“That’s fucking sick, Mari,” Marciano said, his entire face scrunched up.
“What the fuck are you talking about?”
“That’s where Dolly had to release her toxic gas. And you’re fucking sniffing it?”
“Get the fuck outta here.” I waved him back. “Do you smell that?”
“What the fuck’s wrong with you?—”
“It smells like our truck, motherfucker.”
“Oh.” His face shutdown, before he took a cleansing inhale, then another. “Yeah, it does. Roasting meat.”
I bypassed him and went to the steering wheel area. I popped the hood from the lever. Marciano got to the open hood first. The top half of his body reared back like someone stuck something offensive in his face. I put a hand to my brother’s chest and pushed him back when I realized what the problem was. Snakes underneath the hood. One of them had been barbecued by the heat of the motor. The twisting creatures were hissing and slithering around, moving slow, either looking for a way out or being hypnotized by the warmth.
A new fucking den.
“That’s why Dolly has gas. She’s nervous.” Marciano shook his head. “We can’t even look for the problem to fix it. We need those tongs, or snake wranglers, or whatever the fuck they’re called. I saw a few of them in thatshould becondemned barn. We need them to bypass this level of fucking hell. Jack’s right.Look at them. Besides the fried one, they look like they’re canoodling.”
My brother, Marciano Leone Fausti, the word specialist. Leave it to Marci to use the fucking word “canoodling” regarding snakes.
Angelo stepped up to us, a grim look on his face. “It is not the motor,Cugini,” he said, “the dead men have stolen our gas.”
Marciano raised his eyebrows. “Dolly wasn’t throwing a tantrum then. She was trying to warn us.”
Yeah, if we’d only fucking listened.
Chapter 27
Sistine
The music was so loud, the tinted windows of the SUV Remo drove rattled from the deep bass. Willadeene Sharp, who everyone called Willa, was sitting up front with him, and she reminded me of a disco ball with red lips. Her blond hair glimmered, along with the thousands of crystals on her all-black ensemble.
Everyone was required to wear all black with a sparkly silver addition. Mine was nails. Willa also oversaw the music, and it seemed as if it kept growing louder and louder. If she loved a song on her playlist, she turned it up.
“Yahooo, Remo!” She shook her boobies at him. “Are you ready for a night of fun?” She leaned over and squeezed his cheek, which she could not truly pinch. He was probably made up of zero percent fat, just as all the Fausti men were. “You aresoserious!” She spoke to him as if he were a baby. It was as if she were saying things like,wittle ittle.
His eyes slid to her for a second, then back to the road, a long sigh escaping his lips.
Another song came on and she clapped. “This ismah(my) jammie jamjam!” She turned the sound up, and while she was not looking, Remo turned it down a notch. She pressed thewindow down, screaming the song out to any wildlife that could have potentially been listening on the side of the road.
Atta leaned closer to me. We were sitting next to each other in the back seat. “The elk are running for their lives right about now.” She spoke from the side of her mouth, then she clasped my hand, squeezing.
I squeezed back, a sigh escaping my lips. I had caught sight of myself in the mirror, and I did not like what I saw. The same girl from years ago staring back at me. The same girl who had been peeling out of an old dirt road while a few stray bison still ran for their lives.
I did not like the way my heart was feeling. Something was not right. We had not heard from Mariano, Marciano, or Angelo since earlier. Angelo’s brothers had arrived from Italy, along with their parents, Romeo and Juliette, and were still waiting on him for his party to start.
My husband called me often if we were not together. Even when we were, his eyes were always on me, and if they were not, I knew his thoughts were. He would always reach out to touch me, even if he was speaking to someone else.
Remo met my eyes through the mirror. Before he could turn them away, I spoke to him in Italian. “Turn the music lower.”
He did.
I asked him in Italian if he had heard anything from Mariano. Remo did not know we were married yet. I wanted so badly to call Mariano my husband. To let the entire world know he was mine. Especially the women. My name was on him. My scent. My life.
Remo shook his head. No, he hadn’t heard from my husband. I sighed, and Atta squeezed my hand. Her face was solemn. That night was coming back to us both, and it was now connected to our men.
What if they had gone after Rattler and his brothers, and something had happened?
