Nineteen
Aspen
As I expected, my mother is standing in the hallway, arms crossed, her expression a mutinous mixture of concern and anger.
“What were you thinking?” she hisses, keeping her voice low. “Kai is right upstairs doing homework. What if he’d come down? What if he’d seen…”
“I know.” I hold up a hand, trying to ward off the lecture I can feel coming. “I know, okay? He showed up unexpectedly. I got him away from the house as fast as I could.”
“Not fast enough, apparently.” She glances toward the stairs, then back at me. “Does he know?”
“No.” The word comes out sharper than I intend. “And he’s not going to. Not yet.”
“Not yet?” Her eyebrows shoot up. “Aspen, you can’t seriously be considering…”
“I don’t know what I’m considering,” I cut her off, my voice rising before I catch myself and lower it again. “I don’t have a plan, Mamma. I’m just trying to figure this out one day at a time.”
She softens slightly, uncrossing her arms. “Honey, I’m worried, that’s all. Vito might be dead, but that doesn’t mean…”
“It doesn’t mean what?” I push off from the door and head toward the kitchen, needing to do something with my hands.
“It doesn’t mean the danger has passed? It doesn’t mean I should tell my son about his father?
It doesn’t mean I should come clean with Kaiden?
You think I haven’t thought about all of this? Or about every possible consequence?”
She follows me, her shoes tapping on the hardwood. “Don’t even entertain it. Why not just tell him to leave you alone?”
I grab a glass from the cabinet and fill it with water, taking a long drink before answering. “Because he’s Kai’s father.” The words come out harsher than I intend. “And because...” I trail off, not sure how to end that sentence.
“Because you still love him,” my mother finishes for me. It’s not a question.
I set the glass down too hard, water sloshing over the rim. “That’s irrelevant.”
“Is it?” She moves closer, her voice gentle now. “Aspen, I watched you grieve for that boy for years. Watched you cry yourself to sleep, watched you throw yourself into your art because it was the only thing that didn’t hurt. And now he’s back, and I saw the way you were looking at him just now...”
“Stop.” I press my palms against the counter to ground myself while I concentrate my attention on the water droplets scattered across the surface in an attempt to avoid saying something I shouldn’t.
“Just stop, okay? Yes, I still have feelings for him. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t. But that doesn’t mean I’m going to rush into anything. I have Kai to think about.”
“Exactly.” She places her hand over mine. “You have Kai to think about. A little boy who’s been asking more and more questions about his father lately; you’re letting yourself be swayed by that. Thinking with your heart instead of your head.”
I pull my hand away, wrapping my arms around myself.
“No, Mamma. I’m considering this from every angle so I can make an informed choice.”
“You made your choice ten years ago,” she hisses. “Stick to it!”
“Seriously, Mamma? That’s the way you want to play this, when it was at your insistence that I kept it secret in the first place?
It was your choice, not mine. I just went along with it because I didn’t know what else to do, and I wasn’t in a good place.
Besides, things are different now, and I think both Kai and Kaiden deserve a little bit of consideration. ”
“Nothing good will come of it, mark my words,” she argues, her face set into a rigid scowl that mars her pretty features.
“Really?” I demand, my voice rising despite my efforts to keep it down.
“Because I’ve spent ten years hiding Kaiden from his son,” I continue, the words tumbling out now that I’ve started.
“Ten years of deflecting questions, making up stories, watching Kai’s face fall every time another kid talks about their dad.
And I did it because you convinced me it was the only way to keep him safe. ”
“It was the only way,” she insists, but there’s less conviction in her voice now.
“Maybe it was. Then.” I lean back against the counter, suddenly exhausted. “But things are different now.”
“Are they, though? Are they really?” she presses.
“Vito Rossi is dead. He was always the problem, unless you know something I don’t.”
I narrow my eyes at her, daring my mother to admit that her former lover, suspected father of my baby brother, was also involved at a time when she was still his mistress.
Honestly? I’m not sure how I’d even cope if I knew that to be the case.
I watch my mother’s face carefully, searching for any tell that might confirm my worst suspicions. Her expression shifts, and something flickers behind her eyes before she schools her features back into maternal concern.
“Salvatore doesn’t know,” she says finally, but there’s something in the way she won’t quite meet my gaze that makes my stomach drop. “At least, I don’t think so.”
