Page 12 of Forbidden War (Forbidden 2)
KARINA
After Marco excuses us,he helps me to the bedroom at the far end of the house.
“Just sit,” he instructs, easing me down onto the bed.
The next thing I know, I hear the sound of water running in the bathroom, and then the showerhead turns on.
I look up at him when he comes back into the room. “I’m so sorry about Livvie,” I say.
Marco digs a hand into his hair. “It’s not your fault.”
“But—”
“It’s not, Karina. Don’t blame yourself. You had nothing to do with it. Look, I need to go back now. Hopefully my brother will calm down so we can get some kind of a plan together. I think it’s better if you stay here. Take a shower and relax.”
He doesn’t meet my eyes as he speaks. What he’s not saying, however, is crystal clear: I don’t belong at the family meeting. Which makes sense; in everyone else’s eyes, I’m still a Bruno. Or at least, that’s how Armani seems to view me. I nod at Marco, and then he’s gone.
The stain of my bloodline is something that can’t be washed away, but I wish it could be as I step into the steamy shower. I stand beneath the spray for a long time, as if I can scrub off all the years of Bruno influence. I saw and heard so many things around my family’s home while I was growing up, things that I blocked out or didn’t allow myself to fully pay attention to. Maybe if I had, I might be of some real use in finding Livvie. Instead, I’m completely useless.
Just like Marco said I was.
After far too long, I step out and wrap myself in a towel, then go to the closet to find something to wear. I still don’t have many clothes, so I slip on a pair of the leggings Frankie got me and one of Marco’s V-neck T-shirts, and then park myself on the plush sofa in the adjoining sitting room. I’m still flipping through the mind-boggling array of channels on the TV when the bedroom door opens and Marco walks back in.
“Are you feeling any better?”
“No. Not really.” I look up at him with a deep, pounding beat of sadness. “I can’t imagine what Livvie is going through right now. She must be so scared. I’m scared, too.”
My breath starts to hitch, and Marco drops onto the other side of the sofa. “We’re going to get her back. I don’t know exactly how, but we are.”
“How can you say that? You don’t know my uncle, he’s—”
“Armani already has a few pieces in play. My brother is…a force. You don’t know what he’s capable of, but I do. He’s cleaned up a lot of messes in his time. He’s handling it.”
I want to believe Marco, but…deep down, I can’t. True, I don’t know what Armani is capable of, but I do know what my uncle is. And it’s the stuff of nightmares.
“I never had a sister,” I murmur. “I always wished I did, but seeing Frankie and Charlie like that…it makes me glad I don’t have a bigger circle of people I care about. It’d just be that many more people who might get hurt. Especially right now.”
Shaking my head, I dig my palms into my eyes and try to physically hold back the tears.
Beside me, Marco clears his throat. I’m expecting to hear more about how everything is going to be perfectly fine, but instead he starts telling me a story. His story.
“I had a sister. A long time ago. She and our mother died when I was very young. Boating accident.”
“I’m sorry,” I say softly. It feels trite to apologize, but I do it automatically.
He shrugs. “I don’t remember a lot about that time of my life. They say sometimes with trauma, you block things out. I guess what I remember most is how my dad changed. He kind of just…disappeared. I know he was hard on my older brothers, pushing them to get tougher, beating up on them, especially Dante, but…maybe he just couldn’t stand to look at us after the accident. All of us were sent to boarding schools on the East Coast as soon as we turned twelve.”
I slide closer toward him, tentatively reaching out to put a comforting hand on his knee. “Do you remember much about your mom and your sister, before the…accident?”
He smiles. “My mom was crazy about us. We were her whole life, us kids. I know that for a fact. She was a hugger. She liked to give us bubble baths and read us books before bed. Guess that sounds pretty generic, right?”
“No,” I say. “Not to me. I never had that with my mom. Or anyone. I wish I did.”
Marco places his hand over mine, exhaling slowly. “Lili, my sister, was always following me around. We had our scooters, we played with Hot Wheels cars, we’d go out in the yard to make potions in the mud or sneak cookies from the pantry. Our favorite place to go was called The Monkey House—it’s this local place with an arcade and a roller rink and pizza. We idolized Dante, too, with his shiny red bike, but I think we just annoyed him.”
“Sounds like you were lucky to have her,” I say.
He nods, and I scoot closer to lean my head on his shoulder. We just sit there for a while, both lost in our thoughts. I’m about to ask if he wants to watch TV when he starts talking again.
“It was a boating accident. The bodies were never recovered. It’s almost worse, I think. Knowing we visit empty graves. Leaving flowers and talking to air.”
My heart breaks for him. He goes quiet again and I look at his profile for a long time. Marco doesn’t seem to mind the silence. I wish I knew what to say.
Is it selfish of me to hate the fact that I grew up in a household with both of my own parents? A mother who never once stepped in to defend me? The father that viewed me as nothing more than collateral?
Finally, Marco pulls away to look at me. “The other thing was…after the disappearances, my dad’s involvement with the Mafia just grew and grew. He had so many hooks in the business that even though he died a few years ago, we’re still trying to unravel the mess. My brothers wanted to get out of the business, and we were so close, but then…we got pulled right back in.”
I keep hearing about the mob, and every time I do, it feels like a shock. But in reality, it’s not. It can’t be. I’ve known all along that my family’s “business” was tied to the Mafia. My uncle, in the very sense of the word, is one of its bosses. It’s funny how you can block out the truth for your whole life. I did because I didn’t want to see it. Yet, even so, I recognized early on that my family is not good people.
“It’s almost impossible to get out,” I say with a nod. “I don’t know a lot about my family’s involvement, but I do have vague recollections of people coming to the house and begging to get out. It never happened. At least not on my uncle’s watch. And I know he ordered some…retaliations, if anyone tried to go without his permission.”
Marco stands, suddenly fired up. “We’re going to get out. Once and for good. We made the decision as soon as Dad was in the ground, and we agreed we were leaving and never going back in. It’s just taking longer than we planned.”
My shoulders sag with relief.
Then I think of the look on Armani’s face. The coldness that seems to emanate from him. The danger. “All of you want to be out?”
“Dante and I don’t want anything to do with the business. Armani is…more complicated. He still wants vengeance for our father’s death. Dante might be the leader of the family, but Armani is the protector, and he will never back down from what he sees as his higher purpose in life.”
