I need to get out of here.
I roll my head back on my shoulders like I’m about to pass out again, and when Pardini leans in to start cutting on me again, I headbutt him hard in the nose.
It gushes blood like he’s taken a shot to the face, and he moves away, swearing. But I’m still stuck in the damn chair; it’s welded fast to the floor. Meatball grabs me in a headlock from behind.
No one’s laughing anymore.
Pardini picks up the knife again, wiping the blood still running from his nose, and tells me, “You know, we could’ve made this easy on you. But you had to go and do that, Orsini. So now you get the full treatment. And you tell Seb Conti hello from me when you get to hell, eh?”
He approaches me with the knife again, and the fucker choking me is doing it hard enough that I could black out if I helped it along. Spare myself some of the misery.
But I don’t want to.
I deserve this, after everything I’ve done.
I haven’t prayed since I was thirteen years old, but I find myself doing it now anyway. Not to God. God never listened to me—and hell, I can’t blame him.
No, I pray to the one person I actually believe in.
Get out of that house, Caligula. Get out of that house.
Get out.
CHAPTER 43
CALIGULA
My dearest Cesario,
You must forgive me for the many terrible things I said to you about the murder of Vincent Orsini. I was shocked that my own son could be so cold-hearted as to kill his closest friend.
I should have realized long before now that you would never undertake such a betrayal.
I know now that you were forced to take the blame for something you did not do. And I understand why.
I understand everything.
You must take Caligula and leave. Go to Italy. Go anywhere. I will find a way to get money to you.
Please know that I will love you always, you and Caligula.
Forgive me for not seeing the truth earlier. Forgive me for not having better protected you.
Your loving mother,
Amelia Clemenza
The letter is writtenin Italian, in Nonna Mellie’s elegant hand. It’s short, but I still have to read it twice, because I don’t take it in completely the first time.
The third time I reread the letter, my hands are shaking so hard the paper rattles, and I have to press it flat against the floor to keep the words still.
You were forced to take the blame for something you did not do.
My daddidn’tkill Vincent Orsini. But he carried the blame like a stone around his neck for the rest of his life.
Damiano put a collar on me for a murder my father didn’t commit.
Hechainedme in this basement. He put a goddamn cage on my cock. He wrapped his hand around my throat and considered snapping my neck as a mercy, and all of it—every bruise, every fear, every night I lay in the dark wondering if I’d ever see light again—all of it was for nothing.