“You don’t think so?” The words taste bitter, and her lack of conviction unsettles me even more than I already am. I do not need more stress right now! “What does that mean, exactly?”
She sighs, moving to sit at the kitchen table like her legs won’t hold her anymore. “Sit down, Aspen.”
“I’d rather stand.”
“Please.” Her voice cracks slightly, and that more than anything makes me pull out a chair across from her.
She’s quiet for a long moment, staring at her hands folded on the table.
When she finally speaks, her voice is barely above a whisper.
“Vito confronted me one day when I was visiting the compound. It was maybe three months after you’d gotten out of the hospital.
He wanted to know if there had been any...
‘complications’ from the accident. I didn’t like the way he said it. Like he meant something else entirely.”
Ice floods my veins. “What did you tell him?”
“I told him no. That you were fine, recovering well, getting on with your life.”
I stare at her, my blood running cold. “And did he believe you?”
“I don’t know.” She shrugs, finally meeting my eyes, and I see a fear there that she’s probably been hiding all these years. “He watched me for a long time, like he was trying to read whether I was lying. Then he just... smiled. That horrible, terrifying smile he had.”
My hands clench into fists on the table. “What else?”
“He said he was glad to hear it. That it would be unfortunate if there were any... lasting consequences that might complicate matters.” She swallows hard. “Then he told me that if I ever heard otherwise, it would be in everyone’s best interest if certain information remained private.”
“He threatened you.”
“He didn’t have to make it explicit. The implication was clear enough.
” Her voice wavers. “I was terrified, Aspen. Terrified of what he might do if he found out about Kai. So I made sure no one knew. I paid for everything in cash, helped you keep your pregnancy hidden, made sure there was no paper trail connecting you to any baby.”
I nod, remembering that she insisted the birth certificate was listed in my maiden name with the father’s name blank. Something I hated then and still hate now.
“And Salvatore?” I press, needing to know the full truth.
She looks away again and shakes her head. “I don’t know for sure,” she says quietly, her expression tormented. “I desperately want to believe he didn’t. For the most part, Vito was a law unto himself, and as long as it didn’t affect Sal directly, he let things lie.”
She straightens her spine as if coming to a decision.
“I never wanted to be Salvatore’s mistress.
” She presses her lips into a thin line, and I stay quiet, partly because I want her to continue, partly from shock.
We’ve never discussed this before. Not once.
It’s always been a taboo subject. “It went against everything I believed in… he had - has - a wife!” she chokes, and the disgust she feels at herself is written all over her face.
Mamma blinks rapidly and clenches her hands into fists. “Apparently, I caught his eye on my frequent visits to see Therese, and he decided that was the perfect cover for our little trysts.”
“But you just said you didn’t want that,” I say, barely above a whisper.
My mother’s face becomes stoic. “Some things are less about choice and more about… Well, knowing what’s good for you in the long run.” Her laugh is hollow, brittle. “Salvatore made it clear that refusing him would have... consequences. Not just for me, but for you.”
I try to swallow back a gasp, but Mamma doesn’t seem to notice, either way. I’d always suspected but hearing her say it is a different thing altogether.
But then her face fixes into a fierce expression, and she raises her head and looks me in the eye.
“But he also promised me that the position would afford me certain privileges, and one of those was that both you and I would be protected. I was immovable on that point. I might not have liked the direction things were taking, but I knew well enough I could be painting a target on both our backs.”
Damned if you do, damned if you don’t. The idiom flashes into my brain front and center.
“I think he was at least genuine in that. Salvatore Rossi never says anything he doesn’t mean.”
She pauses for a moment, her eyes far away in the past.
“And when he found out you were in the hospital, he paid all your medical expenses.”
She flicks a glance my way.
“I never asked him to; he just took care of it.”
Or maybe he felt guilty for his brother’s actions. I don’t say that out loud. And in fact, I quickly dismiss the idea. Men like Salvatore Rossi don’t do guilt. They do power, control, and calculated moves that serve their interests. Coercing my mother into becoming his mistress is a case in point.
“What conclusions did you draw?” I ask, bringing us back to the question that matters most.
My mother’s silence stretches so long I start to think the worst. “I can’t say for certain that the Viper knew, despite whatever innuendos he made. I always refuted them, regardless.”