Gianni. I didn’t know where this notion came from, but I agreed with it, though I couldn’t remember why. Should I remember? I’d come to rest on the cool fabric of a cushioned bench, and everything around me went dim.
Then, a white-hot stab of agony arrived on my left hip and suddenly, I was fully awake and screaming. I could smell the sickly sweet odor of burning flesh, and the combination of the smell and the pain made me feel nauseous. The concept of nausea reminded me of someone… Lucia. Because Lucia had been ill, and I had been privy to it. She’d been ill due either to her pregnancy or due to Gianni’s kiss or both.
The fucker had slobbered all over my expectant bride. I’d kill him with my bare hands.
As soon as I could.
Someone turned me over slightly and more misery followed, this time feeling like a branding iron the size of a toaster. Whatever they were doing to me seemed to go on forever, and I shrieked and writhed and bellowed the whole time, until my vocal cords felt shredded. Until any sounds coming from me were hoarse imitations of what they had been. I caught sight of Giorgio Bonifacio, myfarfalla’swedding surprise. He watched from the doorway with eyes blazing with satisfaction, probably because he felt turnabout was fair play.
Had I been a better man, I might’ve even conceded the point.
But I wasn’t a better man. I was bitter and exhausted. I felt full of so much hatred for Gianni that I could taste its bleachy aftereffects. After a few minutes, I regained enough breath to look down at the damage. The bullet had pierced the side of my left hip and exited through my lower back. It appeared my father and Savio had stanched the bleeding, but even still it hurt like a son of a bitch.
Only after I’d studied the injuries did I realize that my father was visibly livid.
“Ingrate. Fucking bastard,” he ranted as he paced back and forth. “Duping us in some ridiculous attempt to wrangle control of the Cavetti empire.”
Of course, Angelo didn’t give a damn about Lucia. All he cared about was the treachery that Gianni utilized against us. Which was insane considering that our own grandfather perpetuated the exact same sort of duplicitous means to secure his own house and the beginnings of our crime family. All of us learned from the examples and role models set forth, after all. If I weren’t just as angry, I might bring up to my father the hypocrisy of pots and kettles.
But the thing was, Iwasjust as angry. And I wanted blood. Moreover, Iwouldhave it.
Even if it killed me.
“Father,” I called out to him, but my voice came out as nearly inaudible. “Father… We have to get Lucia back.” Angelo shot a vicious look my way as if the woman I loved was of no consequence. “The situation is worse than you know.”
Savio had started to bandage me up, but his eyes flitted to my face at my proclamation.
“How could it be worse than this?” my father barked at me, demanding to know.
“Because the next generation of our legacy has already begun. My bride is carrying my child.”
19
Lucia
“My time has come at last,” Gianni spouted like the lunatic he clearly was, still brandishing his stupid gun like a toy. “All my groundwork. All my plans. Not one of you saw me coming, did you? I outsmarted you all, Bonifacio. Both sides. Do you hear me? Every single one of you.” With each word of his last sentence, he tapped me on the scalp with the barrel of his pistol, making me freeze into total stillness.
In a bizarre moment of clarity, I pictured what my life might’ve been like had I not been born into organized crime. Would I have had not private tutors but a public or private school education? Would I have been allowed to get a college degree and pursue a career? Would I have made friends outside of my own family? Would I have fallen in love, gotten married, and become pregnant all without any fear that any or all of us might be shot in an instant?
But as I lost myself in the idea of this, my attacker relented, backing away from me and digging out something from his pants pocket. One thing Gianni could never discover is my condition. It might endanger the baby if he were to know of his or her existence. I didn’t even know whether this child might be a boy or a girl, have my blue eyes or Romeo’s dark brown. I hadn’t gotten a chance to hold the baby to my breast or watch him or her grow. And despite how recent my revelation had been, I wanted that. I wanted all of those things to come to fruition.
Even though I felt so worried about Romeo I thought I might come out of my skin, my world had shrunk to one basic fact. I had to protect the life of this child. Especially if I ended up being his or her only surviving parent.
The thought made my throat hurt and my eyes sting, and I’d already cried today. So, I stopped. I simply shut that train of thought down. Because I had to stay on my toes and think my way out of this. I had to live moment to moment.
The Chicago traffic was its typical snarl, and the driver had gone from peeling out of the church parking lot to a complete standstill. Gianni had chosen this downtime to pry out a little baggie full of pills. I had no clue what these might be, but it was vital that I not draw any undue attention to myself. It would be far better if I let this man think I was the shrinking violet he believed me to be.
As I made myself as small and invisible as I could, I noticed Gianni removing a Swiss army knife. He spread his pills out—they were a kaleidoscope of pastel colors—and crushed them with the side of his blade. Bewildered by his behavior, I then observed him from the corner of my eye as he snorted the concoction he’d made up his nose line by line. Each time he expelled a wild woot of joy, as if he’d just experienced the best feeling in the world.
Perhaps he had.
This was one of the reasons why both my family and his sold illicit substances. Such a business could only be profitable if people thought they benefited from taking them. Not that I ever had. Partaking in our products had always been expressly forbidden by my father.
As I watched Gianni Cavetti become more and more erratic, I was starting to see why.
He leaped around the admittedly roomy backseat of the limo, making me flinch any time he came too close. I still didn’t know what his intentions might be, and his capricious actions weren’t helping me solve that puzzle. He removed an unopened bottle of what appeared to be tequila from the wet bar built into a compartment in a center console and guzzled it down. Then, retrieving a bag of white powder from his jacket pocket, he took his knife, separated out the lines, and snorted it down, too.
Was this a normal amount of drugs to take all at once?
