My Brother Owed $50K To The Mob — So I Extorted The Boss With A Bowl Of Burnt Pasta
Part 2
The rain lashed against the floor-to-ceiling windows like handfuls of gravel thrown against the glass.
I couldn’t sleep.
The massive house felt suffocating in the middle of the night.
I was sitting at the kitchen island with a mug of cold instant coffee when the heavy oak front door slammed shut.
Dan walked through the swinging kitchen doors a few minutes later.
His white dress shirt was unbuttoned at the collar.
His right hand trembled violently.
The knuckles were split, red, and raw.
A dark, rusty smear of blood stained his pristine white cuff.
The metallic, coppery stench of violence rolled off him in thick waves.
The cold night air clinging to his clothes couldn’t mask it.
He stopped when he saw me.
He shoved his injured hand into his pocket.
His jaw clenched so hard I thought his teeth might crack.
The wide, hollow panic was back in his eyes.
The nausea was rising in him again, choking the life out of him.
I didn’t gasp.
I didn’t ask what happened.
I stood up, my chair scraping loudly against the tile.
I ordered him to sit down before he passed out on my clean floor.
I turned my back to him and turned on the flame under a flat steel griddle.
I sliced two thick pieces of dense, sour rye bread.
I dropped a heavy knob of salted butter onto the hot steel.
It bubbled and spit, turning a nutty, foamy brown.
I threw the bread down.
It sizzled violently, soaking up the rendered fat.
I cracked two eggs next to the bread, letting the oil snap against the whites until the edges curled crisp and dark.
The harsh, fatty smell of burning butter and frying eggs rapidly filled the kitchen.
It pushed the cold stench of blood out of the air.
I slid the eggs onto the toasted rye.
I dashed cheap, vinegar-heavy hot sauce aggressively over the top.
I slid the plate across the marble island.
It stopped inches from his hand.
I set a mug of scalding, bitter drip coffee next to it.
I ordered him to eat.
He awkwardly picked up the heavy sandwich with both hands.
The crunch of the fried egg echoed in the quiet room.
The harsh acid of the hot sauce cut through the heavy butter, shocking his palate.
It was rough, loud food.
It demanded his attention, forcing him out of his own head.
When the plate was empty, the violent trembling in his hands had stopped.
The ghostly pallor vanished from his face.
He thanked me quietly.
I told him to wash his hands next time so he wouldn’t get grease on the marble.
A short, dry laugh escaped his throat.
A few nights later, Greg panicked when rival bosses Brian and Tyler arrived for a sit-down.
Greg begged me to make something elegant.
Instead, I baked a massive ceramic dish of rigatoni buried in spicy sausage and bubbling mozzarella.
The edges of the cheese burned black against the dish.
I slammed the boiling, steaming pasta onto the mahogany dining table.
Tyler sneered at the peasant food.
Dan simply locked his dead, black eyes onto the rivals.
He ordered them to eat.
They took one bite and the sneers melted away, replaced by greedy silence.
The meal was a terrifying triumph, but when a massive car bomb shattered the estate’s peace twelve days later, could a mug of hot broth really be enough to save him?
