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"No, no, I remember this." Vinnie scooted to the edge of his seat. "Martinez does have a construction company. When I was retrofitting my building, he did some work for me. When I signed the contract, the company business was called Díaz Enterprises. Martinez wasn't listed as the company owner."
I smirked. "Díaz Enterprises is the name my grandfather gave to every business venture we have in Brooklyn, which means—"
"Which means it should all go to you when you take over," Vinnie finished for me.
"My advice," Lucas said. "Get it into your name as soon as possible. As a businessman, I can help you with that. I can also tell you that even if you have a board of directors, if it's in your name, no one can take it from you, so you should put it in your name specifically, not a company name."
"You also might look into what other businesses fall under the Díaz Enterprises name. Depending on what they are, you might want to get them into your name as well."
I nodded absently as another roadblock hit me, a big one. "I know nothing about construction."
"You don't need to," Lucas said. "You have a construction foreman for that. You just need to know how to run a business."
I winced.
Lucas chuckled. "A good business manager can help you with that."
I realized that I was at a serious disadvantage here. While I had grown up in the mafia, I really didn't know the ends and outs of running one. Not the business side of things anyway.
"I am my father's bastard, one of many. I wasn't the favored son or grandson growing up because I wasn't legitimate like my half-brother Dante, who is considered the golden child. After that incident at the university, it became even worse. My grandfather made no bones about the fact that he loathes me and considers me an abomination. Because of that, I don't have a lot of experience in running things. My experience lies in more...violent areas."
"Open a bodyguard business."
I glanced at Jake. "A bodyguard business?"
"I employ an average of four bodyguards on any given day. Ten or more if there is a problem. And that is just my personal bodyguards. I also have security guards at all of my facilities and my home. If you were to open a business training bodyguards and security guards, using your experience, I'm sure you would do well."
That might actually work. I knew how to guard someone. I knew what to look for in any given situation, how to survey a scene, and how to fight if I needed to protect someone. It would be great if I could make money teaching other people the same thing.
"Between the construction company, security company, and whatever else falls under Díaz Enterprises," Lucas said, "you are sure to make enough money to send back to Columbia."
"That would be good," I stated, "because if I go back, I'm dead."
Vinnie's eyes narrowed. "What do you mean?"
"Jake and I talked about it already and he agrees with me. We think I am being set up so my grandfather can take me out without having any backlash from Spain.
"Why would there be a backlash?" Lucas asked.
"Even if I am illegitimate, I am still a blood heir. My grandfather might be in charge in Columbia, but he still reports to Spain, and they frown on taking out blood heirs without reason, and I haven't given him one." I had done every dirty little job assigned to me and bit my tongue more times than I could count. "Family is important to those back in Spain. My grandfather would need a good reason to kill me."
"Does he have good reason?" Dmitri asked.
"Not yet, but that may change. One of his stipulations was that I had to marry Delancy and stay married to him. My question is, why would my grandfather promise me Brooklyn if I agreed to stay married to this guy when he is a media nightmare unless he wants me to fail?"
"As I told Alejandro," Jake started, "I think that his grandfather is either waiting for him to divorce Delancy or get outted by one of the news outlets. Either way, he keeps his promise to his old friend, gets Brooklyn back, and Alejandro is out."
"My grandfather also told me that Martinez is retiring and going back to Columbia once I take over. We don't have any concrete evidence, but we don't think that is what is happening. We think he is either going on vacation until I fuck up or he doesn't plan to really leave at all. He's just waiting for me to be called back to Columbia so he can take over again."
Those disgusted looks were back.
"There's also a possibility that he will try and run things behind the scenes. I have my man Hugo doing a little snooping to try and figure out what his plans are. Until Martinez officially leaves in a few days, we won't really know anything."
"We'll keep a lookout for things in our territories," Dmitri said. "I'll send word to King to keep an eye out as well."
"What about Staten Island?" Lucas asked.
I found it funny, and somewhat disconcerting, when Dmitri and Vinnie both grimaced. "Who runs Staten Island?"
