Chapter 6 Valentino
My sister sputtering her mimosa in my face is not how I planned for this brunch to go. Not much takes Francesca by surprise, but guess I just did.
It takes her a minute to regain her composure, the napkin pressed to her nose. Well, she just snorted champagne and orange juice from there, it must be burning. I’m sorry for this, but she shouldn’t have been so taken aback.
Francesca blinks as she drops the napkin then motions for the waiter to bring her another drink and a plate of eggs benedict.
“You’re going where?” she asks once the table has been cleared before her.
I roll my eyes. She’s rubbing it in now.
“You heard me just right.”
I don’t want to say it aloud again. Because it would make it too real. The Governor’s New Year ball is the last place you’d ever catch me. High society, the hobnobbing, the very snobbishness of it rubs my skin the wrong way.
“Um, why?” Francesca asks as a fresh plate and flute appear before her. She nods to the waiter in thanks before turning her piercing hazel eyes on me.
Merda, it’s like having Mamma giving me ‘The Look’ all over again. We Andretti boys took after our father. Our mom and Francesca look like they just stepped out of a Botticelli painting, all red hair and pale skin.
A sigh escapes before I can quell it.
“It’s our world now,” I say.
“It’s your world, you mean.”
Another sigh wants to emerge. I quash it. We always come to this in our conversations.
It’s fair to say Francesca never really took to our way of life. Not that she should’ve been a pampered princess, but she resents how we live. The expectations our Borgata places on each of us. As a woman, she’s expected to stick to a certain image and role. As much as I don’t like that she feels caged, it’s a fact. We’re the Andretti family—we have to act like it, whether we like it or not.
“Francesca, please. Not today.”
She has the decency to look chastised.
Since coming back home in all urgency and crash landing to handle the murder of our father in the summer, I’ve taken to having monthly brunch with Francesca in New York. She doesn’t like coming home to Morris County, says it stifles her. She needed leeway, so I gave it to her. As long as she allowed me to keep tabs on her once a month.
But today’s no ordinary Saturday. It’s the holidays, and we should’ve all been together. Since the funeral, all five of us Andretti siblings haven’t been in the same room at the same time. For security reasons. My dad wasn’t gunned down in the middle of a street or a busy restaurant at lunch time. But he got shanked, nevertheless. It happened at the gym, of all places, a goddamned cugine trying to be made into a rival faction getting the drop on him.
Needless to say, that figlio di puttana is swimming with the fishes now. We also sent a strong message through the eye of his whore of a girlfriend who had grand ambitions of being a mob wife.
This was handled a few months ago. It’s been quiet ever since. Guess everyone knows you don’t mess with the Andretti family. None of our plans are going awry, and if I can keep it that way, I will.
Yet, my brother Victor is right. We’re not a cohesive unit yet. By taking out the head of the Andretti family, it destabilized us all. Everyone respected Marcello Andretti around here. We don’t use ridiculous terms like ‘Capo di tutti capi’ in real life—the media came up with this one—but that’s the position my padre held in this region.
So, no meeting where we’d all be sitting ducks at the same time. Meaning no Christmas celebration at home this year. Victor’s natural paranoia prevailed this time. He’s in Venice enjoying the empty cathedrals at this time of the year. Franco is in London. Luciano took little Luka to his in-laws’ so the bambino could have a semblance of holiday cheer at his maternal grandparents’ estate in upstate New York.
It's just Francesca and me here, and it hurts. It sucks.
“Let’s talk of something else,” I tell my sister.
“David is thinking of proposing, I think.”
“Urgh.”
She laughs, which makes me smile. I over-emphasized my dislike in replying to her.
“Don’t worry. I won’t say yes.”
“You better not.” I grumble.
David is a struggling artist crashing on her couch—I refuse to think of him in her bed—because his art means he’s basically penniless and homeless. Nice enough kid, same age as her. Just not going anywhere in life. I want more for my only sister.
She’s our youngest sibling, and we all look out for her. Are we over-protective? Sure. We’re her brothers. That’s in our job description. Like making sure no one ever takes advantage of her.
Francesca is twenty-four, one year older than Naomi. This gave me a benchmark in my dealings with her. I didn’t want some grown-ass man setting his sights on my sister when she was eighteen and vulnerable. Which then made me carry this forward onto Naomi, too. Once she grew older, sure. And this became a non-starter altogether for me when my father sent me to Turin to learn the business from our Uncle Gennaro.
I always knew I would inherit the throne one day. As his eldest son, it is my birthright. His most loyal capo deferred to this state of affairs from the get-go, his loyalty to my father and then to me as I grew older was unwavering. The plan was for me to learn the ropes until I turned thirty-five. At forty, our father would start easing off, so I’d gradually take center stage.
Alas, this wasn’t meant to happen. I have to step up now. But my father, I am not. Mamma maintained it was the Taurus in me—an Earth sign, solid and stable and that didn’t like to make brisk moves let alone ripples. A far cry from his Aquarius Water energy— the water-bearer who needed to connect people as a gateway. He did it well. In less than twenty years, he rose from a nobody to one of the strongest bosses of the region. His family wasn’t just feared but also respected, which is saying something in this world.
“Please don’t tell me you need a plus one for this ball,” Francesca says, interrupting my musings. “That’s also a big no.”
I smile and tip my champagne flute to her. “Wouldn’t dream of it. You’d make that resting bitch about to vomit face. No.”
She rolls her eyes at me. “It’s a masked ball, stronzo.”
“Only the top half of your face would be covered. Your mouth is a dead giveaway.”
She throws a piece of bread at me, which makes me laugh.
Francesca can always make me laugh. As can Luka, our little nephew.
And now there’s Naomi. I enjoy thinking about how riled up she got when I brought up Wickham on the plane. The soft insult did its job, though—it distracted her from jumping back into her anxious haze after I made her come, and kept her mind otherwise engaged for the rest of the flight.
I’m tempted to tell Francesca that Naomi is back. But I don’t. That will open a can of worms I’m not ready to deal with. Plus, she’d have the news broadcasted on the family WhatsApp within the hour.
No. For now, I wanted Naomi to be my little secret.