9. Luca
Luca
Chapter nine
Thirty minutes later, we pull up to a hole-in-the-wall bar in a small town outside of Boston. It’s where Finn and I would occasionally meet when he wanted a face to face. I think he liked to remind me in person that I have family and I’m not completely alone even though I’m essentially in enemy territory playing the part of a heartless criminal. Finn has made it clear on more than one occasion that if it gets to be too much, I can leave at any time, but doing this, bringing down the man who ordered my parents’ murder, hell, wanted me dead, too, is the driving force that keeps me going back to that house every day. Just because Francesco’s in jail doesn’t mean my work is done. Finn wants Carlo gone. He wants the Cataldis to be a cautionary tale of what happens when you fuck with the Monaghans. That’s what keeps me firm in my resolve to see this through.
“This place looks…interesting,” Giada says, peering at the red brick building I’ve parked across the street from. “Is this the part where you make sure I go missing for being a pain in the ass? If so, you’ve picked a good spot where no one will care about a woman screaming her head off.”
The bar sits in the middle of a commercial building. For Sale signs that have been there since the first time I met Finn here sit in the windows of the businesses on either side.
“Don’t be a snob. The place has a good music selection and cold beer. And no one here will give a shit that they saw your father’s face all over the news this morning.” The story has been on every local news station today, and no doubt a few national ones too.
Giada lets out a long sigh. “Yeah, I suppose my family is going to be the talk of Boston for some time.”
I nod in agreement. “Most likely. But not here.” I jerk my head toward the building. “Come on.”
Giada gives me a small, nearly imperceptible smile and nods, opening her door and climbing out of the car.
As we’re walking across the street, her heel gets caught in the cracked pavement and she nearly topples face-first into the road. My arm shoots out, and I grab her around the waist before she falls, smashing her body into mine.
“You okay?” I ask, looking down at her wide eyes, my arm still banded around her middle.
“Uh-huh,” she pants out, and I see the vein in her neck pulse violently beneath her skin. “Damn heels.”
Making sure she’s as steady as she can be, with one foot in her shoe and the other balancing on her tiptoes, I kneel down and pull the heel of her shoe from the deep crack in the pavement. Her hand moves to my shoulder to steady herself while she lifts her foot and slips it back into the heel I’m holding for her.
“Thank you,” she whispers and my gaze collides with hers. A charged moment passes between us, completely catching me off guard. Her amber eyes are glued to mine. For some reason, I can’t seem to tear my hand from the soft skin of her ankle, even though her shoe is back in place.
“If you stay down there much longer, people are going to think you’re proposing,” Giada says, a half smile gracing her lips.
I stand and swivel my head dramatically like I’m searching for something. “What people?” A grin tilts the corner of my mouth when I offer her my elbow. “I’d rather not have to take you back home with a busted lip.” Giada gives me a flat look but loops her arm through mine just the same.
It’s impossible not to feel the warmth of her body as she walks next to me. She allows me to open the door to the bar before moving my hand to the small of her back to lead her to a table in the corner. The place is dark and narrow with old wood paneling covering the walls that have booths running the length of the building and several scarred tables with worn vinyl chairs down the center. The bar has one man behind it sipping from a coffee cup who looks less than thrilled to have patrons this early. The reason Finn likes it here is because it has no affiliation to the Cataldis or the Monaghans. Here, we were just two guys catching up. That doesn’t mean I’m going to sit in the middle of a bar with my back exposed, though.
“What do you want to drink?” I ask Giada as she slides into the corner booth.
“Vodka and cranberry please.”
I quirk a brow.
“What?” she asks.
“That’s just so…girly.”
Giada rolls her eyes. “I like what I like. Girly or not.”
Shrugging my shoulders, I walk to the bar and order her a drink and myself a soda water before fishing a twenty from my pocket and getting change for the jukebox.
“Here you go. They didn’t have any umbrellas,” I say, handing her the drink.
