Chapter 5
MICHAEL
What do you want?
The question echoes in my head.
Shit. I can answer that in many ways. But I’ll keep it simple.
“I want to take over and save our brother. I don’t need a real wife for that, just someone who can play the role.” I rub my palms together. “Until I no longer need her.”
“And where the hell are you going to find a woman like that in such a short time?”
“I have no clue.” My elbows fall to the top of my knees, face buried in my palms, hair falling over the tips of my fingers.
There are some days where this is all too much. Worrying about my brother, taking over for my father, and taking care of my daughter, the only person in my life who truly matters. She needs me. If something happens to me, she’s got no one.
“He’s got a point about Valentina,” Gio points out.
“Then you marry her,” I snap.
“Damn. Okay, don’t shoot me. Shit. I’m just saying. Who else do you have?” His brows knit in thought. “Cassie’s cute.”
“Who’s that?” I ask, not knowing that name.
“That chick from Saint’s bar.”
“Ahh…” I chuckle lightly. “She has big tits like you like them.”
“They’re damn nice.” He winks, and my face turns hard.
“You fucked her?” The words spill harshly.
“Of course I fucked her.” His shoulder lifts a fraction. “Years ago.”
“What did I tell you about that?” I clasp his forearm. “You didn’t learn shit from the incident with Fiona, did you?”
“It worked out.” He pushes me off.
“He almost killed you.”
“Now that I see how badly he wants Raph dead, I believe he would’ve if I hadn’t fixed my mess.” He snickers.
We both know our father is a hard-headed man who doesn’t stand disrespect. And a bartender at one of our bars getting knocked up when Gio was eighteen was not what my father wanted. It’s a good thing Fiona’s baby was someone else’s.
“What are we gonna do about Raph?” Gio asks, looking unsure.
The Marino boys were once a united front, unstoppable. But life…it changed all that.
“We’re going to stall as much as we can and hope nothing else happens in the meantime. But if it does, we must end it once and for all.”
Staring ahead, I think about Raph and how good it once was. It was only a year ago when we were all in this very house, having dinner, and the next day, everything changed.
“Sophia, your hair is just so beautiful,” Bianca gushes, twirling a piece of my daughter’s wavy chestnut-colored strands around her finger. “Every year, you get prettier and prettier. Your poor father.”
She laughs unauthentically, giving me a glance, while I nod with a tight smile.
“She’s just perfect.” Mom leans her head to the side, brows knitting, a hand at her chest, adoration growing on her face.
“Thank you. Thank you.” Sophia curtsies with a bright grin, then twirls in her entirely too poofy dress she insisted on wearing.
Both of my brothers laugh. They love that kid as much as I do. She’s the only light in the darkness that is our world.
Being her father changed me as a man. Before her, I had no idea what it meant to love another person, not like I love her.
But when I found her, when I saved her…in that moment, she became mine.
It doesn’t matter where she came from, whose blood courses through her veins.
Because she’s my daughter. A Marino. And she will die a Marino.
Raph sits beside Bianca, his wife, while Gio’s across from Nicolette, Bianca’s twenty-year-old sister, nearly five years younger than Bianca. Nicolette’s pale green eyes stare right at Raph, but he’s always been too oblivious to notice.
But that’s Raph. He’s devoted. He’d never be interested in anyone while he’s married, especially his own sister-in-law. He’s as loyal as they come. I don’t think he’s even talked about fucking another woman, not even as an afterthought. He’s nothing like our father.
Raph is the real deal. Better than all of us. He puts everything into his marriage, even with some of the problems they seem to be having lately. I can see the tension between them, a lot more than usual.
If I ever settle down, I won’t be like our father either. But I haven’t found anyone who’d be good enough to be Sophia’s mother. My daughter deserves that, someone who can love her like they share the same blood.
But it takes a lot to marry someone like me, to accept the danger that comes with being Mrs. Marino.
Some of them are too eager for a chance with me, seeking the thrill of this life, but I’m not after a woman like that.
I want someone real. Someone smart. One who recognizes the dangers and accepts them because she wants me, wants us.
Nothing less than that will ever be enough.
Maybe one day, there’ll be a Bianca for me. Not today, though.
She comes from a solid family. Both of her parents are Sicilian.
Her father owns a bunch of liquor stores, which is where we get all our supply for the restaurants and bars, and for way below the market price.
It’s the least her father can do, my father says.
Elio would never refuse us. He knows better.
“When are you two having a baby and giving your mother and I another grandchild?”
Here we go: my father starting with Raph again. It happens at every damn family dinner. If it’s not this, it’s something else.
