3. — the prodigal problem. #2
Sal said nothing.
It didn’t matter. He already knew the answer. No.
Otherwise, they wouldn’t be doing this. Nico would still be down at the guesthouse safely tucked within the four walls of a high stone fence that he had no problem climbing what with all the trees and vinery around.
Fucking idiots.
“You know,” Nico said as his running shoes carried him closer to the seating arrangement in the middle of the room, “I could already be gone if I wanted.”
Last night proved as much.
Salvatore leaned back in his chair and steepled the tips of his fingers together. “I suppose. Why not go, then?”
“Contrary to popular belief, I can actually do what I’m told.”
Larkin scoffed at that comment.
Nico just rolled his eyes.
“And what Giorgio says, goes...right?” Nico added about his father. “That’s how it works. He calls the shots.”
The mere mention of the boss had Salvatore glancing Larkin’s way. “Take a walk, would you? I’ll call you back when I’m ready.”
“Sure thing, boss man.” On his way past Nico, Larkin stared him down. “Behave.”
“I also know how to do that. I just don’t care to do it for you.”
“Actually, you will do it for him,” Salvatore said, his tone becoming firm as the office door closed. “You will behave for him, and anyone else I deem appropriate, the same way you did in this office with me so far today.”
Nico cocked an eyebrow higher than the other. “With sarcasm and thinly veiled contempt?”
“With respect. I’m not saying it has to be perfect, Nico. You don’t have to be perfect here, all right?”
Good thing. He didn’t know where to begin for that.
“Trust me,” Sal stressed, shaking his head, “I get that literally no one would be happy to walk off an airplane just to immediately have their belongings and rights taken from them, told where they could and could not go, and expected to follow along without argument or discussion. I do get it, Nico.”
Salvatore then waved at the white chair beside Nico. “Are you going to sit?”
“If you’ll let me.”
“I asked for you to be here. You can sit.”
Actually, Nico didn’t just sit, as the other man suggested. In someone else’s private space, he always waited for the explicit invitation. It meant showing respect that others didn’t often consider. An invitation to sit comfortably in a place that meant something to them, hit different for Nico.
He still wavered in sitting until Salvatore murmured, “Pick a chair, son, it isn’t hard.”
Nico sat.
“Now, between you and me, and I do mean just you and me,” the other man said, folding his arms across his chest, “let’s get a few things straight.”
Nico was still trying to get beyond the flippant son comment. “Like what?”
“Like who is calling the fucking shots from here on out, for one. I know it probably wasn’t obvious to you yesterday evening when you found me waiting for you, and we didn’t have a lot of time to clear shit up, so I’ll take the time to shine it like crystal for you this morning.”
“Uh—”
“Me,” Sal interjected fast. “I’m the shot-caller here. Not your father. Not Larkin. And definitely not you. It’s me. What does that mean to you?”
Nico chewed over his thoughts, considering both what he should say, and what he wanted to. They were often not the same things. “I thought my father said—”
Sal put a hand up, silencing Nico instantly. “You are mine to do with what I see fit. Officially, you are my problem, even if I don’t know the specifics around why you ended up here quite yet.”
Nico’s brow lifted high at that comment. Sal didn’t miss it.
“What?”
“He didn’t tell you about Miami?” Nico questioned.
Salvatore’s cheek twitched. “To be fair, he threw this on me yesterday morning with zero notice, and I really just wanted to leave.”
Standard Giorgio behavior.
A snort fell from Nico. “Oh, I get that. Believe me.”
“Do you care to tell me about Miami? Do I need to know something?”
“I was told I couldn’t talk about it,” Nico replied, shrugging. “It’s a matter of national security. Those were the exact words used, for the record.”
Sal blinked. “What?”
“Yeah, you should probably just talk to Giorgio if you need to know.”
The man across the room massaged his right temple with two fingers in the shape of a gun as he took in the information. “Unreal. Okay, moving on. When I feel the need to report back to Giorgio on your comings and goings, then I will. Otherwise, what does that mean between us, Nico?”
Right...
“You call the shots,” he stated.
A nod answered him back. “And what does that mean?”
Nico cleared his throat and glanced down into the mug. “I guess I should have been up here at eight, right?”
“For starters.”
“I probably shouldn’t throw things that don’t belong to me.”
“Another good one. Anymore?”
“I’m sure you’ll let me know.”
