Chapter 7 #2
The landscape before me is crumbling. No point in clinging to past plans. My mother accused me of being cold we spoke over video chat. I prefer to think of myself as focused and practical in the face of limited choices. There are games within games here. Survival is the only option sometimes.
At his indication, I take a seat at the table before the bay window.
A faint buzzing sound accompanies him driving his electric wheelchair over to join me.
I’ve been visiting Cedro regularly. This is the first time he has called for me in an official context.
I know what’s coming, or suspect it, at least.
“Ettore came by earlier. The Russians have withdrawn from Cove district.”
While they may have moved out of the Cove district, my sources tell me they’re ramping up in the South Side after Ettore declared our businesses were losing money there and we pulled out.
“Yes, I heard.”
“I know what you’re going to tell me,” he says.
He’s going to bury his wife in a matter of hours, but he’s a man focused on the bigger picture. Cedro has limited options and he’s protecting the only thing he has left: his daughters.
Legacy. This is what all this is about, building an empire and holding on to it. My father certainly did his share of legacy positioning before he passed away. Like Cedro, I sense his legacy plans are about to take a hit.
“And what is that?” I hedge.
“That I shouldn’t trust him.”
“Your assumption is correct.”
He sighs. “Your engagement to Carmela was never announced.”
“No,” I agree.
“You’re a good advisor, Dante. I told Ettore as much.”
I keep my expression neutral. I told myself I was ready for what was brewing, but the truth is, it still feels like a kick in the gut.
“She needs protection—stability. You can’t give her that.”
“And Ettore can,” I surmise, offering him that small courtesy of not needing to spell it out because I know this can’t be fucking easy for him, either, especially not today.
“Yes,” he says, his voice steady even if the faint shake of his hands betrays him.
“I don’t entirely trust him either. But I’m trapped in a goddamn wheelchair, and I trust our enemies less.
You’re twenty-nine, Dante. I’ve often thought of you as the son I never had.
But you’re not old enough to run the family.
My word only goes so far, and you won’t get the support.
At first, maybe, but the plays will soon begin.
Ettore is a strong successor. He’ll be good to Carmela.
Take care of her. With you at his side.”
“Have you told him this?”
“Yes, this morning.”
It’s done then. This conversation is merely a formality. There will be a few ripples and private conversations, but then the capos will settle down.
Ettore has won.
For now.
If this is hard for me, it must be equally so for Cedro.
He has just handed his daughter off to the man who, if my instincts are correct, indirectly put him in a wheelchair and killed his wife.
Cedro can be ruthless when he needs to be, but in this, he has lost his way.
He’s grieving. His judgment is skewed, and he willfully avoids the glaring truth.
“What if evidence is uncovered later indicating that Ettore was behind it.” No point in skirting facts anymore. Life is about to change for all of us come tomorrow.
His sharp eyes bore into me.
“You say you don’t entirely trust him,” I continue. “But you’re giving him your daughter so you must trust him so far.”
I don’t look away.
Neither does he.
“Then with my dying breath, I will make him pay.”
“Good.”
I want to tell him to channel that damn fire now. I’m not a man who gets his hands dirty. I’m a firm believer that, in this world, you leave the soldiering to the soldiers. But I swear to fucking God, I would have personally put a bullet in Ettore’s smug face already were I in Cedro’s shoes.
I questioned whether I wanted to be married, whether I was ready, whether the punch to the gut I feel is merely bitterness in losing her to Ettore.
She’s marrying someone else.
I’ve never thought of myself as particularly possessive, but Carmela Accardi was destined to be my wife and I’m feeling pretty fucking territorial right now.
In three weeks, she’ll be eighteen. The date is marked on my calendar.
I have a present already picked out—one she will now never get, and one that would be highly inappropriate for her to receive, given that she’s marrying another man.
Except the gift and my duties as a fiancé never lingered in my mind whenever I looked at that date. No, it was the anticipation of allowing myself to see her as a woman.
My cell vibrates from the inside pocket of my jacket, and I glance down at my watch. “We need to leave.”
CARMELA
Ettore sits in the front and talks to the driver. Jessica shares the back seat with me, holding my hand the entire journey.
My heart clenches as we pull into the cemetery where the service will take place. My eyes scan the crowd already gathered, spotting my father in his wheelchair with Dante at his side.
Just seeing his presence beside my father eases some of the tension between my shoulder blades.
We pull to a stop.
My sister is out like a shot before the driver has a chance to open her door.
“Jessica!” I hiss, but she is already making a beeline for our father.
Ettore opens the door for me. He holds out his hand to help me out. I don’t want to give it to him, but I also don’t want to appear rude and so I accept the offer.
When I go to take my hand back, his grip tightens slightly. “Please. Allow me.”
I don’t want to be escorted. I want to dash over there like my sister just did. But I’ll be eighteen very soon and need to compose myself, as my mother would have expected.
I force myself to relax when he draws my hand over his arm, aware of the quietness in the gathered crowd, of all eyes turning my way, of the softening in my father’s face, of the tightening in Dante’s jaw, of the blind rage burning in my sister’s eyes as they land on us.
It’s a relief when I reach my father’s side where I can withdraw from Ettore’s touch and take my father’s hand instead.
Only now do I realize the stranger I’d previously dismissed standing at Dante’s side is his younger brother, Christian.
There is no cocky smile for once. He seems serious.
Older. He’s almost as tall as Dante, his hair a shade lighter but with the same whiskey-brown eyes.
His face is softer than Dante’s, and his lips a little fuller, but the resemblance is striking otherwise.
He doesn’t look like the boy I remember.
The one who stepped in when I was in trouble and left blood splatter over my peach silk dress.
It wasn’t my blood or his.
He doesn’t offer his condolences. He doesn’t say a word.
No, he stares at me like he knows I’m thinking about that day when he saw me vulnerable.
Maybe it’s the formal suit, the setting, my sister’s comments about him getting kicked out of school for assaulting a teacher, or simply my present state of mind, but his presence—and the changes I see in him—really throw me.
Ettore moves over to speak to Dante, and I drag my gaze back to my father.
“How are you girls doing?” Papa asks. “I’ve missed you.”
“We’ve missed you too,” I say. “Please say you’ll be home soon.”
He pats my hand. “Yes, hopefully soon.”
His words sound false. The kind of words you give to someone you care about when you know the truth will hurt.
The service is beautiful.
I start crying, and I don’t stop until we leave for the wake where people I barely know come over and tell me how sorry they are, how wonderful my mother was, and how she will be missed.
I’m aware of Dante on the periphery, of the strain on my father’s face, and my sister’s tears.
And how Ettore is always nearby.
It’s only later, after we are leaving, that I realize he never gave the envelope, and whatever was so important in it, to my father.