Chapter 2 #2
I spin around, taking in the over-the-top grandeur of the home. What the hell has my father been doing to afford all this?
“Go up to your room and change into something appropriate.” Davide points at the curving staircase. “I’ll go break the news to your father that you’re here early.”
Indignant anger flushes my cheeks. How dare he order me around as if I’m a child. And my clothes are perfectly fine.
But before I can put him in his place, there’s a sharp gasp.
“Gina?” Shock fills my mom’s voice.
I slowly turn around and face her. “Hey, Mamma.” I haven’t called her that in years, as she preferred the English version when they moved to the States, preferably Mother because it was more formal and ladylike.
She’s beautiful, willowy, and perfect as always.
Dressed in a fine evening gown that seems way too elaborate for dinner at home, even if they have guests.
She floats toward me, ever the poised wife.
However, panic has replaced her shock as her eyes travel over me and take in my less-than-posh appearance.
She waves toward the stairs. “Hurry. Get upstairs and change.”
Stubbornness roots my feet to the floor. I just traveled for over twenty-four hours, so yeah, I’m not put-together like the princess they like to pretend I am.
“Why? Who’s here?” I ask.
And why is she shaking like she’s scared?
Both she and Davide push me toward the stairs, and I stumble a step before re-rooting my feet.
“It’s great to see you, too, Mom.” She cringes like I knew she would, at my calling her that.
“Geez, it’s been months, and yeah, sorry you and Dad couldn’t make it to my graduation from the snobbish school you forced me to go to. ”
Yeah, I’m not bitter. At. All.
“Now is not the time,” she hisses.
“Gina Isabella Caruso.” My father’s voice doesn’t boom, but it slaps me with the anger in his words.
My mother trembles and steps behind me while I turn to face him.
What the actual hell, Mom?
Since my father’s mild stroke and the Babbo version of him died, he hasn’t been a loving man, but why is she acting like she’s afraid? Afraid of him?
Franco Caruso isn’t overly tall, and I got his short stature instead of my mom’s tall, willowy frame. His dark hair is grayer at the temples than I remember, the lines deeper on his face. He storms over to me, his polished shoes harsh on the marble floor.
“What the hell are you doing here?” he seethes.
The little girl in me who just wants her Babbo and the close family we once were dies a little.
I straighten my shoulders and lift my chin, refusing to wilt and bow at the less-than-loving homecoming.
Not that this is my home; I haven’t set foot in it until today, and none of my parents’ houses have felt like home since my father started to change.
I miss our small home back in Italy. I miss who my parents were, and I hate who they’ve become.
My father, ambitious and conniving; my mother, who craves the elite, lavish lifestyle.
Plus, the afraid woman she currently is as she trembles behind me.
“Good to see you too, Dad.” I don’t use Babbo, because screw him, and I don’t use Father as he prefers because it makes him sound ‘more lordly’.
Mom sucks in sharply behind me. In the next instant, my face snaps to the side, and my cheek erupts with pain.
It takes a moment for my brain to catch up to what the hell just happened.
My father just slapped me.
Tears burn in my eyes, but I refuse to let them fall. The man seething in rage is nothing like the man I used to love, respect, and call Babbo. My heart breaks as my cheek throbs.
I look at Davide, who is standing there, fists clenched. But he just stands there, doing nothing.
Fucker.
I stomp on my urge to cry and defiantly lift my chin and turn back to my father.
But before he can say anything or strike me again, he’s slammed against the wall.
One of the paintings clatters to the floor, making my mother gasp.
A large, scarred hand pins my father to the wall, holding him by the throat.
I’m frozen in shock, staring at that hand. Then my eyes move to his wrist and up the sleeve of a tailored suit jacket that perfectly encases a thick arm and shoulder. To a strong, corded neck and a jaw lined with stubble to the perfect carved features of a god. When he turns to look at me, I gasp.
Crystal-blue eyes that feel like they’re burning into my soul, and the most gorgeous man I’ve ever laid eyes on. He must be at least six-five, because he towers over my father by a foot.
I know who this man is. Everyone in the mafia world knows who Tommaso Santoro is. All the mafia princesses at school fawned over the idea of him and took bets on who he would marry. Rosa Altera was the most vocal of all, smugly smirking that she’d be the one.
