Son of the Mob by Gordon Korman Page B

“What?”
    â€œNothing. It’s just that—you told your parents about me?”
    â€œOf course. Well, my mom, anyway. My father’s been working a lot. I haven’t really seen him all that much. But they’re not stupid, Vince. They can tell I’ve been dating somebody.”
    â€œWell, uh”—I’m grasping at straws—“do we really have to bring parents into it already? I mean we’ve only been going out for three weeks.”
    She’s bewildered. “It’s not like we’re meeting at the caterers to pick out hors d’oeuvres for our wedding! It’s just dinner. My girlfriends come over all the time. What’s so different about this?”
    For starters, your dad isn’t bugging any of their houses. “What we’ve got, Kendra—it’s going so great. I guess it’s just that I don’t want to mess with it. And bringing parents in might change things.”
    She looks troubled. “What are you saying? You’ll never meet my parents, and I’ll never meet yours?”
    â€œOf course not,” I protest, but in reality, I can’t see how it could work any other way. “Let’s keep it just our thing a while longer. Then our relationship will be rock solid, and we’ll be able to handle the pressures.”
    Our thing. What an unfortunate choice of words. In Italian, “our thing” translates as cosa nostra.
    She’s more than merely silent. She’s silent with extreme prejudice. In her eyes, I’ve just crossed a line.
    â€œWhat?” I ask gently.
    She shakes her head. “I don’t know. It’s like there’s something you’re not telling me. Like you have a secret life.”
    I try to make a joke out of it. “Everybody has a secret life. At least everybody we pass in the car. Remember that nun who worked for the Mossad….”
    My voice trails off. She’s not letting me get away with it. She’s really mad.
    â€œSomething’s not right. I don’t know if it’s you or me, but something’s messed up here.”
    â€œIt’s just temporary,” I plead. “When we’ve been going out a little bit longer, I promise this’ll be no big deal.”
    She eyes me suspiciously. “But it’ll happen eventually, right? Dinner with my folks?”
    â€œOh, sure. Eventually.”
    The next ice age is coming eventually, too.

 
    CHAPTER ELEVEN
    â€œH EY , V INCE, HOW COME you never told me you got a girlfriend?”
    I’m trying to check up on iluvmycat.usa, but Tommy’s hogging my computer. Ever since my mini lesson, he’s been hooked. Actually, I’m more impressed than annoyed. I never would have pegged my brother as the Web-surfer type.
    â€œShe’s not my girlfriend,” I say quickly. “We’ve only been dating a few weeks. Who told you? Did you bludgeon it out of Alex?”
    â€œNah,” he chuckles, “Uncle Pampers saw you and her at some burrito joint.”
    â€œUncle Pampers came here last night?” It’s only Sunday morning.
    He nods. “Business thing.”
    Unbelievable. The guy went straight from yodeling to doing business. Business!
    Tommy notices the look of distaste on my face. “Take it easy, Eliot Ness. We just needed him to go with No-Nose to make a point with somebody. Friend of your buddy Jimmy Rat.”
    My brother hasn’t shut up for two seconds about the Jimmy Rat thing. There he’s found a surprise ally in Ray. But while Tommy raves about how Dad’s gone crazy, Ray just thinks it’s bad business. I’m not so sure. Anthony Luca may be a lot of things, but he’s not stupid.
    If there’s an undercover agent in the organization somewhere, maybe Dad thinks that throwing me into the mix might confuse him. After all, the vending-machine business is as organized as a Roman legion, complete with captains and soldiers and a