Chapter Eighteen
GIANNI
A n hour and a half after Becca walked out the door, my sister bulldozes through it looking like she’s been sucking on a lemon.
“May I help you?”
“Actually, yes.” Sera plops her ass in the center of the coffee table, a determined lift to her chin that feels way too familiar. “Stop being a fucking idiot.”
“Great to see you, sis. Too bad you can’t stay.” I cross the room and stand by the open door, waiting for her to get the hint.
She just stares at me, head cocked, and lips pursed like she’s trying to figure out a way to drill through my head. “I saw Becca. It’s quite a feat to cause your wife to look even worse than she did after getting in a car accident. I’m impressed.”
“Thanks.”
“What the hell, Gianni? Are you trying to lose her?”
I sigh and close the door. “Of course not. I wasn’t aware there was a manual I had to follow when?—”
“Do you love her?”
“What kind of question is that?”
“One you’ve avoided answering.”
And I can think of a couple dozen ways to avoid doing it now. All of which she’d see through in an instant. My personal life has always been my sister’s favorite subject. Trying to keep something from her is like rolling around in catnip, then taunting a box of kittens.
She won’t let this go, which means the only way out of it is through it.
“I’ve loved her from the moment I saw her.”
“Why?” she asks. I’m taken aback by the question. Mainly because no one has ever asked it. “Is it because of her resemblance to Victoria?”
I’m so fucking tired of hearing that.
“I shouldn’t dignify that with an answer,” I say, storming to the wet bar because I need to douse all this “bared soul” shit in something eighty-proof.
“However, I want it known, that narrative is not only inaccurate, but it also pisses me off. Blonde hair and blue eyes are DNA traits, not fetishes, Sera.”
“My mistake.”
“Yes, it is.” I fill my glass with enough whiskey to dilute the destruction pumping through my veins.
“I fell in love with Becca because she’s smart, witty, stubborn, and not afraid to call me out when I’m being a total dick.
That’s not something many…” I stop as a wide smile spreads across her face. “What the hell’s so funny?”
“Nothing. You’re just validating my theory of why I think you’re shutting her out. Want to hear it?”
“No.”
Apparently, it was a rhetorical question.
“I think her accident made you realize how much you’ve lowered your walls. Loving Becca made you vulnerable, and you got scared because it reminded you that level of vulnerability has the power to break you.”
I drink while Sera waits in silence, her last words hanging in the air like a bad omen. I want to tell her she’s wrong. That her fatalistic hero complex hypothesis is a crock of shit.
But it’d be a lie.
She pushes to her feet with a sigh. “I know I’m right because I’m watching it all on replay. Mom’s death changed you, and not for the better. You blamed yourself for something a thirteen-year-old boy had no control over, and here you are at thirty-five doing the same thing.”
I let out a bitter laugh. “No control? If it wasn’t for me, Becca wouldn’t even be in this mess, much less hunted like fucking prey.
She tried to keep things professional, and I wouldn’t listen, because Gianni Marchesi has to always get his way.
” I swing the glass hard enough for liquid to slosh over the rim. “Just like when I was thirteen.”
I’m the common denominator here, the selfish bastard who takes what he wants and lets others pay the price.
I lift the glass again only for Sera to snatch it from my hand and set it on the bar. “Getting plastered won’t solve anything.”
“How do you know? Have you tried it lately?”
She groans. “I know Becca’s accident brought up some deep, unresolved feelings, but avoiding her won’t make them go away. You need to talk to her before you push so hard that she doesn’t come back.”
The finality in her warning hits in a place I don’t want to acknowledge. She’s right. I’m avoiding Becca because she’s too in tune with the parts I keep hidden. I don’t want to hurt her, but the accident opened old wounds. I need time to regroup and shove this back inside the box it escaped from.
“I’ll think about it.” It’s the best offer she’s going to get. “Did you seriously come all the way from Newark to play marriage counselor?”
“No, I came to check on my favorite sister-in-law.”
“She’s your only sister-in-law,” I mutter.
She grins. “That’s why she’s my favorite.”
She’s so ridiculous I can’t help but laugh. Fuck, I’ve missed her. “You know I have a lot of spare rooms,” I say before I can stop myself. “Why don’t you stay a while and?—”
“Gianni…” Her smile fades, and she stares at her feet. “I can’t. Sal?—”
“Fuck that coglione . I can have that farce of a union annulled before dawn.”