“What do you have against my drink?”
“Nothing. It’s exactly what I thought you’d like.”
“Well, what are you drinking?”
“Soda water. I’m technically on the clock.”
Giada shoots me a sad smile. “Pretty pathetic that I’m sitting in a bar at eleven in the morning drinking with my bodyguard the day after my father was arrested.”
I shrug and sit across from her. “Depends on who you ask.”
“I’m asking you.”
I lean back and sip my soda. “I’m not judging you, Giada. It was a shit night followed by an even shittier morning. If you need a minute to gather yourself, this place is as good as any. Here.” I set the stack of ones on the table and nod toward the opposite corner where an old jukebox sits. “Have at it.”
This time her smile is happy as she grabs a couple bills and heads over to pick out some music.
When she returns an old song from the sixties is playing through the bar. She slides back into the booth and sips her cocktail.
“Not what I expected,” I comment.
She rolls her eyes. “What? You don’t approve of my music selection, either.”
“I didn’t say that. I actually like the oldies. I didn’t think you did.”
“You don’t really know me all that well, do you?” Her brow rises in a challenge for me to disagree.
“I don’t suppose I do.”
“I know what you think of me, Luca. I’m just some little Mafia princess who doesn’t have a brain or thoughts of her own. That I’m oblivious to what my father and brother do. Or that I don’t care because it keeps me in expensive clothes or some shit.”
“Whoa,” I say, holding my hands up in mock surrender. “I never said that.”
“You didn’t have to. That’s what all the men in my father’s organization probably think about me. Little Giada does everything she’s told. Smiles when she needs to, is only good for marrying whoever her father picks out for her so he can have more power, and having little Mafia babies who’ll grow up in the same life doing the same thing.”
“I’ve never been under any misconception that you’re one to do as you’re told, Giada. If you recall, I used to catch you sneaking out of your room in the middle of the night to go to parties. And I believe it was just last night you made me go to a horrible fucking club with you so you could do God knows what with God knows who. That doesn’t scream submissive little princess to me.”
“Yeah, that club was pretty bad, huh?”
“Are you kidding? It was terrible. Why the hell did you want to go to a place like that to begin with?”
“Truth?” There’s a slight wince on her face.
“Always,” I reply.
She groans and takes another sip of her drink, nearly swallowing the entire contents of her glass. “I wanted to piss you off.”
My head tilts to the side, staring at her as she chews her bottom lip. Something I’ve noticed she does when she’s nervous.
“It’s so fucking dumb, Luca. Especially considering the last twelve hours. I was pissed my dad said I needed a full-time bodyguard, and I wasn’t exactly thrilled it was you.”
“Why?”
She looks down into her empty glass and mutters, “I can’t believe you’re going to make me say it.” Her eyes meet mine and she holds my stare. I don’t know if the alcohol she just consumed in less than five minutes is giving her courage—not that she needs any around me—but she speaks in a clear and sure voice. “You had to have known I had a huge crush on you when I was a teenager. Well, seeing you again, I don’t know; I guess I went back there in my mind and remembered the last day I saw you.” She shakes her head, remembering the morning in the hallway when I was told I was moving on to Alberto’s crew. “I was so worried we’d been caught and you were going to get fired or something.” I don’t bother telling her that if I’d been caught sneaking her back into the estate, my “firing” would likely have left me with a bullet hole. “Anyways, I heard you talking with Alberto and my father and realized you were going to work for him. I knew what he did and it pissed me off that you turned out to be like every other man in this business.” Giada looks at her glass then me. “I need another drink.”
I sit still, stunned at her admission. Not that I didn’t suspect that was the reason for her behavior last night, just that she’s admitting it now.
“Same thing?” I ask, nodding toward her glass.
“Maybe make this one a double.”
