My eyes narrowed but I kept my mouth closed. I’d gone over how I would deal with this man: I wouldn’t. Don’t engage him. It was the best I could come up with.
When I continued to walk awkwardly with my strap dangling against my ankle, an amused breath came from behind me.
“The silent treatment, huh?”
My teeth clenched. He thought this was funny. How could I be so confused and twisted up about him, while he thought it was all amusing? I spun around, retorting, “You pushed me into a pool! Why should I talk to you?”
Light blue shirt, gray waistcoat and pants, black tie, stupidly handsome face. I swallowed. Why did I engage? It was too late to go back now.
He ran a thumb across his bottom lip, his gaze falling to coast over my strapless nude dress and pink heels. “You’re the little liar, Elena.”
Of course he’d turn this around on me; he was too good at that. “Me? You tried to blackmail me!”
“If you would’ve listened to me in the first place I wouldn’t have had to.”
Was he serious? His gaze remained stoic. Ugh, he was.
I turned around, and when I almost fell again, I braced a palm on the hot brick wall and managed to buckle my shoe with one hand.
“Where’s your cousin?” he asked, typing something on his phone. “You shouldn’t be out here alone.”
Benito had only dropped me off at the door to go park, and Mamma and Papà had driven separately with Adriana. But that was none of Nicolas’s business.
“Quit the brotherly act. I already have one.”
I said it just because I thought it bothered him.
His jaw ticked. “Inside, Elena.”
“Ask me nicely,” I retorted, mocking him from the time he’d said it to me.
His gaze came up from his phone, amused, dark. “If you don’t get your ass inside, Elena, you’ll be the one screaming please.”
My God . . .
“That was inappropriate,” I breathed while heading to the doors.
“Perfectly platonic,” he parried.
It was then I realized I’d really screwed myself over with that word.
The red-lettered Closed sign was visible through the window near a few shelves of fresh bread, but when I pushed the door open, I was immediately greeted with, “Mia bella ragazza!”
A smile tugged at my lips. “Zio.”
My great uncle grasped my face and pressed a kiss to each cheek. He smelled like oregano and nostalgia. Some things will forever have that smell no matter if they never left to begin with.
Francesco Abelli lived on the tamer side of the Cosa Nostra. Every cent laundered in our family name was a product of this dress pants and shoes, wife beater and apron-wearing sixty-five-year-old. When he wasn’t cooking books, he was running this restaurant.
“Have a seat near the windows. It’s a buona giornata.”
It wasn’t that beautiful of a day. It was hotter than Hades, but he probably hadn’t set foot outside. He lived upstairs.
I took a seat at the table and poured myself a glass of water from the pitcher. Blinding sunlight streamed through the large window. It was an awful spot to sit, honestly, but Zio’s word was as final as Papà’s, no matter if everyone was miserable because of it.
Benito came in and took a seat, clearing his throat and pouring himself some tea. My eyes narrowed on him as I sipped water through a straw. “You got a hickey on your neck.”
He rubbed the spot, muttering, “Told her not to do that.”
I shook my head, not wanting to know how he’d gotten some action in between parking the car and now.
Fifteen minutes later, Mamma and Papà sat across from me, Adriana on my side, and Nico on my other. Mamma frowned when she realized my sister and Nico weren’t sitting beside each other, but neither the bride nor groom seemed concerned. Tony, Benito, Dominic, Luca, and my uncle Manuel shared a table next to us, talking amongst themselves.
Mamma glowered and blinked against the bright sunlight, and Papà blocked it by reading his menu, though he knew it by heart.
Lunch wasn’t a tense affair like I’d expected it to be after the note last night left off on. However, the oddest thing about it was Adriana. She seemed distant, like she was here but her thoughts were a mile away. She only stared out the window, when she was known to always keep her hands busy.
Papers were strewn about the table as Mamma went over the last of the wedding details with Nico, asking for his approval on some things.
“And will there be a honeymoon?” Mamma asked.
Unease danced beneath my skin to a foreboding tune. I shifted in my seat.
Nico ran a hand across his jaw, glancing out the window. My gaze followed his into the street, Long Island pavement and sun.
A tickle played in my awareness when I saw a black town car on the road, going slower than normal. And by the time I saw the tattoo MS on the driver’s face, Nico’s voice filled the restaurant, “Scendi!”
Down.
Shouts broke out. Scendi, scendi, scendi, over and over again like a messed-up recording with a myriad of voices. Alarm came on the air so thick I could taste it on my tongue.
And then a lungful of air escaped me as I was taken to the floor. A heavy body covered mine as glass shattered in an unmistakable pattern. Gunfire. My heartbeat drummed in my ears, and I couldn’t discern it from the bullets flying above me.
I knew who lay on me, tried to match my breathing to his as the chaos played on. A feeling of safety enveloped me while the restaurant became a battleground for New York’s scorned criminals.
It felt like it went on forever, before a stillness fell over the room that carried an echo of gunfire.
“Stai bene?”
I heard the words, but my thoughts were focused on red. Blood dripped to the wooden floorboards in my line of vision.
Hands grasped my face, turning it.
“Are you okay?” Nico repeated.
I nodded, the ringing in my ears fading.
His hands and gaze ran down my body, checking anyway, but I didn’t feel it because all I saw was the drip, drip, drip of red. Anguish tore into my chest, cutting my consciousness down to only emotion. I pushed Nico’s hands away.
“Get off me!”
“Stop.” He gripped my wrists. “Everyone’s all right.”
I blinked numbly. “Yeah?”
“Yeah.” He ran a thumb across my cheek. “Breathe.”
I inhaled a steady breath, and it was then that I heard their voices. They were all checking in, and I hadn’t been able to hear it over the horror of that dripping blood.
Benito was the one bleeding. He groaned, “Son of a bitch,” while holding his arm. “The same fucking arm.”
Papà spit Italian over the phone and Mamma was crying. Adriana sat up, surrounded by broken glass and disorder. Just as sirens sounded in the distance, the restaurant fell into silence, as though the shift in the air touched everyone’s skin.
And then my sister stared ahead and muttered two little words that would change both of our lives forever.
“I’m pregnant.”
“The die is cast.”
—Julius Caesar
SOMETIMES THERE’S NOTHING TO SAY.
Sometimes words will only clutter a space already filled with an unpleasant truth.