Chapter 1 #2
I stand motionless, watching a capo disperse the curious men.
For a moment, I concentrate on the sounds around me. The hummingbird sipping fragrant nectar from my mother’s garden. The steady stream of water easing through the pipes of a fountain. My mother’s muffled screams within the house.
Jets of a plane soaring through the clouds …
My eyes drift to the sky, my heart beating unsteadily in my chest. I imagine it’s Sophie’s plane, taking her far from this hell, and it brings my pulse back to a fixed drum.
My father’s men round the side of the estate.
To them, I’m no better than the filth beneath their feet.
A traditore . An infame . Henri passes me with a damning scowl, clicking his tongue while the other one parks directly behind me.
I don’t need to turn to know he’s the one who my father has ordered to subdue me.
Little does he know I have no intention of fighting what comes next.
“I’ve got to give it to you, X.” Arturo sets down the paper, inhaling deeply. “Loyalty is a good quality in a man. I wish all these fuckers around me had more of it.”
My mother’s wails have stopped.
Stand still, Marcello. Focus . Forget she’s there.
“I’d be proud if it wasn’t that damn loyalty that made you betray this family.
” He pushes himself up from his seat, slipping a glowing cigar between his teeth.
“For months, Xavier, you made a fool of me. Your Papa. And worse, your Boss . You went back to your daily life without a word of concern for that woman. I admit, I began to believe I’d done my job correctly. ”
His consigliere grabs a piece of melon from the tray on the table, popping it through his teeth. From the window, Mama’s housemaid is pressed against the glass, trying to decipher the words she’ll eventually relay to my mother later tonight.
For her sake, I hope he chooses a different location to exact his punishment on me.
“Every man here, family or not, respects you. Not just in this house, but in all the houses. Enemy of ours or not, you have been brought up to be respected, feared, powerful. Why, why , would you throw all of that away for a woman? A soiled woman, at that?”
“Are you gonna keep talking or are you gonna beat me?” I gesture boldly to the table, letting him see how little remorse I have, letting him really soak in the last four months I spent deceiving him so I could find myself right here, in this moment.
The real winner. “Is this gonna take long? Should I have a seat?”
His pearly veneers bare at my audacity.
Devo essere impazzito. To push him in a moment such as this, I must be crazy. His men look equally offended that I dare to open my mouth. Arturo’s eyes flash to the man behind me, bright with the promise of rage.
There’s still an insolent smirk on my face when the world expands into sudden darkness.
“He’s moving, Boss.”
Before my eyes can open, my ears enhance what’s around me. The whistle of the harbor. Sloshing waves battering wooden planks. Seagulls cawing for food.
I don’t have to look to know I'm near the docks, but I do, peeling my eyes apart with difficulty. My lashes are stuck to my swollen eyelids, coated in a thick layer of dryness. As my head pounds from the back of my skull, I understand it’s blood .
The windows reveal the time.
It’s dusk. An entire day has passed.
My head hangs low to inspect the industrial rope binding my wrists together, its rough texture biting harshly into my skin. The warehouse floor is strewn with timber and scattered pallets. Glinting shards of glass. Relics of factory equipment.
This place. It’s not one of ours.
This warehouse is owned by my father-in-law.
My eyes scan the room for Vito Marin, coming up short. Instead, I find my father leaning against the wall, waiting for me. I freeze, sensing someone at my back where I cannot turn.
You’ve been through this before.
Many times. More than you can count.
Steady your heart. Dissociate. Let them wage war upon your body and give them nothing.
“You are my son.” Arturo’s eyes are glistening. “You don’t understand what it takes to be a father and do what I do. The conventional rules never apply to a boss. The Family always comes first. You know this. I know I’ve said it enough times.”
He straightens, not a scuff on his sand-colored suit. “It breaks my heart to do this.”
As if he has one.
Uninterested in listening to him try to justify what he’s about to do, I turn my face until I glimpse the man behind me.
Dario. One of Vito’s men.
The bastard has always reeked, and today is no different. It isn’t until I strain to meet his gaze that his grip on the steel pipe loosens, clattering to the ground with an echoing thud.
A year ago, I caught the man in the back of a truck with a capo’s wife. He’d been brought in by Vito in preparation for the joining of the companies. He looked as fearful then as he does now, apologizing as he scoops the weapon from the floor.
A hand captures my chin, jerking me forward.
My father glowers inches away from my face .
I give him nothing, a well-programmed machine.
This is who he’s made me. I don’t know why he’d ever think I’d beg.
“If you think this time is anything like the others, you are gravely mistaken.” His voice lowers to a menacing depth. “If you think I’ll give you my seat after all this shit you’ve pulled, I’ll tell you you’re fucking dreaming. I brought you here to punish you, make you understand what you lost.”
It’s near impossible to repress the hatred I could spew.
He’s always underestimated me.
He doesn’t think I know why none of our men are here to witness my fall from grace.
From the moment I could make out his words, he assured me I was his future.
His pawn against the hordes who wish him dead.
Vito’s man is here to dirty his hands because my father knows better than to let the men who will follow him see me in the dirt.
He’s retained his position this long because he has an arsenal behind him. A band of fucked up men too afraid or too envious of him to look in other directions.
With a single word, he was able to gain access to Vito’s men. With a single word, he secured this space to reform his kin back into the monster he made.
He doesn’t realize, as he speaks to me, that he already revealed himself long ago. He will put me at the top by any means necessary. That’s the way he wins. That’s his legacy.
He thinks dangling the position in front of me like a prize will bring me back to reality.
In some ways, he’s already the victor here.
Because I will seize my opportunity.
I no longer dream of freedom. Or children. Or my wife. Too much has happened even to imagine a life so gratifying. The moment they laid their hands on her, I knew I couldn’t go back. I knew if I wasn’t originally made for this life, it had now sunk its claws into me .
He won’t get away with this.
Neither of them will. Vito will pay as well.
Arturo nods to Dario, standing with a disappointed sigh. My eyes fix on a crack in the floor, preparing for the bluntness of the steel.
Suppress it.
Accept the pain.
It’s nothing compared to hers.