She lifts her chin, those dark eyes throwing arrows at me. “You’ll do no such thing. You have your role in this family, and I have mine. Besides, I have a comfortable life. Sal may be an insufferable jackass, but he takes care of me. What more could I want?”
“Do you love him?” I ask throwing her challenge back at her.
Her lips flatten in a strained smile. “Don’t be a stranger, big brother.”
Her calm acceptance makes the hate I carry for my father even heavier.
“Newark is only a half hour away,” I mutter.
The tightness in my chest relaxes a bit as her eyes brighten. “Which means I can show up to knock some sense in that hard head of yours anytime I want.”
While corny, it draws somewhat of a smile to my face. “Thanks, piccolina , for everything.”
She shrugs. “Eh, what are sisters for if not to be an accessory to murder?”
I walk her to the door where she lifts onto her toes and wraps her arms around my neck in a crushing hug. Just as I tighten mine around her waist, the door swings open.
“Hey, Sera,” Anton chirps, a little too cheerily.
Giving me one more squeeze, Sera drops back onto her heels, only to spin around and attack Anton with the same ferocity. He gives me a wide look of confusion over her head, but I just shrug. “Take care of my brother,” she says, then walks out the door.
Anton gestures a thumb over his shoulder. “What was that all about?”
“Sera’s playing marriage counselor,” I say, leaving him standing there as I cross the room toward the ugly card table I hate with a passion.
Marcello’s table.
I’ve threatened to toss it out the window multiple times but never go through with it. Anton says it’s because deep down I see it as a reminder of how easy it is to get caught up in the power and greed this life offers.
I’m not so sure about that. I just can’t be fucked to replace it.
He takes a seat across from me. “Did it work?”
“Fuck off.”
He chuckles. “What’s on your mind, kid? You look a million miles away.”
I grind my teeth, knowing I’m going to regret this. “Anton, do you think being vulnerable to love is worth the risk of it breaking you?”
He’s silent for a minute, then a serious look falls across his face. “I think regrets will break a man faster than vulnerability. Love isn’t for the weak. It can rip apart more flesh than any bullet or blade. But a wound from lost love bleeds slower than one from love you turned your back on.”
“I’ve shed enough blood. I can’t spare anymore.”
“Look, Gianni, I get it. Watching love fade away is a pain I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy. But fate gave you something others would kill for—a second chance. Don’t blow it.”
The raw emotion in his voice pulls me out of my river of self-pity. I stare at the faraway look in his eyes, one that seems chained to another time. Then, it hits me.
Holy shit. How did I not see it before now?
I knew bits and pieces of the story, but with Anton serving as my father’s loyal underboss, I always assumed it was their friendship that built the foundation that’s lasted four decades.
I never stopped to ask myself why Anton had never married.
Why I’d never seen a woman hold his attention.
Why I’d seen tears pooling behind his sunglasses at my mother’s funeral when my father’s eyes were bone dry.
He loved her.
Anton loved my mother, and because of another fucking arranged marriage, he had to sit back and watch his best friend marry her and then drive her to her grave.
I can tell he knows I’ve figured it out, and another uncomfortable silence has us scrambling to crawl out of this hole we’ve fallen into. So, I do what comes naturally…
I talk business.
“Becca thinks this Dagger asshole followed her and Reese to Hackensack,” I say, hoping he runs with it. “She swears she saw him sitting a few feet away from them at Cucciola’s .”
He mulls that over for a moment, then his eyebrows shoot up. “Shit, that means he probably overheard them talking about where Reese was?—”
“Way ahead of you. I sent Paulie to Marvin Hooper’s mountain cabin two hours ago. I should have an update anytime now.”
“Good thinking.” His eyebrows lower only to pinch together. “The crash happened off Route 3, right?”
“Yeah. Why?”
“Too bad Leo didn’t take the Parkway. It’s a toll road, and Marcello had a contact at the Turnpike Authority who could’ve run?—”
“A plate check on all white Camrys,” I say waving him off.
“I know. Unfortunately, I can’t place a call to Hell and question Leo’s fucking thought process.
Luckily, Deadpan Don had another contact at the Bloomfield PD who realized it was in his best interest to send me the accident report.
It seems a witness got the plates on the Camry in question.
As suspected, the car was reported stolen five days ago. ”
“Of course it was,” he mutters. “So I assume the cops are following up on that.”
“They would’ve…” I give him a flat stare. “If a glitch in their system hadn’t lost the report.”
“Gutsy. That must have been one hell of a phone call.”