Page 38 of Mafia King
“You were the exception.” He flicks his hand in my direction. “Most of the brides know what and when.”
Why wasn’t I told? Why was it piled on me all at once?
“If it hadn’t been for the guy who raped her, would you have told Rosetta?”
“Eventually.”
“Before you married her?”
“I don’t know.”
I’d like to strangle him, but there’s a deep vulnerability in his answer. It’s not justI don’t know. It’s also,I never got the chance to find out.
“Damiano’s not going to tell Gia he’s buying her,” I say. “Her own father wants her to be blindsided so he doesn’t have to deal with her being afraid or begging or whatever she’ll do.”
“She won’t be afraid.”
“How do you know? She’s full of these silly ideas about love.”
“So she won’t see a wedding as a bad thing.”
Having held back since I eavesdropped through the office doors, I didn’t feel the slowly bubbling rage until I’m near the boiling point. “She should have a choice!”
Santino responds with a raised eyebrow. “You are not the one to give that to her.”
“She’s just like me.” I have to stop myself from pounding the table. “And you know that wasn’t right.”
I can’t tell what’s happening to his face. Is he softening?
He is. This moment can’t go to waste.
I slide off my chair and kneel at his feet, looking up imploringly. The supplication is completely sincere, and it’s the least I’ll do.
“Please,” I say with one hand on my heart and the other on his knee. “Let me tell her.”
“No.”
“She needs a way out if she wants it.”
“You cannot change these things.” He puts his hand on mine and bends at the waist, speaking tenderly—as if to a child who doesn’t know how the world works. “Be careful you do not ruin something for her because of your own experience.”
Was my experience so uncommon? If I’d known it was coming but still had no choice, would the wedding and the following weeks have been better or worse? And what’s the difference? Knowledge is valuable, even if it hurts, but I can’t explain basic human respect to a man who’d let his cousin pay a debt.
“I heard you say you wanted to tell her.” I run my hand up his leg. His body is reacting to seeing me on my knees. “Let me do it. Let me give you what you want, then blame it on me.”
He grabs my wrist before I reach his erection. “This is our way, Violetta.” He stands and looks down at me as I collapse onto the floor. “It’s our fathers’ way, and their fathers, and their fathers’ father before them.”
“What about your mothers?”
He takes his phone off the table and leaves me on my knees, petitioning to an empty throne.
* * *
—YOUR HUSBAND IS SOOOOO HOOOOOTTTTTT!!!!! —
I’ve leftScarlett’s notification up, even though I answered it. I miss the life I had when she was in it, but I’m so divorced from this kind of talk, it seems like a curious language I understand but don’t speak.
In the drugstore, Armando stands a respectful distance away, pretending he’s shopping for cold medicine as I browse the feminine products. I swipe Scarlett’s message away without deleting it and call Gia.