Two hours later, Giada isn’t feeling any of the sadness or hurt she walked in here with. Her hips sway back and forth in front of the jukebox as she feeds more money into the machine. I have to say, I’m impressed with her musical tastes. They range from old country to some ear-splitting pop hits mixed with a lot of songs from the sixties and seventies. Ordering another drink from Jay, our unimpressed bartender, I ask him to make this one heavy on the juice and light on the vodka.
I sit back down at the booth and Giada dances her way back to the table, picking up the refilled glass and taking a sip.
“My mom used to love dancing to this song.” It’s one of the older ones I appreciate much more than the newer shit she was playing. “She used to dance around the kitchen while she baked bread or was making homemade pasta. She’d twirl me around and we’d sing and sing.” Giada’s smile is bright as she’s caught up in the memory of being a little girl with a loving mother. Something I never had.
“Before she died, she enrolled me in dance classes. It was obviously different from our kitchen dancing, but I loved it.”
“I don’t remember you dancing when I came to the house.”
“I’d quit by then in a fit of bratty teenage rebellion.”
I give her a flat look.
“Hey.” She points an unsteady finger at me. “I know what that look means.”
“I think we’ve established that you actually can’t read my mind.”
Giada laughs, but I’m not sure what she’s finding so funny.
“You’re not like I thought, Luca Bennetti, I’ll give you that.”
I tilt my head to the side, a question in my eyes.
“I mean, how many other bodyguards would be here with me while I drink my problems away in the middle of the afternoon? If it were anyone else, they’d have called my brother, and he would’ve come storming in here and dragged me out for being an embarrassment to the family or some shit. Like I’m the one who’s the embarrassment.”
It never occurred to me to make that call. She needs a minute to wrap her head around everything that’s going on, and someone needs to look out for her. It’s not as though her asshole brother gives a shit, and neither does her father, for that matter. I certainly remember how they treated her when I first came to work for the Cataldis. It was just as Giada described earlier. They brought her out and pranced her around like a show pony then put her back in her ivory tower until the next time they needed her.
“I learned a long time ago it’s better to go along with your plans than tell you no and have you sneak off without protection.”
Her hips stop moving and she looks at me through glassy eyes. “Thank you,” she says sincerely. “For stopping that boy all those years ago and for last night. Those assholes thought they had a sure thing in their pocket.” She giggles and takes a swig of her drink. “I would have loved to see you smash his face.”
“Violent little thing, aren’t you?”
“Surprised?”
Considering who her brother and father are, no, not really.
“Nah, but most girls would freak out over a little blood.”
Giada shrugs. “It’s not the first time I’ve seen blood, and I’m sure it won’t be the last. That’s the thing about being the girl everyone forgets about. I’m like a tiny fly on the wall that no one notices.”
She turns and raises her glass to the bartender. “Jay, another drink please,” she calls and sets her glass on the table before sitting down next to me. Jay meets my eyes, and I nod before he pours her a weak vodka and cranberry.
Giada telling me that no one notices her makes me wonder what she’s heard and seen living with Carlo and Francesco. And what information she has that could help me and my cousin bring down her family. I never considered she would be privy to anything useful, but now I’m wondering if I’ve been working this entire thing from the wrong angle.
“Thank you, Luca,” she slurs next to me.
“You already thanked me.”
She shakes her head back and forth. “No. For today. For bringing me here and listening to me ramble. There isn’t anyone I can talk to about any of this. My family in Italy isn’t involved with this side of our life at all, and other than Bianca, I don’t really have any friends in the States. Not that I would ever tell her any of this. Hell, I don’t even know why I’m telling you any of it, but here we are.” She lets out a dramatic sigh and closes her eyes. “I think I’m drunk.”
“I think you passed drunk an hour ago.”
A huff of laughter escapes her. “You’re right. Maybe it’s time to go home.”
“Yeah, princess. Let’s go.”
When we return to the estate, her brother isn’t around, and Giada continues to drink and play her mom’s old records that she brought down to the family room.
