Chapter 25
Luke
E mma left to return to the resort. My mom appreciated the chance to say hi to her, but when I sat down with her, she could tell from my demeanor that I intended to have a sobering, serious conversation.
I didn’t want to have to ask her about my father. On the wake of Emma accepting my proposal, I rather would’ve spent time with her. To look forward to my future, with her. Not looking back at the past.
“Uh-oh.” Mom cringed. “What’s wrong?”
“Marlo Rossini.”
Just saying his name brought a reaction.
She lowered her head and sighed, looking so old and small.
“Marlo Rossini is my father?” I phrased it as a question, even though I already had the answer.
“I’m sorry, Luke.”
“How could you keep this from me? Why?”
She pressed her lips together and shook her head sadly. “I never wanted you to know.”
“You’re ashamed about it?”
Lifting her face, she stared at me with a silent imploration to forgive her. I wasn’t there yet. I was still too shocked to consider forgiveness.
“How did you find out?”
I narrowed my eyes. Like that mattered. I knew and that was enough. “Jimmy. And I want to know how my manager and my mom got into fucking cahoots to lie to me all my life. Thirty years, Mom. You could have told me at any time, dammit.”
“Jimmy’s not only your manager.” She cleared her throat, seeming to struggle with breathing steadily as I put her on the spot like this. It was hard for her. I knew it had to be, but this wasn’t a walk in the picnic for me, either.
“He’s Marlo’s brother. Jimmy Rossini. He helped me look out for you the best he could, from a distance.”
The hits just kept on coming. I had to learn that I had a father and uncle in the same day. And I’d proposed. Before, it was just me and mom. Now my family had doubled in size.
“Why—”
“I was just so worried. About what to tell you. What not to tell you.”
“Did Marlo expect you to raise me on your own?” My hatred for this man I never met deepened. “Did he even know about me?”
She shook her head. “No. He didn’t know about you. When I realized who he was, how powerful he was, things got complicated. I felt it would be safer to raise you on my own, with no involvement from the Rossini family at all.”
I could almost understand that. Distance seemed wise from these powerful men and their fucked-up policies about arranged marriages.
“But I did have involvement. Jimmy’s been training me to fight since I was young.”
She nodded, furrowing her wrinkly brow. “I know. He and I agreed that making sure you had street smarts would be best.”
I grunted a single laugh. “Street smarts?” The man tapped my rage and darkness to mold me into an elite killer and fighter.
“As you got older, there was no easy way to tell you. It became a matter of worrying that you’d find out from someone else.”
“I can’t believe you’d lie. For so long. That hurts, Mom.”
“I’m sorry, Lucas, but I truly thought—and hoped—it would never be an issue.”
I scoffed. “What, that I’d grow old without ever knowing at all?”
She nodded. “Sometimes, ignorance is really bliss.”
I glanced at my phone as it buzzed.
Randy: Dude, where are you? I’m covering for you but Tim’s asking when you’re clocking back in.
“Can we talk about this more later?” I asked her.
“Yes, honey. I really am sorry. I kept this from you thinking it would be best.”
Too bad for her, I’d never really agreed with the concept that ignorance could be bliss. I was a believer in knowledge being power.
“I’ll stop in later,” I said as I stood to leave.
Even though everything was being turned upside down in my life, I couldn’t slack with work. I couldn’t forsake all my obligations.
As I walked back in the drizzle that followed the rain, I let the mist rising from the pavement swirl around me.
My mother had a lot more explaining to do. Jimmy as well. They owed me answers for why they kept this from me. They had to tell me what motivated them to hide who my father was.
Until I had answers, my mind ran off with worst-case scenarios.
Was my mom threatened? Maybe Marlo was in one of these stupid arranged marriages with someone other than my mom when I was conceived?
Was she paid off to stay away? Coerced?
Did she fear me growing up in the family, raised like all those other mafia men and soldiers?
“If I’d only known...” I shook my head as I walked.
If I’d known that I was the son of a mafia boss, my entire life could’ve been so different. Not struggling for money. Not eking out a living and wondering what would happen if I was too tired to go on anymore.
Now, this was a huge issue.
I got nervous about how Emma and I could get out of all this danger.
