Chapter 1 – POSY #3
He taps the desk with one long finger. “The watch.”
It takes a moment to sink in. He wants the Rolex back. It’s on my wrist. I never take it off, except to sleep and shower.
My lungs seize as if it will hurt too much to take another breath.
I don’t know what’s stronger—the humiliation or the death of the dream.
He was the one, wasn’t he? The jewelry, the flowers, the late nights, the box in the drawer.
I’ve been hurt so many times, but it was worth it because it led me to him.
As my fingers fumble with the clasp, reality rearranges the pieces in my head. I wasn’t living a fairy tale. I was high on a delusion that this man loved me.
The watch hits the wood with a soft thud.
“Earrings, too.”
I touch my lobes. I’m wearing the studs he gave me for Christmas.
I can’t take them out quickly enough. No matter what he thinks now, I’m not a gold digger. I’ve never asked him for anything. He made me quit my job. He insisted on the “allowance.”
I hate this feeling. I fight it, force my hands steady as I pair the posts with the backs, already stepping away.
Dario’s hand darts out, his rough fingers wrapping around my forearm, squeezing hard enough to bruise.
“People don’t make a fool of me and walk away, Posy Santoro .” He says my last name like a curse. “If I see you again, you’re not walking away. Capisce?”
I jerk a nod. He drops my arm as if it burns him, and jerks his chin toward the door.
“Get out,” he says, his attention already on his phone. “And shut the door behind you.”
* * *
Ray is waiting for me in the hall, his weathered face blank. For a second, the relief of escaping the lion’s den rocks me on my heels, but it ebbs quickly, leaving a tangled mess of shame and loss and shock. My lip trembles, and a fresh wave of tears threatens to spill down my face.
For a brief second, I want to dash up the stairs, throw myself on the bed, and sob into the comforter like I did when I was in junior high and kids were mean to me at school. I want to let myself dissolve in pain until I’m too worn out to hurt so bad.
But I can’t do that. I can’t crumble.
I fight the panic back one breath at a time.
I’m not a child anymore. There’s no mama in the kitchen to make me hot cocoa. I have to get myself out of here. I don’t have the luxury of self-pity. I need to get angry. Quick.
I square my shoulders. Done giving me a moment to collect myself, Ray gestures for me to follow him back the way I just came.
Did he see the video?
My cheeks burn. Ray’s old enough to be my father. Oh god. How many people have seen it? I bet Ivano couldn’t get enough. He’s always brushing by me too close. Watching my tits when I come down the stairs.
It went to everyone, Dario said. All the men who used to drink with my dad before our family’s fall from grace.
All the honorary uncles and cousins have seen me take it in the ass.
My stomach gurgles ominously even though I didn’t stop for lunch.
I was rushing back to make myself up before Dario got home.
I trail in Ray’s wake, numb, brain spinning. This is better than the vortex of feelings. I can handle this.
What am I going to do?
How could Giorgio do this to me? I haven’t seen him in years. And how could Dario have believed it?
I’m not a liar. He knows that. Dario’s a genius. He’s a quiet man who keeps his own counsel but somehow knows everything. He spends his days playing the markets, master of a system none of us understand. I’m simple in comparison. What you see is what you get. How does he not know me by now?
I’m only half aware of leaving the house, stumbling down the stairs, and waiting beside the town car for Ray to unlock the door.
He’s taking a suitcase and a duffle bag from Ivano and stowing them in the trunk.
It’s the luggage I came with. Dario’s bought me a huge wardrobe since I moved in, way more than two bags worth.
Guess I’m leaving with what I came with.
My mouth is bone dry, my limbs still weak from the aftermath of the adrenaline rush. I need to sit. As soon as Ray clicks the key fob, I open my own door and collapse in the back seat.
Where is he taking me?
I look out the car window to the front of the house, the tiniest bud of hope poking up in my chest, as if I can’t help but torment myself. Maybe the door will burst open and Dario will run out, shouting, “Stop!”
He’ll drag me from the car, clutch me to his hard chest, gentle and careful this time, begging me to forgive him. He got carried away in a jealous rage, but he knows I love him. I might have gotten around, but I’d never cheat. He knows that because what we have is real. The connection is real .
He’s not going to just let me go.
It’s a hope that pricks like sorrow.
The door doesn’t open. Ray pulls out, and I keep it in view until we turn onto the street, but there’s no sudden flurry of activity.
Of course.
I’ve been here before.
