn’t it?”

  I was surprised by his comment.

  “No, I just have things to do before I settle down with anyone.”

  “Do those things involve your father, your brother?”

  “Yes, I made a promise to myself and I will keep that promise.”

  “And you will get yourself killed keeping that promise. Is that what you want?”

  Somewhere in the back of my mind I knew I would never settle down until I had killed the man who had destroyed my family. I would never get close to anyone for fear of them being hurt. The want for revenge ate me up inside like a cancer. It was all I thought of before I slept, it was all I dreamt about and all I imagined when I woke. Images of that man at my feet, blood pooling around his head, his eyes staring up at me as he took his last breath were what kept me in the village. Yes I was stifled, not by village life, but by my burning desire to murder.