Total pages in book: 89
Estimated words: 83776 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 419(@200wpm)___ 335(@250wpm)___ 279(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 83776 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 419(@200wpm)___ 335(@250wpm)___ 279(@300wpm)
Except I want to be in bed with Stefania, and this guy’s only a C-tier operative at best.
Which is a problem. My new wife isn’t supposed to affect my work, and here she is, already lodged deeply in my skull. I know on a rational level that she’s extremely safe in the little Bianco oasis—every inch of that street is guarded by snipers and foot soldiers, and every house within a quarter mile around it is owned by friends and soldiers.
Only I can’t be sure she’s okay unless I’m there with her.
Uncle Luciano will pay for this provocation.
Just not tonight.
“Maybe I’ll buy her some new clothes,” Bruno muses as he begins the cleanup. All the plastic tarps make the process straightforward. “I mean, what if I push her away, you know? Fuck, man, I’m a mess.”
“You’re fucking screwed,” I say, shaking my head at him.
Chapter 12
Stefania
It feels like I’m a plastic bag drifting around in the wind. I flit around the house trying to get a feel for the place, but nothing feels right. There’s nowhere to hide, for starters. Everything is wide open, and even though Davide’s gone for most of the day, I feel totally exposed. Anyone could walk right inside and find me, and there are like two total doors that I can shut and lock if I need a second of privacy.
The homesickness hits me that night when I’m lying in bed all alone. I miss my apartment and my brothers and even their wives. I miss my nieces and nephews. I miss the Famiglia too, even though it pisses me off, but at least I understood it and knew most of the people. I miss Philadelphia. I miss my friends and my job.
I wake up the next morning to half a dozen missed calls from Giorgia. After showering, puttering around the kitchen, opening and closing the refrigerator in the hopes that food will magically appear, I finally decide to call her back even though I know this is going to be a miserable conversation.
“Where the heck have you been?” she asks, sounding a mix of frantic and worried. “You basically disappear, send me some batshit insane email, and you haven’t bothered reaching out since. I’m at red alert over here. I’ve been Googling the phone number for the Chicago Police Department all morning. Stefania, what the hell is going on?”
I sit up straight and curl my legs under me. “First, don’t call the police.”
“Is this like some kind of kidnapping situation where if I reach out to the cops they’ll kill you? I mean, I know the rumors about your family and all that, but still—”
“Giorgia, I’m fine. And I’m serious, please don’t call the police.”
“Are you under duress right now?” she whispers. “Say I love Kentucky if you really need me to call the cops.”
“Stop it,” I say, trying not to smile, because I know she’d put herself through hell if she thought I was in trouble, and that’s the sort of friend I need right now. Even if I could do without the police drama. “I’m genuinely safe, okay? Things have just been extremely weird lately.”
She lets out a long breath. “No shit. According to your email, you got married and moved to Chicago, which makes basically no sense at all.”
“Yeah, well.” I close my eyes and rub the bridge of my nose. “Unfortunately, it’s true. You know how you said you’re aware of the rumors about my family? Let’s imagine some of those are true, and theoretically, I got married for political reasons. Now I’m out here living with a man I barely know and barely keeping it together.”
Giorgia’s quiet for a second, then she says, “Are you sure you don’t want me to call the cops? Say, I love you, Giorgia, right now and I’ll do it, I swear.”
“Would you stop it? This was my choice.”
There’s another long silence and I can read a whole lot into that pause. Whatever she’s feeling, I’m also feeling, but magnified by a thousand-fold. I don’t even recognize myself right now. This whole arranged-marriage thing is bizarre, even by my standards, and I keep wondering who I am and what the hell I’m doing basically every waking second. It very much sucks.
“I don’t get it,” she says at last, which was pretty much a given. Giorgia’s from a good family: her mom’s a doctor and her dad runs an insurance company, which means she was raised typical upper-middle class and as straight as an arrow. The idea of marrying because her mafia Don brother asked her to is impossible to conceptualize.
“Can you trust that I’m safe at least? And please don’t make things worse.”
“I’m not trying to make things worse,” she says and sounds a little defensive. “I’m just trying to understand why you’re still there. I mean, do you actually want to be married to the guy? Why don’t you just walk away? I don’t know what your family convinced you to do, but come home, Stefania. This is crazy.”