The Life - Rebirth (The Life 4)

MANCINI

I wish we’d figured this out before we left New York, so we didn’t have to head back to the mainland so soon, but it couldn’t be helped. Because we didn’t know how long any of this would take, we spent the next day and a half making sure the island was secure and that the women had everything they needed.

We weren’t all going, but those of us who were were leaving our women and children behind to be looked after by the others. We had to take the older Lyons with us as kind of an introduction to the long-lost cousin they hadn’t seen in years, and the plan was to leave them there if plausible while we continued our search for the girl, if she was in fact not there.

A quick call to Draco had provided us with more information, and we learned that she was, in fact, not with her grandmother. He’d also filled us in on the relationship between her and Gabe and what led to her leaving the way she did. Add the fact that she’d used the services she had to help her disappear, and it’s obvious that she’d been mad enough to want to disappear for good.

After two years, you’d think she’d be over her mad, but no one knows what was said between those two to make her react this way, but if she’s anything like Colt, well… That’s better left alone.

LYON

I’m not sure how to feel about any of this. On the one hand, I’m coming to terms with having a whole family out there that I’ve never met, but what’s bothering me most, truth be told, is that this kid looks so much like my daughter and what I think she’d look like when she’s older and my mother at about the same age she is in the photo.

It's hard not to feel something, anything, as much as I love those two. And knowing what this kid went through in the last year before her disappearance has been bugging me. I don’t know her, but if she’s one of mine, the fact that she endured so much and is now out there somewhere alone breaks my heart.

It didn’t help that when I stayed up all night digging through whatever info I could find, I learned that she’d lost her mother at a very young age. Draco had filled in a lot of the blanks, sharing what little he knew from the short time he’d known her, and none of it was good.

I kept imagining Mengele in any of those situations, and I think I was starting to spaz out. By the time we got on the plane to head to Virginia, I was hyper-alert to every damn thing to do with my parents. The way the pothead held onto Elena and kept whispering to her told me that this was more than they were letting on.

I had to take them into consideration too, what this could mean to them. They’d left their family for a reason, after all. Would this reunion be welcomed, or will those same people give them shit? I wish the fuck they would. I need an outlet for whatever this is growing in me, so one wrong move and somebody’s gonna get it.

“Ma, you doing, okay?” She reached across the aisle to grab my hand and smiled. I sometimes forget that my parents are getting up there in age, though they neither look it nor act like it. The pothead swears it’s his smoking habits keeping him young, whatever. As long as they’re happy, I can deal. This Eloise woman, whoever she is, better not say one fuck to my parents to hurt them, is all I’m saying.

GABRIEL

By the time I landed in Palermo, it was about three A.M. my time and nine A.M. in the city. I checked into the hotel and got to work right away, calling Sal, who was only too happy that I was here. “Why did you go there? Why didn’t you come here?”

“I figured your family had their hands full with everything that’s been going on, so….”

“Nonsense, I’ve told you, you’re not a stranger. I’ll send Fabrizio to get you; you come stay here.”

“Are you sure? I do have something to talk to you about.”

“Yes?”

“I may have found a solution to that problem you told me about.”

“Is that so? I can’t wait to see you then, so you tell me all about it.”

Sal sounded tired, which I’m sure he is after the roller coaster ride of the last six months, and things were about to get dicier. I couldn’t let that get to me. As much as I feel for the old man, I didn’t start this off looking for family. Though I no longer blame him for his son’s actions, so to speak, I still feel some animosity towards him for inflicting him on the world, knowing what he is.