Page 20 of Mafia King
“My God, just listen.”
“The debt? What about—”
“There is no debt!” Santino clamps down, having said more than he wanted to. “Your father was the most powerful capo thecamorraever knew. How could he owe some lowlife like me a debt?”
“My father was a grocer,” I say, turning away from the mirror. “He had a store he named after my sister, and my mother worked behind the register. He loved us. That was all I ever knew until very fucking recently.”
“I know.” He puts his hands on my arms and leans down to look into my eyes with seriousness and warmth. “I know. And you’re right. He did love you both. But everything else is a very small piece of truth.”
I have only this slim, unguarded moment to extract more from him. I should ask why now, why me, why this, but another question muscles past those and into my mouth.
“Did you love her?”
His hands slide down my arms and rest under my hands, leaving the ring I shared with my sister nested in his palm. He thumbs the stone as if asking it for strength.
“You were a child.” He raises his gaze to meet mine. “A future sister. The thoughts I have for you now didn’t occur to me. Then…” He glances at the ring. “I saw you as a woman, and that changed.”
“When?”
He drops my hands. “We should go.”
“Santi! Was it when I saw you in Zio’s office?”
“Every day,” he says as he backs out of the bathroom, “I fail you.”
“He was kneeling and weeping.”
“Every day,” Santino continues as though I haven’t said a word, “I push you away.”
“Was it gratitude? Is that why he was crying at your feet?”
“When I finally lose you”—he goes on as if I haven’t built the scene for him—“I’ll be in hell, and I’ll deserve it.”
He leaves before I can ask him another question. The moment of revelation is over, and I’m to perform my social duties with scraps of information. I’ll have to see Paola for the first time since her guest dropped the world from under me.
The jewelry box on the vanity plays a tune when I open it to remove the red seashell brooch carved with three dancing Furies. I slide the pin through the navy fabric, clip it closed, and check the mirror to make sure it’s straight. The fashion statement is 1970s old Italian woman, and it’s accurate.
I am a shrewd Italian woman out for answers.
6
VIOLETTA
Angelo and Anette’s house sits in a neighborhood one step above the one I grew up in. The garages are in the back, and the houses are separated by narrow driveways. The front yards aren’t deep, and all have painted plaster shrines where the Virgin Mother presides over patches of grass and rosebushes. As the sun sets, the altars are bathed in yard lights.
I always thought the Virgin shrines were showy piousness. But as we pull up, I see them for the first time as a way the residents connect with each other by a common thread of faith.
Santino pulls into the last spot in the driveway, behind a row of luxury cars. The block is lined with them.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” I ask. “About Rosetta?”
“You want to talk about thisnow?”
“No, I want to talk about it before she died, or when you married me, or any time in the last month.”
He sighs and clicks the car into park. “You think I keep secrets.”
“Uh, yeah. It’s a compulsion with you.”
