Chapter 3 – Sara
The kitchen was filled with rich, aromatic scents and warmth.
Mamma made the best chai tea lattes. She didn’t believe in containers of premixed syrups but kept a blend of the right spices in a jar.
I took a scoop, put it in the tea diffuser, and let the mesh ball steep in a mug of hot water, while I turned my attention to the milk frother.
The mug was a smiling jack-o’-lantern.
Mamma loved fall. She was a basic girl, and she started decorating and eating the seasonal flavors the moment the Fourth of July was done. An artist, she said the color palette of autumn was the most vibrant, the best inspiration.
Papà and I just shook our heads at her whimsical ways.
While I took after him in a lot of ways—detail oriented, logical, and stoic—Mamma gave me her creative flair in that I wrote. Words were my tools, not numbers.
“Morning, sweetie.” Papà ambled into the kitchen and pulled a pumpkin mug off the wire rack. “How’d you sleep?”
My thighs shifted together. I quickly hid the movement by reaching for the glass pan filled with cinnamon rolls—which were of course pumpkin spice.
The last thing I wanted my father to know was that I dreamed of a pair of light brown eyes that captured the setting sun.
Running into my muse last night set a flutter of feelings loose in my blood that no amount of reasoning could shake.
“Fine!” My voice sounded unnaturally high. I cleared my throat. “I forgot how comfortable my old bed was.”
Papà chuckled as he took out the coffee grounds. “That’s great. Say! You weren’t going to the harvest ball with anyone, were you?”
I pushed the glasses up my nose. My father was nervous. I studied him, trying to read what he wasn’t saying. “Um, no?”
I didn’t tell him I wasn’t planning to go at all. As soon as I gathered my things and grabbed some groceries, I was headed to the lake, which was an hour back in the woods outside of town.
“Oh, good.” He looked relieved. “So, no dates?”
I frowned. What was he getting at? I’d told my parents my plans last night, and while they said they would miss me, they were enthusiastic about my writing retreat plan.
At least, Mamma was. She understood the need for curating the perfect atmosphere to summon the creative juices. My father simply went along with the shenanigans.
“No dates, Papà. I’m done with men for now.” That was a topic for another time. They didn’t know the full story about Rob, the cheating piece of shit. If they did….
Would you really cry if he died?
I gulped. My father wouldn’t hesitate putting a hit on him.
One of the Ravello hitmen would do it in a heartbeat.
While it would be nice to end the phone calls and texts from the random numbers Rob used, I didn’t want to be the reason he died.
I’d never taken a life, and if I said anything to my father, it would be like pulling the trigger myself.
My father set the moka pot on the stove and turned on the gas. He adjusted his glasses, peering down at me through the thick lenses. “Oh, well now, don’t be too hasty.”
“I don’t have time for a boyfriend,” I insisted. “I have a book deadline.”
“Did you set up a preorder?” Papà countered, using my own process against me.
“Well, err, no. Not yet.” I hadn’t even announced my project to my readers.
I’d spent hours with Mamma yesterday, right when I arrived, to hash out my thoughts.
She agreed wholeheartedly that the change in genre would be good for me!
She didn’t see writing as a business like my father and I did.
Which was exactly why I hadn’t told him I was switching from light-hearted rom coms to a dark fantasy romance full of dragons, magic, and betrayals.
It was far too early to set up a preorder. I didn’t even have an outline done! Just notes from my chat with Mamma before my friends drug me to the cheesy maze and interrupted my brainstorming session.
“Well, then, how can you have a deadline if you don’t have a preorder?” Papà argued. “Have you scheduled with your editor?”
He was going to back me into a corner! I didn’t want to bring up my career shift for fear he’d tell me that writing rom coms was what I was known for and should continue to make a name for myself.
He wouldn’t understand…. Life was too short not to write what was in my heart. I’d already cheated death once, and this story had been with me, night and day, just an idea, but now I wanted it to take shape.
“No, I haven’t.” I turned on the frother.
My father waited for me to steam and whip the air, silently studying me. He was a finance guy for the mob. Life was cut and dry to him.
But as I turned off the frother, Papà fidgeted with his own empty, orange ceramic mug, twisting the cheerful pumpkin back and forth.
I turned to face him. “I’m not going to a bunch of the small-town festivities this fall. I came back to the Cove for a fresh start. I’ve got a new book I’m excited about, and I want to throw myself into work.”
At that, my father’s face paled.
I nearly dropped the metal cup of steamed milk. In all my twenty some years of life, I’d only ever seen that once. The day the doctor sat my parents and me down to deliver my diagnosis, Papà’s face went ghostly white.
Now, standing before me, his summer-tanned olive skin was deathly.
“What is it?” I insisted, taking a step toward him. What aren’t you telling me?
Papà cleared his throat. “I want you to go with someone.”
“To the harvest ball?” I croaked.
He nodded. “He came by this morning, and we had a little chat.”
I fidgeted with the container in my hands, ignoring the tea that was perfectly steeped. My father seemed worried. Scared. That could only mean one thing in our world. One of his superiors had requested in no uncertain terms that this happen.
I’d escaped an arranged marriage due to my health.
If that was because the mafia didn’t want a bride who could relapse or if they took pity on the sick girl and let her live her life, it was hard to say.
It probably depended on whom I asked in the organization.
Either way, I was grateful that the yoke of our world passed me by, and I was free from tradition.
But something had clearly changed.
“Alright, who am I going with?” I hedged.
Relief swept over my father’s features. “I can’t tell you that. It’s a masquerade ball, which means part of the mystery lies in anonymity.”
“Papà,” I groaned.
He placed a hand on my shoulder as his moka pot gurgled beside us. “It’s just a favor, cara mia. Just a dance. Nothing more.”
It was never just a dance. The quaint facade of this small town hid the poisoned underbelly.
Most of the locals saw a charming, safe city with good schools.
Tourists flocked to San Pietro Cove to escape the bigger metropolises of the East Coast. But those of us who knew saw past the pretty, friendly little Cove.
“Your mamma will help you find a dress,” my father said, giving my shoulder a squeeze before turning his attention back to his second morning coffee. He poured it, said something off topic, and disappeared into his home office.
Alarm bells roared in my ears. I would go, because Papà seemed worried. Whatever the reason, I didn’t want him to get into trouble. But I would make it plain to whomever thought this practical joke was fun that I wasn’t the kind of girl who could be bullied into a date.