Violet
For the first time in days, I feel somewhat relaxed, sitting across the table from Pippa at our favorite restaurant.
I haven't seen her in over a week. Throughout our childhood, we were glued to each other.
It only stopped when I went to college and she went…
wherever she did. Plumbing school? As soon as I went to college, she started working her odd jobs.
"What's with you lately? You always seem a million miles away," Pippa complains.
It's true. And she deserves better. I put down the phone. "I'm all yours."
"Hmm," she harrumphs.
I close my eyes and roll them so she doesn't see.
What am I doing lying to my best—only—friend?
Doesn't need to know? I'm already sounding like a mafia wife.
I might as well go back to Marcello for a repeat of the best sex of my life.
Everything else is already fucked up, so why not reap the benefits?
"Okay, you're doing it again. Honestly, Vi, what the hell is going on with you? I thought you would be happy that you have the funds now to buy yourself a fixer-upper."
She's right. I should be happy. But not even looking through listings of fixer-uppers can raise the dark mood I've been in for days now, ever since I broke it off with Marcello.
And it has nothing to do with the feeling of being watched. I'm sure it's Marcello keeping tabs on me. Which actually makes me feel a bit better. Knowing he still cares enough to have his men watch me is… reassuring. Maybe I should call him? Text him?
Yeah, right, and what are you going to say? I'm horny? I miss you—let's have another one-nighter? Want a booty call?
"Oh my God, Earth to Vi! You're doing it again." She lifts her glass of water. "If you don't tell me right now what's going on with you, I'm going to throw this water in your face."
I laugh. "Here? In the middle of the restaurant?"
She looks dead serious, daring me.
"Fine!" I concede that she'll follow through with her threat. I have to unburden myself to someone. And if I can't do it with my best friend, then who?
"Alright, I think I messed up."
"Oh, sweetie. With whom?"
I laugh dryly, "How do you know it's a guy?"
She tilts her head to the side and wiggles her eyebrows, "Because despite all the shit you've been through, I've never seen you this gloomy before. It has to be a man. Only men can make you this miserable."
This time, I laugh out loud. She's right.
"Remember my patient?"
"The mafia guy?" She slaps her lips and looks around with wide eyes as if worried someone might have overheard her little blunder. "Shut up!"
I nod sadly.
"Yep. I committed the cardinal sin. I fell for my patient."
"What happened?"
I give her the abbreviated version, not leaving the best sex of my life part out, because. Well, it's a big part of the story, and she is my best friend.
"Oh my God, Violet Meade, I could slap you right now. You broke up with him? Why in the world would you do that?"
I down the last of my wine. "Seemed the sensible thing to do at the time."
"Sensible thing?" she echoes.
"Look, what would happen to Mom if I died?" Saying it out loud now sounds like a weak argument, so I add, "I could have been killed in the hospital, Pippa. Killed."
"Yeah," she moves her head from side to side, giving that argument some thought, "but you weren't."
I snort. "Is that the best you can come up with? You weren't?"
She shrugs, "Life is dangerous. Scott could have bored you to death. You could have gotten in an accident on your way here. You could stick yourself with an HIV infected needle. There's always cancer or a brain tumor that could get you."
"Scott did bore me to death." I concede her point, and she grins.
"Finally! I've told you that from day one."
She turns serious, "So you're going to stay single for the rest of your life, because of your mom?" Only Pippa can make the words your mom sound like she's talking about a garbage can. "I'm sorry, I missed the part where you were sanctified."
"Haha." We've had that conversation a few times. Every time a guy hit on me, actually. Unless he was a bore like Scott—and those guys don't hit on you, you make the first move—I always said, too dangerous. My mom will have a heart attack.
"No, seriously. How long will you allow her to ruin your life?"
Have I mentioned that Pippa is not a big fan of my mom's?
Come to think of it, she's never really gotten along with any member of my family.
Well, maybe my brother. She can tolerate Sebastian on good days.
She thinks my brother-in-law Lee is an asshole with a large L for loser on his forehead and says Elaine is a coward who hides behind her husband.
Mostly, it's my mom that she can't stand.
And the feeling is mutual. Mom thinks Pippa and I haven't seen each other in years.
A lie I told her one day when… Huh. I really am a coward when it comes to my mother.
"Look, I'm not happy about the idea of you stepping into a life of danger," she says with air quotes as she shakes her head and rolls her eyes, "but honestly, honey, I have never seen you as animated as you were when you were working for him."
