Page 86 of Mafia King
Flora Street taught me a lesson I don’t want to learn again. If the Tabonas had succeeded in taking her, I would either be standing in the rubble of Secondo Vasto or I’d be dead.
“You go with Armando or you don’t go.” I start the car. “And go to the drugstore over the river. The big one, by the school.”
“Why?”
“Damnit, Violetta, just do it.”
Silence. I should apologize for snapping at her, but I need her to do what she’s told.
“Please,” I add. “Trust me.”
“Fine.” She hangs up, and I’m left staring at Genovese Street out my car window.
Fucking Christ. I want to make her happy and keep her safe. That was what the house by St. John’s was about, but I don’t know how to do either.
If I could take her away—far away—and live with just the two of us, I would do it. We could start over. I’d run a café and she’d run her life around simple things. Our home. My cock. Eventually, children. And she’d be happy, because she’d never know of another‘mbasciata,or think it was in my power to stop them.
That’s how it started.
Not with a decision. Just a desire for a life I didn’t want.
All I wanted from that fantasy was for her to forget what I’d done and what I’d allowed. She said she forgave me, but she’d never forget.
21
VIOLETTA
My strategy is to get the guy in the bright blue jacket to meet me at the front with a pregnancy test, and it works. I bring a basket full of birthday party junk—streamers, candles, little plastic tooters, and party hats—to the register.
Bright Blue Jacket puts the test on the counter, pushes his thick wire glasses up, and says, “This is the one you wanted?”
Yes, it is, because it’s just like every other test. One line for the status quo. One line for time to change the world I live in.
Two lines for an immediate decision. Raise a child in it, or leave it.
“Violetta!”
I spin around to find Santino’s zia Anette, then I turn back to the cashier who’s still holding up a pregnancy test.
“That’s the one,” I say quickly, then I hold my arms out to Anette for a kiss on each of her blush-heavy cheeks, while the beeping of the register goes on.
“You shouldn’t come here for that,” Anette says, flicking a finger toward the items being shoved into a plastic bag, and I tighten. She saw the test. Is she telling me to go to the doctor? “Lorenzo owns a party store on Fifth.”
“Oh. I didn’t know.” I don’t care either, but shame for my ignorance is a good excuse for my hot cheeks.
She takes out an old flip phone. “I have to drop by there to get something for Gia’s reception.”
Gia’s reception? Santino said he would end it. Maybe Anette didn’t get the memo?
“I’ll call Lucia right now and have her tell him you’re coming.”
“Did someone say party?” another voice asks. It’s Scarlett getting rung up at the adjacent register. I feel attacked from all sides. “That’s impossible since I’m not invited!”
I hug Scarlett so tightly I’m just short of breaking a rib, and when I let go, her eyebrows are knotted with concern. We move away from the counter.
“Violetta?” She’s looking me up and down as if she’s never seen me before.
Scarlett’s going to ask me if I’m all right and I’m not going to lie. I’ll tell her straight out, right in the drugstore, and Anette will hear it.