“You’re goddamn right,” Sal said heavily, sitting straight and drumming his fingers to the desk, “starting with the fact that last night shouldn’t happen again. Capisce?”
“What do you—”
“Sitting on the stone wall. Conversating with my daughter. Being anywhere you are not supposed to be.”
“I’ll do my best,” Nico stated, opting for the most honest reply he could come up with.
“You’re being very...compliant.”
“What choice do I have given everything that is mine, is his,” Nico said of his father. “Besides, I know I’m a fuck-up. I’m sure you’re aware that this isn’t even the third time he’s tried handing me off to someone else to handle his problem.”
“Are you?”
Nico’s head tilted sideways. “What?”
“Are you a fuck-up?” Salvatore clarified. “Or is that what everyone thinks and sees, and it’s just easier for you to give them exactly what they expect?”
No one had ever asked Nico that before. It bothered him that he couldn’t immediately answer. “I...don’t know,” he admitted.
Something softened in Salvatore. “I must say, I’m surprised.”
“At?”
“You,” came the quiet reply.
Nico didn’t quite know what to make of that. “I’m sorry?”
“Let’s not pretend here. You didn’t suddenly grow a set of wings and a halo, Nico.
” His mouth opened to speak, but nothing came out.
Sal tsked chidingly under his breath. “I’ve heard the stories about you.
Abject horror, young man. I’ve been involved in cleaning up more than one of your messes over the years, so I also have some firsthand experience in what you are capable of doing when you’re either pissed off, bored, or just out to prove yourself. ”
Nico’s jaw tightened, feeling a bit like a bear being poked with a stick. Things had been going so well, too. “We’re not going to act like my upbringing has been a fucking cake walk, right?”
He expected Sal to do what everyone else did when faced with the reality of his history: deny, ignore, or deflect. Blame was a popular choice, too, but that one typically got used by those who had caused most of his grievances and issues.
Salvatore didn’t blink a lash at the call out.
“Oh yes, and so neither of us forget, although I’m sure we never will for the same fucking reasons, I also had a personal hand in at least one of your father’s brutalities against you.
You were the little black sheep of the family before that night, and then after—”
“The family’s black sheep, Marco’s scapegoat, and Dad’s punching bag. It was all the same before then, and it didn’t change after. Don’t worry, what happened didn’t change much about my home life.”
Sal’s throat bobbed with a swallow. “But you did. You changed a lot. You cared less. Fought more. Actively looked for trouble and tried to die more times than the rest of us could comprehend.”
Nico scoffed. “Giorgio liked to say I was trying to get closer to God.”
“Fathers tend to do that. Excuse their kids’ wrongs or soften the blow of what was done. Whether they’re the cause or not. You should know, I can relate.”
“To whom—me or him?” Nico asked sarcastically.
Salvatore shrugged one shoulder, unbothered. “To loving someone even when they hate you.”
Those words landed like a sucker punch to Nico’s gut and he wanted to disappear. Just...go.
Salvatore moved in for the kill. “A ten-year-old boy doesn’t hug his father after he’s been beaten by him for doing nothing wrong, and apologize, if he doesn’t love him.”
Nico hated the way he could still see his father coming at him in the small bathroom, hands swinging and rage overflowing.
The surface of his skin electrified with the very thought of the memory, and then it was like he had been put right back in it.
Hands shaking, stomach clenching and him...
pleading. It made breathing hard. It made everything in the corners of his vision fuzzy while he tried to sit through it and let the moment pass.
Flexing his left hand gave him something to focus on other than the memories replaying in his mind, and the man who had yet to look away from him.
“You’re not okay, are you?” Salvatore asked.
He thought of the man’s daughter, and what she’d done to herself last night.
“A lot of us aren’t.”
“That’s fair, but I’m the one handling you, remember?”
“You can’t fix me. People have tried.”
A chuckle echoed from behind the desk. “Right. You mean the fifth and last high school where you weren’t allowed to return to without a therapist’s oversight.
And the doctor who put you on a mood stabilizer and went through round after round of antidepressants for two years.
That’s who you mean when you say they tried, don’t you? ”
Nico’s stare narrowed. “Are you trying to piss me off?”
“I’m trying to figure you out,” Sal replied.
“Let me know if you find the trick,” Nico said low. “I’d like to have it for future reference.”
That earned him another soft laugh from Salvatore. “You know, I think I could like you, Nico.”
“I’m still undecided,” he replied.
That was a lie.