Into something like grief and desperation.
“What’s going on?” I asked, unnerved by how emotional she was getting.
“What’s goingonis you promised me you’d get out of the family business – ”
“I am! I just – ”
“ – and now some horrible man is trying to kill us!”
I scoffed. “Cesare is just some pissant gangster from Naples – ”
“You killed his father!”
“BECAUSEHIS FATHERTRIED TO KILLME!”I roared.
I caught myself as Alessandra stopped pacing and stared at me, her eyes welling with tears.
“What would you have had me do?” I asked, keeping my temper in check. “Let him murder me?”
She looked away. “No, of course not… of course not…”
I walked over to her and gently put my hands on her arms. “If I hadn’t done what needed to be done, I wouldn’t be here now. We would have never met and fallen in love. Our daughter wouldn’t be on the way – ”
“But it never ends!” Alessandra cried out, tears spilling down her cheeks.
“What never ends?”
“The violence!” she said, finally looking me in the eyes. “Someone tries to kill you – you kill them – their children come to kill you – you have to killthem –where does it stop?!”
My heart was heavy, but I said, “When I get out. And I swear to you, Iwillget out. I just need more time.”
“But this man is trying to kill you!”
“He won’t.”
“He’ll try to killallof us!”
“Hewon’t,”I insisted.
“So you’ll have to kill him – and the violence will continue – and – ” She stifled a sob. “And maybe Elena will pay the price for it – ”
“Shewon’t!”
“How do you know that?!” she cried out.
“Because I won’t let that happen.”
Alessandra’s lip trembled, and she whispered, “But what if God punishes Elena for what we’ve done?”
I looked at her in surprise. Our conversation had taken averydark turn.
I was not religious in the slightest, but my wife was, so I chose my words carefully.
“If God punishes anyone for what they’ve done,” I said, “He will punishme.Not you, not Elena – ”
“But when Bathsheba sinned with King David, God took her baby,” she said in a frantic whisper.
Now I was alarmed. “What?!”
