“I’ll teach my daughter her place, don’t worry.” Ines had mastered the art of subtle defiance and polite criticism, and so she smiled even though her eyes reflected the same aversion I felt toward our father.
Father’s mouth pinched and he looked at me as if he waited for me to rebuke Ines. He knew my sister valued my opinion more than his. I lifted my glass and took a sip of my wine, not in the slightest interested to get involved in this, not today, not when my mind kept replaying Carla’s last smile, her last breath, the moment her fingers went slack in mine.
“There’s of course something to consider before we decide to give Aria to Luca.” Father’s smile was reptile-like, and my muscles tightened in preparation for his next words. “Aria could give the Outfit beautiful blond children. You need a new wife and an heir.”
Despite my best intentions, the words hit me like a sledgehammer. After so many years, Father had finally found something to cut me once more. Keeping my face neutral was an agonizing struggle.
“Carla’s funeral was only two days ago!” Ines hissed, glancing toward me in blatant concern. “Don’t you have an ounce of respect for her memory and for Dante’s sorrow?”
“You’d do well to respect the man who decides over life and death in this territory,” Father said.
Pietro grabbed Ines’ hand and from the look in his eyes, I knew he was about to say something that would get him in trouble with my father, and while Father would hesitate before disposing of an Underboss, he would never dispose of me because he wanted his blood to live on and I was his only option. I stood and thrust my palm down on the table, letting my anger out and balling my sadness into a tight knot inside of me. “This conversation isn’t happening.”
Even the kids fell silent as they watched me open-mouthed.
I stepped back and stalked out of the room, seething, and continued toward the front door, needing fresh air. Father wouldn’t give up that easily.My suspicion proved correct when Father and I were invited over to the Scuderi mansion a few days later to discuss the newest developments of a possible union with the Famiglia.
Father had talked to Salvatore Vitiello several times in the last few days while I’d stepped back to gather myself. My mental state wouldn’t do us any favors in business negotiations at the time being. Luca and Salvatore could smell weakness from miles away.
“I sent Salvatore photos of Aria and Gianna,” Father said. “He’d accept either of them but he prefers Aria.”
Rocco shook his head. “Gianna’s too boisterous. He’ll beat her to death and then we’ll be left with the problem of how to react appropriately. She needs someone who knows how to control his impulses and break her without killing her. Luca isn’t that kind of man.”
His eyes slanted to me. I ignored the subtle suggestion. I wouldn’t marry Aria or Gianna. Those girls were thirteen and fifteen, mere children, and I was a man who only harbored darkness after Carla’s death.
“We have to make tactical choices that benefit the Outfit, son.”
I nodded. “That’s true. Giving Aria to Luca seems the wiser choice. I think she’ll be less likely to provoke him than Gianna.” Considering how I’d killed Jacopo to protect Ines from a monster, it was ironic how I agreed to give another innocent girl to a monster for the sake of the Outfit. Sacrifices needed to be made, it was Father’s credo. I knew there was only one way to save Aria from Luca’s clutches and that was if I wanted her for myself. Father and Rocco would readily agree. It would spare her the cruelty under Luca’s hand and it would get Father off my back, allow me to bury myself in my grief without constant surveillance. I could insist on a marriage in three years, and even if Father demanded a closer date, I knew Aria would be glad if I didn’t act like a husband, if I didn’t try to lay claim on her. My insides tightened at the mere idea of being with someone other than Carla, of making a vow of that proportion when Carla was the only woman I wanted to be bound to.
As if he could smell my train of thought, Rocco got up and walked toward the door, opening it. “Aria! Come down here for a moment.” Rocco returned to the table and exchanged a look with Father. I knew what they were thinking, what so many people in the Outfit were thinking.
The Golden Couple. The name carried in whispers through our circles, had started to do so even before Carla’s body had turned cold, had begun the moment word about her cancer had gotten out. I’d ignored it but it had grown to a dimension that made it impossible to keep doing so. I was left with two choices if I didn’t want to appear weak, because grieving a dead woman was nothing but weakness in the eyes of so many of Father’s loyal men. Either I married Aria, or I gave her to Luca.