15. Aria
15
ARIA
T he atmosphere at my parents' house is gloomy. Everyone moves more slowly than normal, even Melody, who plays the part of the strong daughter by serving every visitor and graciously accepting their gifts of food and flowers. I'm hollow inside, just an empty husk right now. I stand near the fireplace looking up at the portrait of our family that hangs above the mantel. We had it taken when Jasper was only seventeen, when our family was whole, before either of my brothers died. Now there are only two of us left, me and Melody.
"Do you want some water?" Melody asks me, but I look at her blankly, unable to answer her question.
Do I want water? No. I want my brother back. I want the hands who stole his life to be cut off and the person to whom they belong openly executed. My soul is crushed, suffocating guilt paralyzing me as I blink and look back at the portrait. Melody floats away to busy herself serving someone else, and I shut my eyes, sending a wave of tears across my cheeks.
Tito isn't here—had business to tend to this afternoon but promised to return to be with me and the family this evening. My father understands. He'd never make a man as important or busy as Tito Ramiro deign to darken his doorstep to wallow in mourning with us when we all know Mr. Ramiro gives exactly zero fucks about this. He, after all, is the one who did this. I can't prove it, but I know it. But more accurately, I was the one who did this, and for that reason, I say nothing.
I can't even carry the weight of that guilt myself—that I pulled the strings that pissed my husband off and ruined his drug deal. That I am the person he is really angry with, but he doesn't know it. That Jasper died because of something I did, and now I can't give my father his eldest son back, his heir, his life.
"Bella," he purrs, and I turn to see him approaching me.
Dad's eyes are red-rimmed and puffy, his nose chapped and cracked from being blown so often it's been rubbed raw. He's lost a bit of weight in the past few days. I can see it in his face, the way his eyes are slightly sunken. He hasn't been eating. He's been too busy trying to find out who killed his son so he can retaliate. But if I tell him my suspicions, he will pull out of this deal with Tito, losing everything. Or worse—he'll try to avenge Jasper and get himself killed.
"Papa," I say affectionately, and I bury my face in the crook of his neck as I wrap my arms around him. He smells like pipe tobacco and whiskey, two familiar scents I often think of when I miss him. "How are you today?" I ask him, and I already know he will lie and say he's fine. It's only been four hours since the funeral concluded. No one is fine.
"Aria, don't worry about me." He pulls away, gripping my shoulders and looking me in the eye. "Tito is a good man. He's running everything right now, so all we have to do is grieve." There is a surety in his expression, confidence that he's in good hands. It makes anger stir in my chest. Dad has no idea what Tito is up to.
"What do you mean, he's handling everything?" I ask, but I keep the anger inside me to myself. Dad doesn't need to know that I'm suspicious yet. He'll see that soon enough. "How can he run everything without access to your finances and if your employees don't know he isn't truly in charge of things?"
I'm confused and cautious as Dad's hands slide down my arms and take my hands into their grasp. Dad's face relaxes, and a soft smile passes across his lips.
"He is in charge of things, mia cara . Just last week, we merged all of our companies together. His assets are shifting our entire outlook. We haven't been this healthy as an organization in years. In just a few short months, he will have effectively turned every individual business around. And for now, with the incident…" Dad chokes up but doesn't let any tears escape. He can't even speak of Jasper's death right now. "Well, Tito isn't affected as emotionally as I am, so I've given him full reign for the time being."
The python coiled around my chest constricts and threatens to make me explode. I bite back my hateful thoughts about how Tito will only control everything faster now and try to think of my father in this situation. Of course he can't run businesses. His son was murdered in cold blood in a very gruesome way. Logically, this makes sense, and that's why he is doing it, but I know Tito's ulterior motive is to own it all, the territory, the businesses, the loyalty of my father’s men.
"Papa…" I can't just let Tito walk in here in my father's grief and steal from him. He's already been brought to his knees. This isn't supposed to be happening. My plan isn’t working fast enough. I need to get Tito out of the picture but keep his money.
"I know what you'll say. Jasper had his thoughts about this too…" Dad pats my cheek and walks away. He reaches into his pocket and pulls out a stick of gum, unwraps it, and pops it into his mouth. When I follow with a look of concern on my face, he says, "Mother is making me quit smoking." His smiled grimace makes me chuckle, briefly pausing the heaviness in my heart.
"Papa, do you think it's wise to let the leader of a rival organization take the reins of your business with no oversight, simply because you’re grieving? Isn't there someone we could put in your place for a while? Uncle Gino, or one of my cousins?" I follow him all the way to the couch where he sits and sighs hard.
I sink onto the leather cushion next to him and drape an arm over the back of the couch, sitting sideways so I can see every minor inflection on his face. He seems so content with this choice, as if nothing in the world can go wrong.
"Aria, who better to trust in this time than a man who has offered his hand in marriage to my daughter? He knows the business well, understands the risks. And he will sire my heir." Dad narrows his eyes at me and rests a hand on my knee. "Maybe he already has?" he asks, and I feel my cheeks burning.
