Trapped by the Mafia

1. Godfather's Carnations

Do you think, because I am poor, obscure, plain, and little, I am soulless and heartless? You think wrong!

—Charlotte Brontë

***

2 hours 53 minutes before the funeral of the mob boss Rosario Tangorello.

A SWF, 24, and a florist, I hate weddings, because I'm always the bridesmaid or hired help. It's not like I can handle being married, with everything in my life being so up in the air right now. I'm too untethered. Too different. Too weird. And no, Mom, I don't just need to go out and meet more good guys. Mr. Right won't magically fix me and my life. Even so, FOMO is such a crappy mood.

Weddings make me think about all this, while funerals... funerals are better. They make me feel lucky to be alive, so I'm humming while decking out a pretty church in white blossoms, until my Boss-from-hell, Sheila, throws open the church door.

"Bryn!" Her voice matches the screeching of the hinges. "Those carnations are not in the van!"

"Not in the...what?" I chew my lip, flash-backing to earlier this morning in my head.

There I was, loading Floribunda's van.

Okay, so far, so good.

Fast forward a bit more.

There I was again, in my overalls and no-skid shoes, loading the damn van.

Loading, loading, loading—it's an epic order, the biggest we've ever handled. So, I took a tiny break to check my cell phone. Just long enough to read the comments on my secret Instagram account and—

"Oops."

"Bryn, I've told you!" Sheila laments. "I've asked you three times! Did zombies eat your brain or what?"

"Gosh, Sheila, you act like we've misplaced an assassination squad in Baghdad, not five dozen buds."

"We? Not we! I forgot nothing! It was all on you! I told you—"

Before she re-rants her rant word for word, I suck my stomach in, because sweating the small stuff is so tiring. "The carns are in the cold storage. They'll keep, and nobody would ever miss them. Stuff happens. Right, Boss?"

Sheila advances down the aisle with a glare I can easily picture on a stood-up bride.

"That's what's wrong with you, millennials. You refuse to get it! The funeral party will arrive in two hours, Bryn. Two hours!"

I glance at my phone. More accurately. It's 2 hours and 49 minutes, but I don't feel like correcting her will be a productive move.

"Do you have any idea who our client is?" Sheila's voice drops to a dramatic whisper. The acoustics in St. Luke's church is great and all, but the occupant of the gold-fringed, lacquered sarcophagus wouldn't hear her if he were alive. His coffin is lovingly padded with silky stuff.

"Yup, I know. His name is Tangorello. Rosario Tangorello. He was this..." I snap my fingers, searching for the word on the tip of my tongue. "Aha. A godfather. Like in the old movies about the mafia."

I wave my phone at Sheila to prove that I've done my research. The dead guy in the picture has tufts of silver hair making the last stand around the ears, hooked nose, thin smile on bloodless lips, starched tuxedo collar squeezing his wrinkled neck.

"Hmm. He's more of a mafiosi god-grandfather, if you ask me. The dude's not even trending, he's so ancient."

Sheila's not amused. "Bryn! Bryn! Are you a complete idiot? You don't lose a petal with these people. A petal! We're missing an entire arrangement! And it's from the family."