Grim-faced, Giovanni slams the magazine home and unloads the whole thing into The Cleaver.
“Another!” he shouts.
Salvatore grabs a fresh magazine yet again and gives it to his father.
This continues twice more. By then The Cleaver’s body is no longer recognizable as human.
“Another!” Giovanni shouts when the latest magazine is finished.
“Papa…” Salvatore says.
Giovanni shoots him a deadly glare. His voice is barely above a dangerous whisper when he speaks. “Don’t disobey me, boy. Not now of all times. Get me a magazine.”
“We don’t have any more,” Salvatore says. “Look at him. He’s dead, Papa.”
Giovanni gazes at The Cleaver for a long moment, and then drops the Uzi. He falls to his knees and buries his face in his hands, weeping.
“Finally we have closure, my love,” I hear him say through the tears. “Finally you’ve been avenged. You can rest in peace now. Forgive me for not being the one to take this savage’s life. And forgive me for living that day. I should have died. Me, not you. Forgive me.”
He stays on his knees like that for a long time. He seems a broken shell of the man he was only moments before. No one says a word through it all.
Finally, he stands.
For an instant I’m worried he’s going to blame me for taking vengeance away from him, but instead he lifts his horn-rimmed glasses and wipes the tears away before resting a hand on my shoulder.
“Thank you for doing this.” He speaks with power and authority once more, despite the wetness on his cheeks. “You have achieved the vengeance I couldn’t. To think, I almost married my daughter to this wretch. If you hadn’t kidnapped her, I very well might have. So I suppose I owe you thanks after all. I realize I made a mistake now, those eight years ago. I’m not so prideful that I can’t admit when I’m wrong. I should’ve never ordered my men to throw you into the sea. For that, I’m sorry. But I can’t give you my daughter.”
“Papa, Ilovehim,” Angela says, coming to my side.
“I know, which is why I can’t give you to him,” he replies.
“But why?” she insists.
“Because when he dies, it will hurt more than anything in the world,” he replies. “That’s partially why I wanted to kill him in front of you. I wanted you to feel the pain that I felt. I wanted to strike out at you for disobeying me. I wanted to show you that you’d marry who I wanted, or there would be consequences. But I can’t do any of that now. I can’t kill the man who gave me the vengeance I’ve wanted all these years. But I still can’t let you be with him.”
She crosses her arms, scowling. “Oh?”
“Yes,” he continues. “I’ve decided I want you to marry someone outside the business. Someone safer, like a doctor, or a lawyer. A fireman, maybe. Someone who won’t die on you.”
“But almost all the Palermo doctors and lawyers and even firemen are ‘in the business!’” she retorts.
He tilts his head. “Hm. You’re right.”
“I have no intention of dying for a very long time,” I reassure Giovanni.
He glances at me and narrows his eyes. But then his expression softens, and he sighs. “If she loves you, who am I to intervene? I thought I could play matchmaker. My marriage to my beautiful wife, may she rest in peace, was arranged by my own parents, and it turned out spectacularly well save for how it ended. By marrying off Angela, I only wanted what was best for the family, and for her. But I see now that is not the path for my daughter.”
Angela’s face glows with joy. “Oh Papa! Thank you!” She hugs him and gives him a peck on the cheek. “Thank you so much!”
He pauses, then tells her sternly: “If you love him like you say, then you must marry him. I will have no daughter of mine living in sin.”
The irony of those words isn’t lost on me, given the speaker.
And mobsters like you never sin of course, huh Giovanni?
Angela bites her lower lip and looks at me expectantly.
I can’t help but laugh out loud. “That’s an easy choice for me.”