Not exactly what I want to discuss with my dad at this moment. What does he want me to say? Yeah, Dad, I fucked the man I was forced to marry? Hardly a good topic for discussion the day of your brother's funeral.
"I'm just saying, he has a lot of motivation to be unfaithful to you, or disloyal to your wishes." I hope my words of wisdom don't come across like the accusations or suspicions they are. But I also hope Dad heeds my fears.
"Let me worry about it, Aria. You need to trust your husband. You just worry about keeping your heart from being too overwhelmed. I know how close you and Jasper were. Heavy emotions like this can't be good for anyone, let alone you in the delicate position you're in. And if you're with child…" He takes my hand and squeezes it.
"God, Dad. No one says 'with child' anymore." I roll my eyes and force a smile, and he nods at me.
I'm not going to get through to him this way, which means the only thing left I can do is push this partnership with Carlos a little further. If Dad is letting Tito take the lead so early into this agreement, I'm never going to see the day my father leads his own organization with pride again. Tito will build things up and my father will lose it all.
"Well, I say it," he says, and then he sighs and the grief returns to his expression. It's so heavy, a weight no one should ever bear alone, and mine is doubly heavy. "We have to go to Jasper's house later to clean it out. His landlord would like to find new renters even though I offered to pay out the lease in order to not lose the funds." Dad speaks, and his hand waves in the air in a frustrated gesture.
"I can go help," I tell him, and I grab his waving hand and press it to my chest. "You and Mammina shouldn't have to do it alone."
The leather squeaks as he readjusts his position on the couch, and I lean forward and lay my head on his chest. His arm comes up to surround me, pushing hair off my shoulder and rubbing circles on my back. It's brutally painful to even think of going to Jasper's home and seeing the evidence that he was there only days ago. There will be laundry on the floor of his bedroom, dishes in the sink. And the police caution tape is still there on the street corner too, the investigation still active.
"Melody will go…" Dad's grief is so tangible, I can feel it seeping into me through osmosis. I feel so ashamed. I want to confess to him that it was my fault, but even if I told him everything, he would still say that life is this way sometimes. He'd never be angry or blame me.
"I want to go too." My decision is final. Tito won't care. He doesn't seem to care what I do right now, and for a while, I thought that was because he was busy with his work. Now I know he's busy taking my father's organization over—with Dad's permission to do so.
"Alright, then, we'll go." He rubs my shoulder, squeezing and petting me as if I'm a lap dog. I want to go find Mom and see if she's alright, but right now, Dad needs this moment.
My thoughts linger on the triggering sight of that caution tape stretched around traffic cones and trees, surrounding the burnt-out car and crumbled cement from the aftermath of the explosion. Police cleared the block moments after it happened, and no one is allowed to park within twenty feet of the cordoned-off area.
"Do you think they'll find who did this?" I pick at a loose thread on my father’s shirt. It dangles from a button and annoys me. It's something to keep my waffling mind steady as I listen to Dad talk about the police and what they know.
"We have our guys in the lead, but the best they can see is that it was related to our organization. Gang violence is at an all- time high, blah, blah…" Dad sounds about as convinced as I am. "One of them tried to tell me it was a Ramiro, but I'm no fool. Donatello would never remove my heir after signing that contract. He'd be a fool. It's a breach of our agreement. All the money they've poured into things already, along with the wise business principles put in place by Tito—they'd be stupid to make such an egregious error."
Dad is so confident, and for a single second, it actually makes me hopeful. He's right. If I can prove Tito ordered the hit, it means he's broken the alliance and Tito and I are finished. But if Tito finds out I'm the one who gave that intel to the police, not Jasper directly, then the pendulum sways the opposite way. My heart sinks again.
"You're right," I tell him, but I'm realizing that taking my husband down to rescue my father from this stupid mess he's in—part of it my fault now—is going to be harder than I thought.
"I'm not worried." Dad pats my shoulder again. "You'll produce my heir, and by the time I'm too old to do this any longer, he will be a man old enough to lead well, with a brilliant mother to support him."
I force myself to sit straighter as Melody walks in, Mom trailing behind her. "Look who feels up for company," Mel says, trying to act cheerful, but her eyes are just as puffy and red as everyone else’s.
Mom hurries to Dad's side, climbing onto his lap and letting him hold her. She is taking this harder than us all, and my deep shame causes a chasm of separation between us. I'm sure she doesn't feel it. She would wrap me in her arms and hold me like I’m her baby girl all day if I ask. It's me. I'm the problem. I can't bring myself to meet her gaze right now. I am the reason her baby boy is dead this time, and nothing will undo that.
The most I can hope for is vengeance in the end. So, I curl up and rest my head on her knee as she sits on Dad's lap. Melody sits on the other side of them, leaning her head on Dad's shoulder.
I have to fight harder now than ever before because Tito needs to get his hands out of the pie and away from my father's businesses. It doesn’t even matter that the sex is incredible, and after that comment about us leading together, my heart is starting to fall for him. I didn't do this to find a partner. I did this to save my father's organization, and my heart will be collateral damage, but by God, I will bring him down and his money will stay ours forever.