“There is something else,” he said, standing up, taking a step back. “She is sick,cugino.”
“Sick,” I repeated.
“Fever. Cough. It is not getting better. She is also limping from a cut she endured when she was taken. They will not call a doctor to see to her. This is another way to get her to cooperate.”
“The blood on her dress.” I couldn’t tell if the words were his or mine.
My hands were to my mouth. My eyes steady on the ground. The urge to move was strong with nowhere to go. When I looked up again, Donato had gone, and the sun had started to sink into the horizon. I hadn’t even realized he left. I was stuck in a bottle with time, no fucking way out.
Donato was coming back, my brothers and Tito surrounding him. The crowd broke. Livio came up the line and straight for me.
“Brando,” he said, back straight, shoulders squared. He was taller than I remembered.
We were a reflection of each other.
“The mole inside?” Tito said.
Livio nodded. Then he wasted no time getting down to business.
“You must kill Giovi Spataro’s only son,” he said. “He will want you bad enough to trade you for your wife, if you do. It is her only chance at survival. Scarlett will be in the town tomorrow. Spataro feels she needs to confess to a priest before he decides her fate. If the cough or infection does not kill her, Enzo will. Or he will make her wish she was dead.”
* * *
Holding me under water for an entire night would’ve been easier than waiting for the sun to rise the next day.
I couldn’t speak. I couldn’t eat. I couldn’t sleep. I couldn’t stand hearing the beating of my own heart. Consumed by something close to pure madness, I had no other choice but to keep still, or a rampage would have been imminent. I would hurt those who were the closest to me, or strangers on the street.
Although I felt the men’s anger and disbelief below the surface, they were keeping it together around me. All but Tito, who paced like a madman, mumbling incoherent words, other times questioning himself about the state of Scarlett’s health. “Yes. She is to bring me the things before tomorrow. I will see to it!”
After this remark, he made a phone call to a Dr. Nicchi. He commanded her to bring this and that. I had no idea what he intended to do with these things—there was a slim chance to bring her home, unless I was willing to risk both of our lives. If it were only mine on the line, there would be no problem. Hers, I refused to.
Before Livio had fled, he had given us as much information as he could. He couldn’t stay long. He and the girl at the villa had an understanding. Every so often they would steal away to the property surrounding the villa, acting as though they were going to be alone.
In reality, he would take one of the cars to Pietraperzia—Scarlett was somewhere hidden in the hills, away from the center. The girl at the villa would find her female lover and go her own way. An hour later they would meet once again, and no one questioned it.
Livio had refused to give up their whereabouts, though, claiming that if the villa got wind of our presence, or we raided it, Spataro wouldn’t hesitate to move, or to start all-out war. Livio didn’t feel that Scarlett was strong enough for either.
“If they move her, it will be to another abandoned villa. She is in a clean place now. That is a step up from the places he has taken her before. She will be forced to bathe in cold water. I do not think she could handle this. Also, if war breaks out, and Enzo is able, he will take her on his own. She is safer. For now.”
“I have things—things you can give to her,” Tito said, anxious to send medical contraband.
Livio thought about this for a moment. “I cannot do that. She hates me. She has to. If something shows on her face, a sign that she knows why I am there, they will kill us both.”
Whyhe was there was not to help my wife but to avenge his. When Livio told us in Positano that he was going to infiltrate Enzo’s group, none of us had been able to stop him. He had never said where he was going, though we all suspected. It was his right, and who were we to stop him? I didn’t tell Scarlett because I didn’t want her to worry. He made Enzo believe that he hated us for what we had done—set his life on the path it was on. The truth was, he was planning to kill Enzo.
The day Scarlett was taken from me, he was trying to warn us, or so he said. I didn’t trust a word from his mouth. Livio played for one team only, and that was his.
“There is no way to get her to safety?” Romeo said for the tenth time.
“No.” Livio shook his head. “The group is still suspicious of me, even if Enzo is not. They do notlikehim. But because Ciro had made contact, and died for the cause, some trust is there. Ettore has been in contact as well.”
No doubt. Luca and Ettore would both want to know the current state of affairs, not trusting Lothario to fill them in completely.
“It all seems too tangled—too many traps,” Tito put in.
Livio nodded. “It is nothing but a bunch of tangled webs.”
“He hurt her,” I said. I felt the tremble in my voice, rather than heard it. I didn’t understand how I stood on two legs, demanding him to tell me if another man hurt my wife. It felt surreal. Not even the trees around me seemed real. And this fucker Livio was in a place of extreme power—a place he had never been before.
