Chapter 35 – Geralynn #2
Angela doesn’t think. She turns from the altar and tries to run. I watch everything play out in slow motion. Angela makes it almost halfway to the double doors of the church’s main entrance before the two masked men grab her and drag her back to the altar.
They bend her over. Right in front of me. Angela screams and fights like any animal would in her predicament. Oh God. They’re going to hurt her. They’re going to hurt her and rape her right in front of me…
“This would be a lot easier if you stop fighting,” the priest says, going over to Angela’s head and stroking her like an animal while Felice stands behind her.
Franco and his two henchmen hold Angela down.
I can feel the room spinning around me and I back up a couple feet to lean my back against the wall.
This can’t be happening right in front of me.
It’s not real.
It’s not right…
“I’M GOING TO KILL YOU!” Angela shrieks. “I SWEAR.”
The front of the priest’s robes rise as he continues to stroke Angela’s head. I can’t keep watching. I don’t want to watch… I don’t want to see what happens to her. My throat tightens as I try to force out the word, “STOP!”
All I do is scream as I watch Felice Gravina’s dick come out of his pants. He lines his body up behind Angela’s. I close my eyes as she screams. But I’ll never forget the sound. It’s too much. Too painful. I lean forward and retch, throwing up all over the floor.
Felice cries out. I hear more of Angela’s screaming. My head is so light that I can barely stand. I lean against the wall and slowly fade from consciousness.
“GET HER SIGNATURE,” I hear Franco snarl. “Then wake her UP!”
No. I don’t want to wake up.
I don’t want to witness this.
I just want to go home.
I witnessed three depraved weddings and copulations.
Rapes. What I witnessed were three women getting raped right in front of me.
I threw up twice before my stomach stopped having anything inside to release onto the church floor.
Franco grabbed me by the neck as he led me to the car and snarled at me that I was lucky he didn’t make me lick it up.
And now, I’m outside again with just Nicki and her new husband.
Franco. She hasn’t stopped crying since they got married, but she also struck a deal with him.
He has major problems tonight since apparently Flora Corsini wasn’t where they thought.
She might have escaped and they all want to get the fuck out of here and find her.
Nicki can’t openly celebrate, but I can tell she’s happy that someone got out of this screwed up situation.
“You didn’t have to do this.”
Franco is clearly impatient about us saying goodbye, but he can’t leave us alone so we don’t discuss anything off-limits. What the hell am I going to tell Renzo about what happened to his sister.
“I owed you this much,” Nicki says in a torn voice, broken by screaming and sobbing from earlier. She fought and bled the most. Franco tried to calm her down but… he’s just as much of a monster as the rest of them. Worse, even.
“Your brother won’t accept this.”
I glance at Franco, hoping he doesn’t interpret my comment as a threat. Nicki’s eyes meet mine. We’ve been best friends for long enough that she knows why I said that comment specifically. If this is a power play, Buffalo won’t take it lying down.
“My brother will have to accept this,” Nicki says, stiffening her back and looking at me with seriousness that blocks me from reading her emotions. “I mean it, Geralynn. I’m paying for your freedom by staying willingly. Marriage means peace, right? Not war?”
Franco puts his arm around her. She winces, but he doesn’t seem to care.
“Thank you for your services tonight, Geralynn,” Franco says, grinning at me with the smugness of a man who knows he won. My life is inconsequential to him, so I feel lucky that he hasn’t put me in the ground. “You have changed the history of this city forever.”
Nicki looks at him nervously. She doesn’t like this, even if she agreed to it, but I can tell she doesn’t see another way out.
She fought this marriage, but if Franco has his way, she’ll soon have his baby.
A forced marriage. A forced baby. A forced allegiance between the Taviani family and the… Corsini family?
I shudder at the idea that she might be married to her first cousin, even if I don’t understand the connection completely. Poor Nicki.
“Franco. I don’t know who you are. Angela knows you, but I don’t,” she says, her voice numb, like she’s going through the motions of trying to find control here, knowing that she has absolutely none. “I’m agreeing to go with you willingly, but please… Leave my friend alone.”
Nicki seems scared. I’ve never seen my best friend scared, not even when she went toe to toe with her brother Renzo.
And considering everything she’s put me through, it feels fucked up to still call her my best friend.
In a way, she’ll always be my best friend – just only at this point in time, this part of my life which will soon become a part of my past.
Franco grins with smug satisfaction. His thumb brushes Nicki’s lower lip and she doesn’t bother hiding the shudder of fear that travels straight down her spine. He doesn’t bother hiding how much he likes it.
“I will obey your wishes, my precious wife.”
He kisses the top of Nicki’s forehead. I swear I hear the gentlest lilt of an Italian accent on his voice.
She looks over at me one last time. I reach for Nicki’s hand and squeeze it.
We’re getting away with this. We both have the dark instinct that if these men knew that I am the mother of Renzo Taviani’s child, my night would have gone very differently.
I’m forcing myself to act normal when nothing here feels fucking normal. As I let go of Nicki’s hand, a sharp stabbing sensation forms in my chest.
Her eyes well with tears. I don’t know if we’re ever going to see each other again, or if she’s ever going to see her cousin or sisters. I just have to accept this – my one way out.
Nicki never regains her color. Franco sends me off with a random man who I can’t identify. I don’t look at him too closely in case he changes his mind once we’re out of Franco’s view and decides that I know too much and he’s going to kill me instead of dropping me off at Devil’s Hole.
“Make sure you get her there safely,” Franco says to his henchman. “No funny business. We don’t want some thug shooting up our block to protect her.”
I quietly bite my tongue and ignore the irony of racial stereotyping saving my life right now. Some “thug” clearly implies a black man judging by Franco’s tone. Not like this is the first piece of evidence I have that he’s a disgusting creep.
“Don’t worry boss. I won’t push her over the falls or anything like that.”
“Get back in time for the after party,” Franco tells him. “We’re shutting this city down for the whole weekend to celebrate.”