Page 16 of Mafia Bride
I want to spit in his face.
But the words freeze inside me and all I can do is look to my aunt and uncle for guidance. For saving.
“Zia Madeline?”
She turns away from me, sobbing into her apron. Zio holds her. The women all hug one another, one large, amoeba cluster of family…who is watching me be sold off. They are doing nothing. I’m not even 20 yet, 19 and they’re selling me away.
This is not at all how things are supposed to be. This is the United States of America, not Napoli, and they can’t take me anywhere without my permission.
Rage, pure and hot, trickles into my veins.
“Fuck you.” I find the words and aim them straight at the towering monster before me. “Fuck you all. This is bullshit. You don’t own me. I am my own fucking person and I won’t do this. What day and age are we in? I haverightshere, and you don’t get to destroy them, no matter what debt is owed to who.”
Santino barely blinks back at my outburst. Like it was nothing. Like I mean exactly that: nothing. Then he opens his mouth, and the thunder rolls out.
“Death was death when our fathers killed for less. It’s death today and tomorrow, and if your family dies to pay this debt, the sleep will be just as deep.”
Another threat against the little family I had remaining. No. I’m not letting him take me for a jaunt around the block and then tell me if I don’t get in the car and marry him, he’ll murder my aunt and uncle in cold blood. That isn’t a thing.
Come to your senses, Violetta. You aren’t stupid.
This is how they work. This is how they control. This is how they do things. Capo Santino. Re Santino. He could probably have my Z’s killed this very moment if I don’t get in the car.
That thought is enough to flood total fear through every vein, every pore. There is no more anger, just fear.
“If you want to keep going to school, to be the savior in white you’ve dreamt of becoming, you can do that with my blessing. If you get in the car.”
With his fucking blessing?
“If I must force you in, and believe me, I can and will, that part of your life will be over.”
He can eat shit. He can die in a fire. He can put his own gun in his own mouth. He can rot with the worms.
“This isn’t fair.” I try to keep my voice steady and the tears at bay. “I did nothing. I am nothing. You can’t just take me away from my house, my home, my everything on a moment’s notice. I need—I need my things.”
“I will give you things. I’m not a jailer.”
“You sound like a jailer.” What is wrong with my mouth and why won’t it stop?
“I am the man who will be your husband, take care of you, and provide for you. Whether or not you get in the car.” His chiseled jaw cuts through the air like a switchblade as he leans down to be eye level with me. “The choice is yours, Violetta.”
It doesn’t sound like a choice. It sounds menacing and cold and evil.
How did I find this man so beautiful only moments ago? Shame on me. Shame on me for feeling a thrill, any excitement, like this was one of those movies I loved to watch with Rosetta. I thought I wasn’t an idiot. I told myself I wasn’t an idiot.
I am an idiot for ever believing it.
I look back once more at my zio and zia. He’s stoic as ever, holding his sobbing wife. The rest of the women have gone inside and Santino’s associates have fallen in line. Instead of looking like a ball team, they look menacing. Like a firing squad.
Nana Angelina’s the last woman on the sidewalk. She looks mostly unphased. Like this is normal. Like this is how things are supposed to be. Behind her, Elettra peers out from behind the curtains, but the glare hides her face.
If it isn’t me, it’s going to be Elettra. He’ll kill my family and take her. She’s a child, still, in all her ways. I can’t send her to the lion’s den the way I was sent.
So I gather all my resolve. Stop the trembling. Breathe to still my heart. My family did not die for me to perish under the hand of a capo. Nor did I come to live with my zio and zia only to watch them die as well.Death today and tomorrow. Not if I can stop it.
“Fine,” I say through clenched teeth. “I will get in the fucking car.”
“Good girl.”
