Alessandra
The mafia is no place for a woman.
That’s what my father always told me. He always kept us in the backline, always parading us around as though we were inanimate objects. I dreaded the thought of it happening again, but there we were. Chiara and I were standing to the side, dressed and prepped for a meeting that we didn’t want to have with a family that we shouldn’t be around.
What the hell was my father thinking?
It was bad enough that Lucia had been promised to their monster of a son against her will, but now they were entering our home. I wasn’t having any of it. My heart thrummed in my chest like a drum, and I wanted nothing more than to leave the scene—flee like a gazelle from a pack of lions. I could tell Chiara felt the same way. She had that same mask-like expression on her face, but her eyes gave her away. They always did.
We had grown up in comfort, having everything we wanted, and living like royals in our father’s palace of a mansion. We had people who served our every need, and although we hadn’t lived a free life like most kids who were allowed to roam around and do whatever they wanted, it was still a life many people wished for, and all of it, like winter, was about to come to an end. Our lives were about to change forever, and it wasn’t for the better.
I raised my eyes and saw Lucia coming down the stairs. We were lined up like ducks, preparing for them to enter. I’d already heard their cars, and now I could hear their voices approaching from outside. My stomach churned at the thought of having such people in our home. The things my father had said about them made them seem as though they were all murderers and traitors.
“Here they come,” my father said, his eyes pointed forward as he spoke. “Lucia, get down here now. I want all of us here to welcome them.”
I hated that I had no idea that they were even showing up until a few minutes ago. Sure, I’d wondered why my mother had set up hors d’oeuvres and a caterer, but they were always doing things at the last minute. Chiara and I were never told about what was going on in the house. We just stood around like statues, smiling as we were taught and waiting for whatever was to come.
It was exhausting.
It was only some minutes past midday, and the sun was already burning hot, scorching hot. I could feel the heat on the inside of my cheeks. Father told us to behave and mingle, to smile, to look as brave as we could, no matter what happened. The look my father had when he uttered the words to Chiara and me, it made me realize that whatever was going on was more severe than he and my mother let on. And if that wasn’t enough to give me an idea of what was going to happen, the fact that my mother resorted to her bottles the minute this façade began was a dead giveaway.
Pretend. Smile. Mingle.
Chiara always did it better than me, as though she’d resolved herself to being nothing more than an inanimate object. I understood why, but I always had a more difficult time accepting it. My father was a secretive man, but it was strange how he never allowed my sister and me to be a part of things. We were always left out, only to find out the news afterward. Even on a few occasions, when things had gotten too close to our home, our father would make sure the violence never got to us. He had always spared us the pain and told Chiara and me not to be afraid of anything. He’d say to us that he and our brothers would protect us no matter what.
The door began to open, and my heart felt as though it was going to throw itself from my chest. My body was buzzing, and I was getting riled up. I wanted to yell at my father, tell him that he was an idiot for letting these savages in our home. There was an intuitive pull in my chest, warning me. I had no idea what it was warning me about. Maybe it was just anxiety, but it felt like something more.
There they were. Only minutes after my father announced that the Cavettis were coming over, they were there. I felt myself stepping back as though I were having an out of body experience. I didn’t want to be there. They were all different than what I was expecting, but they were as cold as I thought they would be. There was something in their demeanor—they looked at us as though we were their prey. They looked like a pride of lions stalking a herd of gazelle.
“Hello, all,” my father said, welcoming them with his arms open. “Welcome to our home. We’re so glad you could make it.”
I narrowed my eyes at my father, but he didn’t even seem to notice. We were welcoming them? It was wrong. All of it was so wrong. My mother was on another planet. I wondered what concoction she’d come up with in order to numb herself to what was happening around her. I always guessed that it was opiates, but my father dealt all sorts of narcotics—cocaine, meth, heroin. It didn’t matter, so long as it had a price tag.
My father took Angelo’s hand in his, and I frowned.
“What a lovely home you have!” Angelo Cavetti said, smiling from ear to ear. “And it’s so nice to see your girls all here, as well. It’s a pleasure.”
I was uncomfortable the moment he glanced at me. It made my skin crawl. It was predatory in ways I didn’t think a simple glance could be. Relief washed over me the moment that Angelo turned toward my parents, keeping that smile on his face as though it were a mask.
What the hell was my father thinking? I was staring at him in awe as he interacted with them. He was being stupid. This was a family ofmurderers. We were the oldest crime family in all of Chicago, so we’d built our reputation on the work of my grandfather and his father before him. The Cavettis, though? They were nothing like us. They were bloodthirsty. They’d clawed their way to the top by killing anything that stood in their way. Now, my father was standing next to them, and it was such a strange thing to watch. I felt like I was seeing the meeting of two kings who’d been at war for centuries. I wasn’t sure how to take it.
Chiara gave me a look. I realized I was humming again. I really had to stop doing that. In poker, people tend to have a tell—something that easily gave away what they were thinking. Mine was humming. The vibration in my throat always soothed me, and it was happening again.
My father and mother were busy speaking to Angelo Cavetti, the head of the Cavetti family. He was similar to my father in many ways. That was what frightened me. My father wasn’t known to be an overly kind man. The only difference between the two was that Angelo Cavetti came off as being more charming. He was gracing us all with a smile, but there was no joy behind it. He was seemingly doing it to set us all at ease.
It wasn’t working.
There were three young men, and only one did I recognize. Romeo Cavetti was going upstairs with Lucia. I’d seen him only once before when he’d stopped by to see Lucia. They were set to be wed, and I still hadn’t heard Lucia mention how she felt about it. She was a secretive person, generally, but she was also the heir to my father’s name. To think that the Cavettis would be entitled to my family’s legacy through marriage was terrifying. They were, of course, said to be monsters. It was hard to see them as anything else after everything I’d heard.
I was unable to stop humming. I tried to make it so that it was lower, that only I could feel and hear the vibration in my throat, soothing me, as it always did. I wanted to be in my room at that moment, writing lyrics about the kind of people that they were. There was plenty of inspiration to be had. I mean, they were killers, deceivers, and monsters. I could already think of a few.
Romeo, not like Shakespeare. He’s the dagger, not the lover.
I forced myself not to smile at the thought of creating songs based on each member of the Cavetti family. I took a small step back and flinched as one of them approached. I only knew who he was because he was massive, both vertically and horizontally—it was Marcello. It had to be. There were rumors that he’d beaten a man to death with only his fists. He was eyeing Chiara as though she was a meal. It made me want to push him down and kick him until I couldn’t move my legs, even though I knew that it would be impossible. Chiara wasn’t that type of girl—she’d always been the more innocent of us all, and the way he was looking at her was making her visibly uneasy. I hated it. I’d always been the one to protect Chiara. Our brothers would have done something if they were with us.
Our father had told us to mingle, but I wasn’t sure how we could possibly entertain the Cavettis. They already looked bored. None of their expressions gave them away, and they peered about the room as though they were counting our belongings, determining whether they’d keep them. It caused a knot to form in my stomach.
I didn’t realize I had squeezed my face, nor that I had bitten my lips hard until I began to taste blood. All of this was too much, and it felt like it was eating me up from inside. I imagined some miracle out of nowhere came and put an end to this nightmare. I imagined the Cavettis just up and left, never to bother us again.
