“So philosophical,” he said, and I almost laughed again.
“What? You didn’t get that?”
“All I got is a Tim Burton movie soundtrack stuck in my head now.”
“Who’s Burton?” I asked.
“Edward Scissorhands?”
I shrugged. “Have no clue.”
“It amazes me. You have no idea who Tim Burton or Edward Scissorhands are, but you had a pretty good idea of who the Faustis were when we met.”
“It’s a sad fact of life on the streets. You try to keep ahead of the things that can kill you.” I shrugged. “The rest doesn’t really matter when you’re hungry enough to rob a small kid for his ice cream cone. I doubt Tim Burton and Edward—” I made a motion with my fingers like I was cutting paper with scissors “—would chase me down and kill me, maybe even torture me, if I saw something I wasn’t supposed to.”
I had known some about the Faustis, but more about the five families. The Faustis didn’t deal in petty shit. They were royalty in Italy and beyond. Their dealings made headlines. So did their marriages when one of them took a bride, using Capo’s archaic term. And when I asked Capo just how deep it went, he said, “Consider the Faustis a lawless land that no president or dictator can touch. They rule their own territories. And whatever they feel belongs to them does. End of story.”
He glanced at me before he turned back to the road. “You have a lot to learn about the good in life, Mariposa. It’ll be my pleasure to teach and show you.”
With that, we swapped music until we pulled up to the address Keely had given Capo.
My stomach took a dive when Capo parked in front of the house I’d grown up in until I was ten. “Why are we here?”
He took his sunglasses off and studied my face. “You didn’t know?”
“Know what?”
“That this is where we were going, Mariposa.”
“No.” I shifted in the seat some. “Keely only told me that the party was at a friend’s house on Staten Island.”
I’d had a dress fitting that morning. Giovanni had taken me, and then Capo picked me up for Keely’s party after. She wanted to leave early, so she had given Capo the address while I was getting ready. She wanted to help set everything up. Capo must’ve assumed I already knew.
Judging by his hard face, he had no idea that she hadn’t mentioned it to me. He didn’t seem to like surprises. I could tell by the way everyone around him briefed him on everything.
“I thought that’s why you were nervous,” he said, staring past me toward the house. I wondered if he remembered bringing me there.
“No,” I said. “I was nervous because you’re basically meeting the family. Now I’m nervous because I haven’t stepped foot in this house in eleven years. This place is the only house I’ve ever called home.”
“That’s not going to help.” He took my arm, stopping me from fanning my armpits.
It was hot out and my nerves had me on edge. The heavenly perfume worked overtime. The entire car smelled sweet. I loved how the scents seemed to subtly change from time to time. Sometimes I’d smell more caramel, other times, pistachio or sandalwood. It smelled more like almond in that moment.
We became quiet for a while, but my thoughts were running rampant, and if I didn’t say something soon, I felt like a blood vessel might burst. My heart felt close to it.
“After Jocelyn died, I was too young to really consider what happened to me. I lost the only parents I remembered. I was thrown out of my safe place, thrown into the system, which felt wild and unsafe. It wasn’t until I turned eighteen that I realized just how much I lost when I lost them.
“I never had the time to really think about it, you know? It was survive, survive, survive. And then one night, it hit me. Keely and her family loved me, but I had no parents. I was no one’s baby girl. That’s what Jocelyn used to call me, her baby girl. They were good to me. So good to me.”
“Home is wherever you make it,” Capo said, his voice gruff. “Come, Mariposa. Now or ten minutes, waiting is not going to change the way you feel. It’ll only make you feel worse.”
I couldn’t decide what to concentrate on first once Capo opened the door to the car for me. The fact that we were climbing up the steps to the house I had never thought to enter again. Or the fact that Capo wore comfortable clothes—a black t-shirt that fit his chest like a glove, jeans that showed off his thin waist and toned legs, and that ass. His boots only upped his level of supreme coolness. Or the fact that when the door opened to the house, Harrison stood on the other side, staring at us with daggers in his eyes.
I wondered if Keely had truly gone to help set up the party, or if she had gone to break the news to her brother before he found out this way.
Before Harrison made a sound, his eyes raked over Capo, and Capo’s eyes did the same to him. Harrison’s attention stilled on our connected hands before he met my eyes. I felt Capo watching him while he stared at me.
I had no idea what to expect, but the hurt in Harrison’s eyes took me by surprise. It hit me square in the chest and stole my breath. He was like my brother. He was my family. Even before Capo, I’d never had romantic feelings for him, or for anyone.
Keely came up behind Harrison and greeted us, making the situation less awkward for me. The two men didn’t seem to care. Neither one was willing to make introductions. Keely did it.
“Harrison,” she said, a certain level of warning to her tone. “This is Mac, Mari’s…” She hesitated for a breath before she said, “fiancé. Capo Macchiavello. Everyone but Mari calls him Mac. Mac, this is my brother, Harrison Ryan.”
Harrison nodded once. Capo did the same. The air between them was tense. I hadn’t mentioned to Capo what Keely had said about her brother’s feelings. I didn’t feel it was necessary. Harrison had never admitted that to me, and to broach the subject with Capo felt like a betrayal of Keely. She had told me that in secret.
Capo had picked up on it, though. His grip on my hand grew firmer, and I didn’t particularly like the look in his eyes. I’d never seen it before. It was stone cold, not an ounce of warmth to be found. The tension eased a little when we walked outside and there were more people to meet. Keely’s parents (they had flown in for the party), a few family members, a couple of friends, and her other three brothers—Lachlan, Declan, and Owen. There was also a man that I’d never seen before. Lachlan called him Cash Kelly, but I heard one of Keely’s uncles whisper to another uncle that his name was Cashel. Blond hair. Green eyes. An Irish lilt. His eyes were intense as they watched Keely from time to time.
News circulated around the party about our engagement, and everyone congratulated us. A few of the ladies asked to see my engagement ring and to hear the story of how Capo proposed. I was glad he’d given me a story to tell.
I tried to keep my distance from Harrison, who was quiet, watching me with a force that made me uncomfortable. It was almost like he was willing me to be alone with him. He was drinking and hardly saying a word to anyone, but I knew he wanted to talk to me. Lachlan, Declan, and Owen seemed more comfortable around Capo, even though he was being quiet himself. His eyes absorbed his surroundings, and not in the way he sometimes absorbed me. They were on guard.