Page 24 of Mafia King
“… parades her in here like some damn race horse…”
“… looks just like the…”
“… those the rings?”
My breath dies in my throat as I look at my hand. The rings. Rosetta’s diamond.
“… engravers…”
“… Theresa says…”
“… she Enzo Rubino’s …?”
Their voices fade into the white noise of the house, and they’re gone. I drink a paper cup of water. Santino’s fascination with my rings and under what circumstances I am allowed to take them off may be more intense than I think is reasonable. But he’s my husband, and he’s from the other side. He’s possessive.
But how many random guys ever talk about a woman’s wedding rings?
None of them, that’s the answer. No Italian mafioso is going to gossip about diamonds unless he’s fencing them.
Maybe it’s because they know I’m wearing a dead girl’s promises.
I pull the nesting wedding and engagement rings off and look inside, where an engraver would leave a mark. It’s just a serial number or something. Fuck this. I put them back on, cursing.
Fuck Santino for putting me in this position. I head for the front door and blessed fresh air, but I knock into Gia and almost send the bread she’s carrying to the floor.
“I’m sorry!” I manage to catch a loaf before it falls.
“Can you set these out?” She’s obviously totally overwhelmed. “I’m supposed to get the wine, but the glasses are all wrong, so I have to fix them before—”
“I have it.” I take the bread. “Shoo.”
“You’re a lifesaver.”
She’s off to fix the glasses. I set the bread on the long table. On the other side of the room is a hallway. I hear men’s voices rising and falling in a way that suggests formality, like something serious is taking place.
Nothing’s more serious than how much I want to go home, and the only way out is with Santino. I follow the voices down the hall, betting he’s there. I’ll claim I’m not feeling well. Between what I overheard in the kitchen and the stench of cigar smoke coming from the room to the right, I can vomit on request.
“Violetta’s a special case.” I freeze when I hear my name in Santino’s voice, and I flatten myself against the wall. “The‘mbasciatawas blessed by her father.”
I know that word.‘Mbasciatais an arranged marriage.
There’s a window opposite the arched opening, revealing the room in the reflection. Santino sits with three men—Marco, Damiano, and Angelo. All are smoking cigars and drinking iced, amber liquid. Other men stand in the corners, present but not participating, their movements dictated by hierarchy and choreographed by generations of tradition. I try to catch Santino’s eye in the reflection, and as if he can hear my needs, he sees me, but motions, quite clearly, that I am to leave.
I’m about to give him merry hell in front of all of his merry fucking friends, who all clearly know about my sister so intimately they can recognize the goddamn rings on my fingers, when I hear Gia’s name tucked in a blanket of Italian.
I can’t explain it, but something is harrowingly, hauntingly familiar about what’s going on. It’s like déjà vu, or the way you remember a dream, or a memory—not of something the eyes witnessed, but an event described and constructed in the mind, which the mind filed as if it actually happened. The way they all stand. The solemnity of their voices with an undercurrent of excitement, almost.
A transaction is taking place, and though I never saw such a thing, I recognize it.
My stomach bottoms out and I do the only thing I can think to do—eavesdrop, breathing in baby spurts and praying none of the women feel the need to personally call the men for dinner.
“I was there,” Damiano says. “You cut out a step. Twice.”
“This is a problem for you?” Santino’s tone is a dare to the scarred man I met outside the bathroom.
“No. But I never heard of a capo refusing if the father agreed.”
“And the father agrees.” Marco tips his glass toward Damiano.