“My dad doesn’t like anything that reminds him of her. Maybe that’s why he hates me. I look just like her,” she drunkenly confides in me while she’s splayed out on the floor next to the old record player. The record ends and she rolls toward the player to change out albums. When the first song begins playing, she hops up from the floor and starts dancing around the room like she didn’t just share one of the saddest truths of her life.
A few hours later, after switching between dancing and lying on the floor or couch listening to another song with a sweet smile on her face, she decides she’s hungry, so we head into the kitchen. I’m not sure why I don’t just leave her to herself and go to my room to unpack the things I brought back earlier, but I don’t. Maybe I feel bad for her. She’s contending with too much for a girl her age to have to deal with on her own. It reminds me a bit of when Frank told me about my true parentage. I didn’t have anyone to turn to, and I was so damn angry. Hell, I still am. Neither of us deserves the shit hand we’ve been dealt.
Giada pulls a bag of chips from the pantry and opens them, shoving a messy handful into her mouth. While she’s chewing, she grabs a loaf of bread and some peanut butter and jelly.
“I’m going to make you the best thing ever.”
She grabs a pan from one of the lower cabinets and sets it on the large six-burner range. After slathering the peanut butter then the jelly on the bread, she butters each side and sticks them in the pan.
“What on earth are you doing?” I’m horrified at the sight in front of me.
“Trust me. This is the best way to eat PB and J.”
I shoot her a dubious look, which makes her laugh, the tinkling sound causing the organ in my chest to beat a little faster. It’s one thing to feel sorry for her and want to be there for her when she has no one else to turn to. I can sympathize with that. But this is an entirely different emotion that I absolutely need to shut down. There’s no room for the daughter of my enemy in my heart or anywhere else, for that matter.
When she finishes grilling the sandwiches, I look at the messy concoction with jelly and peanut butter oozing from the sides as she takes a huge bite from hers.
“They’re so good this way, right?” she asks as I take a bite of mine. “My mom used to make these for me.” She bites down on another messy mouthful. “Do you have a favorite thing your mom used to make?”
I shake my head. “My mom died when I was a baby.” The familiar anger at the thought of what she must have gone through in her last moments on earth rages through my body. I can’t blame Giada for the sins of her father. It’s not her fault he was responsible for my mother’s murder. Hell, she wasn’t even born then. But that doesn’t mean I’m comfortable seeing the look of pity in her eyes when it was her father’s order that took my mother and all the memories I could have had with her.
“That’s a really shitty thing to have in common, huh?”
I nod, not wanting my voice to give away just how shitty this entire situation is.
“You’re from California?” she asks around a mouthful of the gooey sandwich.
“Born and raised.” Partially true.
“So it was just you and your dad?”
“Yup.”
“You’re really forthcoming with the details, huh?”
I shrug as she watches me expectantly. “I grew up in a little town with my dad. He did the best he could with what he had.” It was pretty damn great, in my opinion, but I can’t exactly divulge too many details.
“When was the last time you went out to visit him?”
“I don’t. He died before I moved to Boston.”
And that look of pity is back in her eyes. “You’re alone in the world,” Giada says, her eyes growing watery.
Something cracks in my chest. This girl, who has no one in the world who cares for her, has to live with who is probably the worst brother and father I’ve ever met. She has to navigate through a world where she has no hope for personal autonomy and she’s in tears over me losing my family. She doesn’t know the truth, that I’m here because of my family, but that doesn’t change the fact that I want to take some of her sadness away. I don’t deserve her sympathy, just like she doesn’t deserve to be collateral damage in this war.
I send her a soft smile. “I’m far from alone right now, though. And you’re right about these sandwiches. They’re fucking delicious.” I take a huge bite and hum in satisfaction.
My reaction brightens her sad eyes and she smiles wide. “I mean, I’m not going to say I told you so, but…”
“I would expect nothing less. I also wouldn’t say no if you wanted to make another one for me.”