It was one thing to butt in and “claim” Emma before Antonio could.
As the son of one of his rivals, though, it was different now. Like an attack or subterfuge to meet her and claim her.
But I didn’t know who she was. She erred in not telling me who she was, that she was the daughter of a mafia lord.
I suspected that she might not have wanted to tell me because she feared I’d want out, that I would walk away. After all those times I told her that I didn’t want any trouble, that would have been a clear sign of it.
If she’d been upfront, I wouldn’t have been able to stay away. It was simply set in stone, some sense of kismet. That when we collided, we’d be trapped in each other’s orbits and unable and unwilling to stay apart.
The dangerous elements of us defying all these mafia leaders weren’t things we had control over. We couldn’t have planned this to happen. It just had.
Emma and I had met. Then crashed and burned. It was inevitable, but now that we’d decided to stick with each other, we couldn’t go forward with this miscommunication. We had to have a better sense of teamwork. And plan.
Too much was at stake to neglect the details that could ruin us.
I had to talk with Jimmy and understand the implications of me breaking Emma’s arrangement to be with Antonio.
I needed to listen to more of my mother’s reasoning and answers to better gauge if the father I never knew about could be a threat to my future.
Emma, too. She and I had to sit down and have a conversation about what our future could look like and how we could make sure no one interfered.
We were pulled together from the beginning, and nothing would force me to lose her. I’d swear on it.
I returned to the resort, finding Randy waiting for me at the door.
“Fuck, man. Where the hell were you?” he asked as I clocked back in.
I sighed. The last hour and a half of my life couldn’t be summed up easily. “I went to see my mom.” That was the truth at the basis of it. I had left to go talk to her on my lunch break after a quickie with Emma at her condo.
Then I learned I was an heir to a mafia boss. Then got engaged.
It was a lot, and I’d need to explain it to my friend later.
“Well, hurry up. Someone caused a fight at the bar.”
“Again?” I sighed, wishing this afternoon could be an easy one so I could think.
“Yeah.” He frowned at me as I hopped into a golf cart with him to get there quicker. “Hey, is she okay?”
I furrowed my brow. “Emma?”
He scoffed. “Man, you’re playing with fire fucking a guest like that.”
“That’s not the worst of it.”
If you only knew, man. If you only knew...
“I meant if your mom was okay. You look...”
Confused? Bewildered? Angry? Hurt? After Emma agreeing to marry me, the only thing I should’ve been projecting was utter happiness. Excitement.
“Lost.”
I nodded. That worked too. “It’s been a wild day.”
“We’ll have a drink when our shift is done. First round on me.”
I planned to celebrate with Emma. But maybe talking with him could give me some clarity too. He had always been a good listener.
I wondered how he’d react though. Learning that I was a mafia boss’s son was big news. But I didn’t feel any different. Knowing I’d marry Emma changed me more. I’d already spent so many years without my father that he didn’t matter now. He couldn’t change anything about who I was deep down. He couldn’t tweak my entire personality.
I wouldn’t take charity. Nor pity. If that fucker never wanted to be in my life, then fuck him. But if my mom hid me from him, he couldn’t have known anyway. This was on her , not him.
Maybe he’d be happy, overjoyed that he had a son who’d been hidden from him all his life. There were too many questions, and I felt uneasy about them floating in my head and overcrowding the limited space there.
“Hey, drive past the VIP condos,” I told him, wanting to just see Emma from a distance. The reminder that she was near would comfort me. It’d soothe me to know she was close by and that soon, the whole world could see that she was mine.
“You’re whipped,” he teased.
“Damn straight,” I admitted. I wouldn’t be shy about how much she mattered.
So much that the sight of men carrying her out of the condo damn near stopped my heart. The sight of her gagged and fighting to get free pushed me into running after her.
“Emma!” I roared it, sprinting toward the scene of the men trying to shove her into a van parked out front her condo.
“Emma!” I dug in, pumping my arms to run faster and stop those fuckers.
She freed one hand, reaching out to me as she stared at me with terror in her bright eyes.
Then they threw her in the back and slammed the doors as the drive pealed out of the lot.
Kidnapping her right in front of my eyes.
THE END