The Story of Blood and Roses

Then, in a moment of coincidence, we had experienced the joyful event of Joe death. Despite the worry marring Anthony\'s brow and the click of his jaws clearly stating that the sheer timing of such an incident had hit a nerve.

And just like that, our paranoia was proved.

The proof that we needed to throw Nolan out and kill him off was in our hands. We could use it as leverage to take the cargo back or we could use it as an excuse to track the man down and take him down. He had acted as an unprofessional agent by revealing himself so openly in front of everyone.

It left the question of his plans open for us to speculate on. What was his purpose for trying to maintain contact with the mob for such a short period of time? The way that he had gotten about dealing with Joe would have inadvertently ended in him being exposed and it wouldn\'t have taken us more than a few months to catch his scent. If he was there to ensure that the loss of losing business with Anthony could be overcome by eluding him, then why would he make such a stupid mistake? He looked like someone who knew how to handle situations, but then everyone makes their own share of mistakes. Maybe he had left it to chance to see how long he could play out the elaborate plot of being new to the business. What was improbable was that we hadn\'t estimated his rank in relation to Darcy. He was obviously someone who Darcy trusted, but he also seemed to fear the man (as any sane man would, Darcy was a cold-blooded mobster).

The urge to run over to my place and take out the records and review them again rushed through me. It was obvious that we would have a drastically different take on the conversation caught on tape, now that we had a better idea about the people who were involved. What fascinated me was the layered nature of the conversation. My memory of the exact words was blurred, and it only incited further interest on the topic. The urge to rush home seemed like the best thing to do. The curiosity and piqued interest could soon fade away or our minds could be less receptive to any new information that we might gain from the tape, and that would be highly inappropriate. It seemed like the logical thing to do—to go over to my place, but I was uncomfortable with the idea of Anthony inside my apartment.

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