I’ve been ghosted, slow faded, two-timed, dumped, and kicked to the curb enough times to know the drill.
This relationship was no different than every other disaster I’ve thrown myself into. Dario and I aren’t a love story. It’s the other kind. Girl meets mysterious, brooding mafioso. Convinces herself they’re in love. Lets him take over her life.
And in the end, mysterious is criminal. Brooding is cruel. And the mafioso is a monster.
This is definitely not the first time I’ve tripped my happy ass down this crooked path.
Giorgio Fusco, the one who took all my virginities, swore he loved me.
He’d take care of me. While he was swearing his undying devotion, he was doing the same with Angie Serra and Teresa Fiore.
Danny Ricci loved me until his friends called him “pussy-whipped” and ragged on him for dating a Santoro.
Hunter Vanzetti loved me until I showed him up a few too many times, won a few too many poker games.
I hopped from guy to guy—lapping up the love until the tap ran dry—until Frankie Bianco. He was a man, not a boy. A made man. A big deal. Possessive and intense. Pushed all my daddy issue buttons.
He backhanded me when I questioned what he was doing all night at the strip club. He punched me in the stomach when I was out with the girls and my phone ran out of charge so I didn’t respond to his texts right away.
I told him I had to visit my sick aunt. I actually went to the Jersey shore for two weeks.
I figured he had a short attention span, and I was right.
He dumped me for his ex Jen Amato before I came back.
Jen pranced around L’Alba like the cat who got the canary, talking shit behind my back. She still does.
Back then, I thought I dodged a bullet. I guess I didn’t learn to not jump in front of them—I hooked up with Dario not much later.
Up front in the car, Ray fiddles with the radio and gets onto the highway.
By some miracle, I’m calming down.
I rest my aching wrist on my lap. The throb is fading. It’s definitely not broken, and it probably isn’t even strained.
This is a bad situation, and when I have time, I’ll cry a river, but I’m not destroyed. I’ve picked myself up from every relationship disaster so far, and I can do it again.
I have my phone. There’s almost two hundred dollars cash in the case.
I assume Dario will cancel my credit card.
When I get where I’m going, I’ll try to take out a cash advance.
Maybe I’ll get lucky and he won’t have thought to cancel it yet.
Hah. He’ll have thought of it. He thinks of everything.
Except why I’d wear a wig to cheat on him—and videotape it.
That doesn’t make any damn sense at all.
I have no guilt about taking his money. I’d still have my waitressing job if I hadn’t let him talk me into making myself dependent.
The first flicker of genuine anger flashes to life in my chest. I’m not sure if it’s toward him or myself, but it’s energy, and I am bone weary, so I cling to it. Nurture it like a spark in tinder.
I will pick myself up. Find a place to stay. A job. A car. I’ve gotten them all before.
Car .
“Guess I don’t get to keep the Beamer?”
Ray startles, his gray eyes glaring at me in the rearview. His thick eyebrows knit together like I’m talking crazy.
“Guess not,” I sigh. I let them trade in my Honda when Dario bought me the convertible.
Ray’s lips thin in disapproval. I know I sound like a gold digger. If he saw the video, I don’t see how his opinion of me is getting lower, though.
Still, my gaze drops to my lap.
I miss my mom.
If she were still here, I’d be heading to our old apartment that smelled like cooking spices and incense. She’d make me a cup of tea and give me a biscotti from the tin hidden on top of the china cabinet. She’d let me cry my eyes out, and then she’d tell me the same thing she always did.
You’re a smart girl, Posy Santoro. You’ve got a good heart and you’re not afraid of hard work. Keep your head up. You’ll be fine.
My mother loved the hell out of me. My father thought I was nothing but a pretty face, worthless like all women.
The kids at school hated me for being a Santoro.
When my uncle stole from Dominic Renelli, he cast shame on the whole family, even the kids.
My cousin Andres had it worse, but I had it bad enough.
I’ve been alone before. I’ve been called names. I’ve been cast off.
But I am smart. I will be fine.
I’ll break down later once I have a bed for the night.
I’m so lost in thought that I startle when the silence in broken by the rip of the emergency brake.
Ray’s pulled into in a parking space along River Street, the congested boulevard that runs along the waterfront.
This is the center of the city. Tall buildings line the north side, a promenade on the other.
The Luckahannock glints silver in the late afternoon sun.
It’s wide and deep here, and on the far bank, mansions sit high on a bluff.