PapaA hand on my shoulder startled me, and I glanced up.
“You okay?”
It was Salvatore. I quickly crumpled the letter and threw it into the trash can, then wiped my face with the backs of my hands.
“I want to go.” I said, looking around for something, what I had no idea. “I need… I can’t.”
“Shh.”
He wrapped an arm around me and, without another word, pulled me into his chest and held me there, one hand rubbing my back, the other holding tight.
“Shh,” he said again.
I choked on a sob and pressed my face into him, for one moment letting his strength support me, lift the weight of all of this from me. But when in response to my surrender he hugged me back, I shook my head and wiped my face before breaking away from him. I couldn’t look at him. I couldn’t take comfort from him. He was the enemy. And I was betraying my family with every tender moment I shared with him.
I couldn’t do this.
“Please…” I started.
With a nod, he ushered me out to the car. “Stay here.”
Salvatore went back into the house and a few moments later returned, loaded the two boxes I’d packed into the trunk, and climbed behind the steering wheel. He glanced at me, the look in his eyes strange, cautious, measuring. Then, without a word, he turned the key and started the engine, taking us back to his house, back to my new home.9SalvatoreI knew it wasn’t right, but I did what any man would do in my situation. I fished out the letter Lucia had thrown into the trash and read it.
If I hadn’t been sure before, I was now. The fucking bastard of a father was too weak to stay alive. Too weak to take responsibility even in this, his final letter to the daughter he betrayed. Did he even know what his letter would do to her? Did he know it would only add to the guilt she already felt with his loss?
Fucking bastard.
I paced my study, phone to my ear, when, finally, Roman picked up on the fifth ring. “I need you to do something for me, Uncle.” I rarely called Roman that. Only when I needed to trust him absolutely. “Just for me.”
“What is it?” he asked. He was too smart to agree to something without knowing the details.
“I know we have Luke DeMarco under surveillance, but I want more. I want to know where he spends his nights. I want to know exactly how much time he spends with Isabella DeMarco. And,” was I really going to do this? “I want a paternity test run on the little girl, Effie. I want to know if he’s her father.”
“We share the same suspicions.”
“And my father? What does he think?”
“He doesn’t think she’s a threat, so he hasn’t looked into it.”
“Isabella?”
“Yes.” He paused. “Never underestimate your enemy, Salvatore. It will get you killed.”
“No one knows that better than me, Uncle.”
“I’ll keep this between us for now.”
“For now. I will go to my father once I have solid information.”
“I’ll work on it right away.”
“Thank you.”
I hung up the phone, that last part a lie. If my suspicions were correct, I couldn’t go to my father with the details. My father did not need any more ammunition against Luke DeMarco, and something about what Lucia had said, asking me not to take them away, I felt it.
Luke was collecting supporters, that I knew, but was Lucia’s sister involved? If so, how deeply? Just how close were she and Luke? And what would I need to do if I what I believed was confirmed?
On top of everything else, I needed to gain Lucia’s trust. I needed to be sure she’d do as I said and not act out during the birthday dinner. I needed to make sure my father knew I had control of her.The next afternoon, I pulled into Nordstrom’s parking lot.
“I don’t want to go to your father’s party.”
We climbed out of the car and went into the department store. She sounded defiant, but I heard the panic behind her words.
“I’m not going.”
I touched her back to lead her inside. “Yes, you are. And you’re going to behave while you’re there.”
“Why? Why can’t you just go on your own?”
“Because he’s expecting both of us.” We stepped onto the escalator, Marco and another man following nearby. A piano played on the second floor. Before we reached it, I saw the salesgirl waiting for us.
“Why?” Lucia asked again.
Once off the escalator, I took her arms, rubbed them, and turned her toward me. There would be no discussion. She would go. Period. Even if it was the last place I wanted to take Lucia, we would both go. “Because I said so. Now be good.” I leaned in, and to anyone who watched, it looked like I was planting a kiss on her temple, but instead, I whispered in her ear. “Or else I’ll have to get creative again.”