I kept holding her even as she became cold, even as the silence in the room echoed loudly in my head. Night fell outside and then it became light again, and I still cradled her in my arms. Steps sounded in the house. Slowly, I slid my arm out from under her body and put her head down on the pillow. After I pulled out the syringe and thrust it into the bin, I kissed her eyelids and stood.
I couldn’t look away from her lifeless body, even though the sight of it crushed my heart.
“Master?” Zita called, and for a moment I considered sending her away so I could be alone with Carla’s body and my sorrow, but I couldn’t hide like this forever. I couldn’t do what I wanted—lay down beside my wife again and wait for death to claim me as well. Life needed to go on. I wasn’t sure how it could though.
Ines squeezed my hand under the table as she kept on her conversation with Mother. I didn’t react to her attempt at consoling me, instead I excused myself and headed for the gardens, needing to get away from all the people who pretended they cared about Carla’s death when all they wanted was to get into my good graces, knowing it was only a matter of time before I’d take over as the Boss officially from my father as well.
I couldn’t remember the last time I’d been this angry but without an outlet to release my emotions. Carla’s death had been like a cluster bomb and since then my insides felt frayed, torn, irrevocably damaged. My sorrow hadn’t diminished, if possible it had grown in the days since I’d killed her and with it my fury, my need to share this agony the only way I could, by inflicting it on others.
Steps raised my protective walls but I didn’t have to mask my face into one of calm, it always was. My muscles seemed perfectly frozen even as my insides burnt with emotions that threatened to unravel me and with it possibly the Outfit.
Pietro stopped beside me, not saying a word and stared up at the night sky like I did. After a couple of minutes, he slanted me a look. “We’ll stay for a week. Your mother is happy to have the twins around and Ines thought it would do you good to have family close by.”
I gave a terse nod.
“Dante,” Pietro said quietly, angling his body toward me and I knew his words wouldn’t do what they were intended to do even before he spoke them. “If you need someone to talk, you know you can come to me. You don’t have to bear this loss by yourself.”
One hand curled to a fist at my side, I nodded again, and Pietro finally retreated.
The night sky seemed endless and foreboding tonight. I wanted to believe Carla was up there somewhere, looking down at me. Maybe it would have offered me a flicker of consolation if I believed in an existence after death. I didn’t, and consolation was unreachable. The images of Carla’s lifeless body, of her casket being lowered into the dank soil slithered through my mind like poisonous snakes.
Two days later, my parents invited the Scuderis over for dinner and despite my need to be alone, I attended the gathering. There was no one at home waiting for me and my duty to the Outfit bound me to be present. It wouldn’t do good to appear weak, not so shortly before my rise to become Capo.
Ines, Pietro, and the twins were there as well. The Scuderi sisters were too old to play with them but Fabiano was only a year older and so he joined Serafina and Samuel in a corner of the room after dinner to play. I barely listened to the conversation, even if it was about the Famiglia and how to assure peace with them.
“A marriage would bind us. Salvatore is eager to find a beautiful bride for his son Luca,” Father said.
“He’s interested in Aria,” Rocco said. “An immediate wedding preferably.”
My gaze turned to the girl who was chatting with her sisters on the sofa. She was fifteen, too young for marriage and too innocent for someone of Vitiello’s disposition.
“That man killed his cousin with his bare hands. I’m not sure if a union between him and one of our girls can be the foundation of peace,” Ines said.
Father’s brows tightened with disapproval, and Mother made a small shush noise toward Ines. “Your opinion isn’t appreciated at this table, Ines. You better concern yourself with how to please your husband and control your children, especially your daughter, she needs to learn her place.”
Serafina was brawling with the boys, holding her own despite her angelic appearance.
In the past, Ines would have ducked her head but as Pietro’s wife, she only had to obey him, not Father, and Pietro didn’t appear annoyed by her speaking up.
“I’ll teach my daughter her place, don’t worry.” Ines had mastered the art of subtle defiance and polite criticism, and so she smiled even though her eyes reflected the same aversion I felt toward our father.
Father’s mouth pinched and he looked at me as if he waited for me to rebuke Ines. He knew my sister valued my opinion more than his. I lifted my glass and took a sip of my wine, not in the slightest interested to get involved in this, not today, not when my mind kept replaying Carla’s last smile, her last breath, the moment her fingers went slack in mine.
“There’s of course something to consider before we decide to give Aria to Luca.” Father’s smile was reptile-like, and my muscles tightened in preparation for his next words. “Aria could give the Outfit beautiful blond children. You need a new wife and an heir.”
Despite my best intentions, the words hit me like a sledgehammer. After so many years, Father had finally found something to cut me once more. Keeping my face neutral was an agonizing struggle.
“Carla’s funeral was only two days ago!” Ines hissed, glancing toward me in blatant concern. “Don’t you have an ounce of respect for her memory and for Dante’s sorrow?”
“You’d do well to respect the man who decides over life and death in this territory,” Father said.
Pietro grabbed Ines’ hand and from the look in his eyes, I knew he was about to say something that would get him in trouble with my father, and while Father would hesitate before disposing of an Underboss, he would never dispose of me because he wanted his blood to live on and I was his only option. I stood and thrust my palm down on the table, letting my anger out and balling my sadness into a tight knot inside of me. “This conversation isn’t happening.”
Even the kids fell silent as they watched me open-mouthed.
I stepped back and stalked out of the room, seething, and continued toward the front door, needing fresh air. Father wouldn’t give up that easily.
My suspicion proved correct when Father and I were invited over to the Scuderi mansion a few days later to discuss the newest developments of a possible union with the Famiglia.
Father had talked to Salvatore Vitiello several times in the last few days while I’d stepped back to gather myself. My mental state wouldn’t do us any favors in business negotiations at the time being. Luca and Salvatore could smell weakness from miles away.
“I sent Salvatore photos of Aria and Gianna,” Father said. “He’d accept either of them but he prefers Aria.”
Rocco shook his head. “Gianna’s too boisterous. He’ll beat her to death and then we’ll be left with the problem of how to react appropriately. She needs someone who knows how to control his impulses and break her without killing her. Luca isn’t that kind of man.”