I’ve only seen Tommaso in pictures. With his size and height, plus his ruthless reputation for protecting the Santoro family, he’s not only imposing but a man to be feared. And right now, as he looks away from me and back to my father, his look darkening, he’s downright terrifying.
“We do not hurt women and children.” His voice is low and deep, dark. And my stomach swirls. I’m just not sure if it’s nerves or what exactly my reaction is. “Do. You. Understand?”
My father’s face is a shocking shade of red with Tommaso’s fingers wrapped tight around his throat, and he opens his mouth, but no words come out.
“He can’t speak with how tight you’re holding his throat,” I say, but then I clamp my mouth shut, because what the hell am I thinking? And how is my voice so steady and strong while Tommaso essentially holds my father’s life in his hands?
He looks at me over his shoulder and smiles. That smile makes my knees weak. His startling blue eyes study me, but I don’t feel like he’s judging me for my messy hair or my sweats, and I keep my spine straight and strong.
His tongue darts out to wet his bottom lip. My toes curl in my shoes, and my entire body feels like it’s buzzing.
What the hell is happening to me?
His smile fades as he turns back to my father and finally releases him. My father drags in a huge breath and sags, clutching his throat.
“Do you understand me, Caruso?” Tommaso asks again about his reminder that the Santoro family does not hurt women and children. His voice is even and calm, but the threat ripples under the surface.
“Yes, Tommaso.”
“Yes, what?”
My father’s eyes dart to me and then back to the powerful man in front of him. “Sorry. Yes, Don.”
Tommaso backs away, looking calm and fully back in control instead of choking my father with one hand in the foyer of their home.
There’s no doubt this man was born and bred for power. And I can’t stop staring at him.
“Welcome home, Gina,” he says.
My mother recovers first, and she steps to my side. “Yes, welcome home, bambina.”
I’m feeling more than a little salty with my mother. First, she abandons me at that school, then she stands by while my father slaps me, and then calls me a childish name in front of Tommaso.
He hasn’t looked away from me, and heat flushes my cheeks. It must make my stinging cheek redder because his eyes harden. He’s morphing back into that terrifying version, but somehow, no fear leaps forth within me.
He offers me his elbow, like a perfect gentleman, instead of the violent and ruthless mafioso he’s rumored to be. “Please join us.”
Panic rolls off my mother in waves. “She can’t join us looking like that.”
Tommaso’s dark brows pull together. “Why the hell not?”
My mother sputters, and my father clears his throat.
“I’d rather not,” I say. “I had a long flight.”
“Yes, dear.” Father straightens his suit jacket. “Why are you here already? I was sending a plane for you tomorrow.”
I fight the urge to roll my eyes. It was no doubt Tommaso’s plane he was sending.
Tommaso’s lips twitch as if he’s suppressing a smile and can read my mind.
“I was in a hurry to get home,” I lie smoothly.
“Well, I hope the first-class flight was comfortable.” It’s like my father is trying to impress Tommaso with how much money we have, when this man is probably richer than God.
My father would lose it if he knew I flew coach and took a bus to the airport.
“Run upstairs and freshen up.” The look he gives me pointedly tells me to make sure I look like the version of what Santa Elisabetta promised to mold me into and that they paid through the nose for.
“That’s really not necessary,” Tommaso insists.
I inwardly sigh, knowing I’m not getting out of this, even though jetlag is going to kick my ass soon. “I would like a moment to freshen up.”
My words seem to kill any further insistence from Tommaso, and he nods, stepping back. Then he says in a hard, cold voice, “Davide, a word.”
His clipped steps across the marble floor echo in the foyer as Davide—who I had forgotten was there—pales, watching his retreating back. “Now, Davide.”
Tommaso doesn’t need to raise his voice or look back at him. Davide jumps, dropping my small suitcase, and hurries after him.
My father grips my wrist and says tightly in my ear, “Look your fucking best.”
Then he takes my mother and drags her back to wherever the guests are, and she flashes an apologetic smile over her shoulder before they disappear through the arched doorway.
Sighing heavily, ignoring my fatigue and my aching cheek from my father’s slap, I pick up my suitcase and carry it up the stairs.
I have no idea where the bedrooms are or which one is mine, but I guess I’ll figure it out all on my own…just like everything else in my life.