Two days.
That’s how long Nina and Austin have been living in my place, and the adjustment period is going better than I expected. Austin’s rolling with it like kids do, no overthinking, just accepting whatever comes next. Nina’s the one tiptoeing around like she’s waiting for the other shoe to drop.
Can’t say I blame her. When your entire life has been one letdown after another, good things probably feel like a trap.
“I want to direct movies when I grow up,” Austin announces, tearing his eyes away from the screen long enough to look at me.
I ruffle his already messy hair. “Didn’t you tell me yesterday you wanted to be a Lego Master Builder?”
He rolls his eyes with the exasperation of someone three times his age. “I can do both, you know.”
The attitude in that response sounds exactly like his mother when she’s annoyed with me. I bite back a grin.
“What’s your job?” he asks, swiveling to face me completely.
The question stops me cold. How the hell do I explain that I run a strip club to a six-year-old? Or that I’m a capo in the mafia?
Right. I don’t.
“I own a bar,” I reply finally. There’s technically a bar in the club, so it’s not entirely a lie.
“Oh. What’s a bar?”
Shit. Now I have to explain alcohol without actually explaining alcohol. Will Nina kill me if I corrupt our kid? Probably. And I’m pretty sure a six-year-old doesn’t need to understand the concept of getting wasted.
“I like my new room,” Austin chatters on, mercifully changing the subject before I can dig myself deeper. “Did you like superheroes when you were my age?”
The question drags me back to when I was seven, right around the time my dad decided family life wasn’t for him. Those memories are fuzzy at best—trauma has a way of wiping the slate clean.
What I do remember isn’t bedtime stories or hugs. It’s voices raised behind closed doors, the smell of gin on his clothes, and then one day he was just gone.
“Sure,” I lie, but my mind’s stuck in the past now. I can’t recall a single moment like this with my father. No movies, no conversations about dreams and plans. Most of my memories of him are distant, impersonal.
Back then, I thought he was a decent dad right up until he vanished. But sitting here with Austin, I’m realizing I might have been looking at him through rose-colored glasses. When you’re seven, you don’t have much to compare your parents to. Maybe my dad was already halfway out the door, and I was too young to see the signs.
“Watch this!” Austin shouts again, pulling me back to the present.
I focus on Superman swooping down to catch some woman who’s fallen off a building. Austin cheers like it’s the first time he’s seen it.
“Superman is brave and strong,” he grins. “He protects people.”
“Like his girlfriend. What’s her name again?”
“Lois,” Austin says without hesitation. “He likes her a lot.”
We watch in silence for a few minutes before another question comes.
“Alessio, would you protect my mom the way Superman protects Lois?”
There’s more behind that question. He’s not just asking about protection—he wants to know if I care about his mother the way Superman cares about Lois.
“Yeah, kiddo. I’ll do anything to keep both of you safe.”
Superman might have a cape, but I’ve got something better: the will to put a bullet in anyone who comes near them.
“Good,” he says simply, settling back against the couch. “I can tell you like her. You get the same look Superman gets.” His head finds my ribs, and my arm automatically goes around his shoulders.
A crack runs through the armor I’ve worn too long. This is the first time he’s done this, the first time he’s reached for me like I’m someone safe. Someone he trusts.