“Oh, Giancarlo.” Mom slaps him playfully on the chest. “Leave the kids alone.”
“Come on, I’m serious.” My father snickers. “Almost three years married and no kids? What are you waiting for? Neither of you are getting any younger.”
He stares straight at Bianca, and her eyes dart to her lap uncomfortably.
“She’s twenty-five, and I’m thirty-seven.” Raph’s jaw flexes as he leans forward with a harsh breath, fixing our father with a glare. “We’re not as old as you.”
“You wish you were made like me.” My father pounds his chest once with a fist, his features curtained with rage. “I’d have knocked up my wife more than once by now.”
Nicolette widens a stare, scratching the side of her neck with long fingernails.
“We’re leaving.” Raph starts to rise.
“What are you so sensitive for, huh? What the hell did I say that’s so bad?” my father mocks with tense laughter.
The air is thickening with heavy unease, my brother’s eyes still on him.
“I mean, your…you know…” my father says, glancing at Sophia, who’s sitting on my mother’s lap and looking back and forth between him and Raph. “It still works, right?”
And we all know he means his dick.
Raph’s entire face tenses. I can practically feel that fury filling his blood with poisonous thoughts.
This is how it’s always been with them. My father has had an axe to grind with Raph for as long as I can remember. Even when we were kids, he was never good enough. Strong enough. Sinister enough.
Me? I never had that issue. We all knew I was the favorite, and I hated that. Gio? Our father just tolerated him.
“Dad…” Gio says. “Enough.”
“Yeah, come on. We should probably be going,” Mom says with a tense smile, playing with Sophia’s hair. “This little girl needs her sleep. Isn’t that right?”
“I’m not tired.” Sophia scrunches her face.
“See? She’s not tired,” my father says, flipping a hand in the air. “All I’m trying to do is make sure we have a solid new generation. Strong Marino genes. No pussies.”
He says that while looking straight at Raph.
Bianca fingers her shoulder-length black hair, while Nicolette’s brows knit as she stares at Raph.
“Yeah, because you should know about being a pussy.” Raph’s voice rises. “Isn’t that right, Dad?”
“You hear this one?” Dad chuckles, but it never reaches his eyes.
He jumps to his feet, and then my brother jumps to his, gritting his teeth.
“Oh my God,” Sophia murmurs.
My mother’s arms slip around her; my baby’s eyes are full of fear with tears filling them.
And that’s when I’ve finally had enough. I get up, standing between them, a palm against each of their chests.
“This is not happening in my house,” I tell them both. I won’t allow a fight near my daughter. “You’re all leaving now. You and Mom first, Dad. Go.”
“Alright.” His chuckle is deep as he waves me off. “I’m going. I’m going.” He turns to Sophia. “Grandpa has to get his beauty sleep. I’ll see you tomorrow, okay, princess?”
“Okay, Grandpa. Love you.” She throws her arms around him in a quick hug, then holds my mom in a tight embrace before placing a palm against her cheek. “Love you, Grandma.”
“I love you too, my favorite girl.” Mom kisses her on the forehead, then grabs her bag and starts for the door after our father.
That’s what she’s done most of her life. Follow him around. And their shitty marriage made me realize a long time ago that I don’t want a wife who follows me, but one who walks beside me. I want a damn queen.
Once they’re out the door, Raph exhales sharply, rubbing his palms over his face, groaning in frustration.
That’s when Sophia walks over to him and places her hand on the top of his head. “Are you okay, Uncle Raph? He wasn’t very nice to you, was he?”
He looks up at her, thick brows bending, his mouth quirking. “You’re my favorite. Did I ever tell you that?”
“I am?” She flutters her lashes with a tip of a smile.
She’s only five. What the hell am I gonna do when she’s fifteen?
I’m gonna knock out every short-dicked fuck who thinks he can touch my girl. That’s what I’m gonna do.
Shit, I’m not ready for this. Not by myself. Raising a girl is hard enough. Raising a soon-to-be woman? I can’t handle it without someone who knows more about this than I do. Mom will help, but it’s not the same.
“You’ll always be my favorite, Sophie bug,” he says, just as she yawns.
Raph gets up, grabbing her in his arms and lifting her in the air, her laughter and squealing erasing all the negativity my father is an expert at pulling out.
“Want me to put her to bed?” he asks me, placing her on his shoulders.
“Hey!” Sophia giggles with protest. “I said I wasn’t tired!”
“Tough, kiddo,” I tell her. “You’ve got school tomorrow, and it’s already past eight.”
“Bor-iiing.” She rolls her eyes.
I lift a single brow. “You’d better unroll those eyes. Right now.”