She laughs and the sound lifts a bit of the weight that’s been sitting in my chest.
“I’ve created a PB and J monster.”
She hasn’t created a monster, but she’s gone a long way in calming the one that’s been living inside me for the last six years.
After finishing our grilled sandwiches, it only takes another thirty minutes for her to pass out on the giant couch in the living room. I consider leaving her there, but if her brother comes home and finds her passed out drunk on my watch, I know he won’t be particularly happy with either of us. The last thing I need is to ruin my chances of getting off babysitting duty. So I take her to bed, lay a trash can next to her just in case and shut the door behind me before going back to my own room.
The next morning, when I step into the bright kitchen, I find Giada sitting at the small table next to the large bay window. She has sunglasses covering her eyes and her dark hair is in a messy bun on top of her head. At some point in the night, she must have gotten up and changed into sleep pants and a sweatshirt because that's not what I put her to bed in. A small smile plays on my lips at her disheveled appearance. I’ve never seen her less than completely put together, even when she was a teenager in high school. This is the look of a woman who had far too much alcohol coursing through her veins the night before and is paying the price this morning.
“Morning,” I say cheerily, grabbing myself a cup of coffee.
“Hey,” she croaks out, raising her glasses from her bloodshot eyes. She scrubs a hand over her makeup-free face, something else I don’t think I’ve ever seen and clears her throat. “Umm, thanks again for putting up with me yesterday. And for putting me to bed. I was…not in a good place.”
“Don’t mention it,” I reply, waving off her concerns.
“I was thinking about something I told you yesterday. About how I used to take dance lessons.”
I nod, not only remembering her telling me but also her dancing around the bar and then the living room last night.
“I think I’d like to start again. There’s a studio—”
“You look like shit, Giada.” Carlo walks in and sneers at her disheveled state.
“Fuck off, Carlo,” she throws back.
He stops and looks her dead in the eye. “You’ll need to start thinking twice about how you speak to me. Remember, Dad’s not here anymore to protect his little princess.”
It takes effort, but I manage to hold in the eye roll. That man never protected Giada from anything.
“You can go jump off—” she starts.
“Giada was just telling me she wants to start dance lessons again,” I cut in. It’s too damn early in the morning for the Cataldi siblings to start World War III. Plus, Giada doesn’t know it, but Carlo’s patience with his sister is thinner than it’s ever been, and I don’t know what will happen if he lays a hand on her in front of me. Not after last night and seeing another side to the girl sitting at the table trying to hold the remnants of her life together.
Carlo laughs. “Why? You think you’re going to be a ballerina or some shit?”
I chuckle at his stupid joke, pretending like I think it’s a dumb idea, but we should just go along with it, all the while imagining my fist flying toward his face. “Can’t hurt anything. Keeps her occupied and out of trouble.” I shoot him a look that says that’s what he wanted in the first place.
“Yeah, alright.” Carlo turns to Giada. “Find something, but Luca goes with you and stays the whole time.”
She gives him a sarcastic salute, but thankfully, before he can lay into her for her disrespect, his phone rings.
“Yeah,” he barks and leaves the kitchen.
“Well, that’s settled,” I say, turning back to Giada, who is glaring daggers at my face. “What?”
“I just love being talked about like I’m not in the room. Thank you so much for getting permission from my asshole brother for me to do something that should be my decision and none of his concern. Really, I’m glad you two are okay with me staying ‘occupied.’”
She stands from her chair, nearly knocking it over.
“Giada,” I call, but the only sound is her stomping up the stairs. What can I really say though? I have to play the part of asshole bodyguard in front of Carlo. He needs to see me as the careless prick because that’s exactly what he is. Nothing about last night changes the real reason I’m here. But I can’t explain that to her. I’m having a hard enough time keeping up pretenses as it is. She may hate her brother and hate how her father treats her, but she’s still a Cataldi, and blood will always be thicker than water.