“Beloved by who?” I ask his headstone, my voice carrying clearly in the quiet cemetery. “Because I sure as hell don’t remember anyone actually loving you.”
A groundskeeper working nearby glances over at me talking to a grave, but I don’t care. I’ve been having conversations with dead people in my head for months—might as well do it out loud for once.
I crouch down and adjust the flowers that are already at the grave. I know Matteo has someone bring flowers once a month to Giuseppe’s grave and his own mother’s grave. For appearances, naturally. As far as I know, Matteo hasn’t stepped foot in this cemetery since I was a child.
“You want to know what I think of you, Giuseppe?” I say as I stand up, drawing my coat closer to me to ward off the chill. “I think you were a monster. A fucking monster who took what he wanted and didn’t care who got hurt in the process.”
The rage that’s been simmering in my chest for weeks finally boils over, and before I can stop myself, I spit on the pristine granite. The saliva slides down the gold lettering, and I feel a savage satisfaction watching it drip onto the perfectly manicured grass.
“You destroyed my mother,” I tell his ghost, not caring if anyone thinks I’m crazy. “You raped a sixteen-year-old girl then acted like she should be grateful for the privilege. You created me through violence, and you abandoned me to be raised by the son who had to clean up your mess.”
My voice is getting louder, more angry, but I can’t stop the words from pouring out.
“But here’s the thing you didn’t count on.” My hands clenched into fists at my sides, my nails biting into my skin, but I welcome the sting. “Yeah, I got your blood. I got your mind, your instincts, your capacity for violence, blah blah blah. But Ialso got something you never had—people who actually love me. People who chose to protect me instead of using me.”
I take a step back, studying the elaborate headstone with its lies carved in stone.
“So thanks, I guess. Thanks for the genetic gifts. I’m going to use every ruthless method you used, every brutal instinct you passed down, every dark impulse in my DNA.” Wind whips through my hair and I push it aside. I’m not fucking done yet. “But I’m going to use them to build something better than anything you ever achieved,” I explain, imagining that somewhere in hell Giuseppe is listening to me. “Something based on loyalty and love instead of just fear.”
The wind picks up again, scattering leaves across the cemetery grounds, and for a moment I imagine I can hear his voice—that harsh, demanding tone that echoes in my head when the Giuseppe voice speaks. But out here, in the cold autumn air, it just sounds like wind through bare branches.
“You’re dead,” I tell the headstone. “And I’m not. I win.”
The walk to Sophia’s grave feels longer, even though it’s only a few hundred yards away. My footsteps echo on the paved path, and I pass other visitors—an elderly woman placing flowers on a grave, a man in a business suit standing silently with his head bowed. Normal people grieving normal deaths.
Nothing about my family has ever been normal.
Sophia’s headstone is completely different from Giuseppe’s display of wealth and power. It’s simple white marble, elegant in its simplicity, with just her name and dates.Sophia Marie DeLuca. Below that, a single line.Beloved Mother.
Another lie. But I catch the omission—there’s no “loving wife.” It seems even Matteo couldn’t bear to add that lie for all eternity.
A delicate angel statue sits atop the headstone, its wings spread and its face turned skyward. It’s beautiful and peaceful and absolutely nothing like the complicated woman it represents.
I settle onto the small stone bench positioned in front of her grave, trying to organize my thoughts. With Giuseppe, my feelings were simple—rage, disgust, a desire to prove I’m better than he ever was. But Sophia…Sophia is harder.
I take a deep breath, trying to collect my thoughts. “I don’t know what to say to you,” I admit to her headstone, my voice quieter than it was at Giuseppe’s grave. “I spent most of my life thinking you just didn’t want to be around me. That you preferred parties and social events to spending time with your daughter.”
The angel statue stares serenely skyward, offering no answers. I drag the toe of my boot through the dirt, my mind going a million miles an hour.
“But now…” I laugh and look skyward. “Now I know the truth. You weren’t avoiding me because you didn’t love me. You were avoiding me because every time you looked at me, you sawhim. You saw the man who destroyed your life before it even really began.”
I try to imagine what it must have been like for her—sixteen years old, alone, probably terrified, carrying the child of a man who took everything from her. Then marrying Matteo, someone she barely knew, living in the same house as the monster who raped her.
What would I have done in that situation? What would anyone?
“I get it,” I tell her memory, surprising myself with how much I mean it. “I understand why you made the choices you did. Why you tried to destroy the family. I even kind of understand why you worked with Johnny Calabrese. You were trying to survive in a world that gave you no good options.”
The wind shifts, carrying the scent of flowers from other graves, and I close my eyes for a moment.
“I inherited your intelligence,” I continue. “Your ability to read people, to understand what makes them tick, to find their weaknesses and use them. Matteo calls it manipulation, but I think it’s just survival instinct. The same instinct that kept you alive for as long as you could manage.”
I open my eyes and study the angel’s face.
“I forgive you,” I say simply. “For the betrayal, for the plans to destroy us, for choosing Johnny over your own family. You were just trying to escape a situation that would have killed most people long before it killed you.”
But then my voice hardens slightly. Just because I’ve forgiven her doesn’t mean I’ve forgotten what she’s done. At the end of the day, she had a choice. We all do.
“But I’m not you. I’m not going to be a victim. I’m not going to let anyone—not Giuseppe, not Dominic, not anyone—make me feel powerless or desperate or trapped. I’m going to use every manipulative skill I inherited, but I’m going to use them from a position of strength, not desperation.”