If she's trying to make me miserable, it's working.
"Still, Pippa, I was almost killed in his hospital room. He's a mobster," I whisper the last word behind my hand, and the rest of my next sentence, "he kills people."
"You said he's hot," she shrugs as if that's all that matters.
"Have you watched Casino?" I throw at her, knowing very well that she has.
As a matter of fact, we watched it together.
Just like we watched The Godfather, Goodfellas, and whatever other movies she could dig out.
That girl is seriously obsessed with the mafia.
It might have been a mistake opening my heart to her.
"So what's your point?" She wants to know.
I roll my eyes. "Remember Sharon Stone's character?"
"Now that broad was seriously messed up," she nods.
I take a deep breath.
"My point is, what happens if he gets tired of me?"
"You think he's going to bury your body somewhere in the desert?"
"Well, not exactly the desert," I admit, because desert is hard to come by around New York. "The Hudson, maybe."
She becomes more serious. "Do you think he would?"
"No," I concede.
She throws her arms in the air in a general I give up gesture.
Just then, I notice a guy in a dark suit walking to the bathroom. Another one of the men Marcello must have hired to keep tabs on me. I snicker and text Luciano.
Me:
You guys seriously need to work on your stalking skills.
"Did you completely mess this thing between him and you up?" Pippa asks.
"I don't know."
"Then go grovel."
I pour more wine. "I don't grovel, Pippa."
She widens her eyes at me in a I dare you way.
My phone vibrates.
Luciano:
What do you mean?
Me:
I mean, the guys he has watching me. They stand out like a sore thumb.
Luciano:
Where are you?
A very, very deep sense of unease fills my stomach.
"What's wrong?" Pippa asks, picking up on the drop in my mood.
"I don't know, hold on."
Me:
At a restaurant with a friend
My phone rings. Absolutely not, don't you dare answer this, aka, Marcello is calling.
"Ping me your location. Stay where you are. I'll be right there." He hangs up.
I stare at Pippa. "Well, he's coming."
"What? He's coming?"
I nod.
"Here?"
I nod again.
"Why?"
I wish I knew, but I have a dark feeling.
"So ever since I broke it off, there have been these men—"
"What men?"
"Men," I elaborate. "In dark suits, with sunglasses. I thought he sent them after me, but…"
"But?" She looks breathless, like someone waiting for the dead person to jump up and attack the heroine. Only for her, it's excitement, not fear.
"I don't think they're his men."
"Oh dear."
"That's one way to describe it."
"Are they here now?"
The man comes back from the restroom, and I widen my eyes at Pippa and nod in his direction.
"Oh," she stares after him.
"Pippa!"
"What, he looks dangerous and… wow." She reads my expression correctly and changes her approach. "So, what do we do now?"
"We aren't doing anything," I tell her, nervously folding my napkin in my lap. He's coming. He. Is. Coming. "It might be better if you leave, I—"
"Fucking hell, Vi. I'm not leaving you."
"Oh shit," I see four more men exiting a car through the window. The man who used the bathroom points in Pippa's and my direction.
"What?"
"We need to get out of here," I dig through my purse and throw a hundred on the table. Grabbing Pippa's hand, I drag her with me.
"Where to?" She wants to know, looking for all intents and purposes like a woman having the time of her life, as if she's about to get on a cruise or a rollercoaster. Unfortunately, she's not misreading the situation. She's excited that something is happening.
"Tell me again why you didn't join the army?" I ask as I lead her first toward the bathroom and then change direction toward a door with a giant, green Exit sign above it.
"Because I would have never made it through the psych eval," she replies, looking back. "They're coming in."
"Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit," I mumble.
"Miss, you can't go this way." A waiter steps in our way, and Pippa pushes him aside.
"National security emergency," she barks, opening the door.
Despite the situation—a situation where I can already feel my body being peppered with lead—I can't suppress a grin.
Pippa would have been excellent in the army or the CIA.
Then again, she's right; her homicidal tendencies would probably have disqualified her.
The number of people on her kill list is unbelievable. I don't think she would ever follow through with any of her threats. Then again, this is Pippa. My best friend, the psychopath. The only person I know who would run over a puppy and not bat an eye.
So what does that say about me? Falling for a mafia boss and having a female version of Dexter as a best friend?