“Porca puttana!”
Natalya glanced at me sharply. She’d already scolded me about cussing so much in front of our son, especially when Elias just repeated the word fuck after me.
“He could be bluffing,” Dario said.
He could be right. The body they had found couldn’t be from our handiwork.
We were in the three-vehicle Escalade convoy on the way to pick up Natalya’s parents. Dario was supposed to ride in the other SUV, but we needed to discuss this.
“Would someone please explain to me what this is all about?” my wife asked.
“We do our interrogations in one of those buildings’ basements.” I ground my molars. Interrogation was a euphemism, but my meaning was not lost on Natalya. The building in question was under a shell company that no way in hell a Chicago PD detective could trace back to us.
“Oh my God,” she breathed. “Have you used it recently?”
“No, and neither has Ange. It was heavily used immediately after your disappearance.” I had blocked what I had done to protect my son’s innocence, but the darkness was lurking at the edges of consciousness. “We did things, Natalya, I don’t care to repeat to you, but it was necessary to eliminate the rats in our organization.”
“Could be a relative who squealed to the police,” Tony, who was our driver, said.
“Text Ange. Make sure he hasn’t used that basement in the last six months.” After each interrogation, the basement was thoroughly bleached. But forensics could use reagents like luminol to revive the DNA in blood. Still, the efficacy faded with time. Two years was a lot of time. My lungs loosened with relief, but not enough because I was worried for my brother.
“But why bring it up now?” Natalya asked. “And they said they discovered a body.”
“Could be one of Orlov’s,” I told her. “There’s no way it would be one of ours.” Because we used an incinerator, but I didn’t have to give my wife that detail either.
“I’m sorry if I messed up,” Natalya whispered.
My gaze whipped to her, and I gathered her left hand in mine. “No, tesoro. You did great. And it’s good we’re aware that the detective has this information. We have our own informants in the Chicago PD.”
“I texted one of them just now,” Dario said. “He can meet me after his shift. That would be after we pick up Vincenzo and Elena.”
“I don’t want you to worry,” I told Natalya gently. “Just focus on your parents, capisce?”
When we met Vincenzo and Elena at the Moretti hangar, I wished I could send them back to Italy. Or maybe I could tell the immigration agent who met us there to tell them that their passports were denied entry. I nearly yanked Natalya behind me when the excitement on Elena’s face turned to horror.
Her first words to her daughter were, “Cara mia, your hair!”
But if there was one thing I’d learned about Natalya, she’d gained a lot of confidence since her time away from me. I hated that I wasn’t the one who helped her grow, but took pride that she outwitted us all with her intelligence.
I couldn’t see my wife’s expression, but at least Vincenzo engulfed his daughter in a hug that spoke of the lost years and the depth of grief that we experienced. There were tears in her father’s eyes, and I took solace in them. Elena followed her husband’s lead and filled her eyes with the requisite tears, and it made me despise her more.
Natalya
“Oh, bambolina,” my father cried as he swept me into those arms that comforted me as a child. The familiar scent of his cigar, and that spicy cologne, was a memory that existed during my amnesia. My reaction to my mother troubled me. There was something akin to hatred. I despised her for suppressing my growth through guilt.
My father pulled away and gripped both my cheeks, giving it an emotional squeeze. “I thought you were dead, and we had a funeral for you.”
A ghost walked over my grave.
Mamma made the sign of the cross. “We didn’t want your soul to rot in purgatory.”
Fuck you, Mamma.
I concentrated on Papà’s round face. His hair had grown whiter, and it pained me to see all the stress catch up with him. But I wasn’t his innocent daughter anymore. I’d been on the other side of the law, even Luca temporarily questioned whose side I was on. I was a vigilante, and with my self-revelations today, I had to make sure I could live in the world where the two men I loved existed. On my terms.
“That’s such a flattering welcome from you, Elena.” The icy tone of my husband wasn’t lost on anyone.
Luckily, Elias was done being ignored and pulled away from Luca’s hand. “Nonno! Nonno!”
“Here’s my bombolino.” Papà proudly lifted my son. “You are so big already.”
“Strong too!” My son showed his biceps and looked at Luca. “Like Papà.”
A familiar fear gripped my heart, but my husband put his arm around me, giving my shoulder a squeeze. Reminding me that my father was not going to take our son away anymore. It was like reprocessing all these emotions again, and I was glad Luca was at my side while I did this. I was feeling more secure in his love.
When we returned to the M building, we put our parents in a unit three floors down from the penthouse. As usual, my mother complained. My father had pulled Luca away to discuss his new underboss, leaving me with Mamma.
“This is not the way to treat your parents.” Mamma sniffed, looking around the apartment that had an amazing view of the Chicago skyline. “We should be staying with you in the penthouse.”
“Luca and I want privacy.”
“For what?”
Lord, please give me patience. “We just found each other again.”
“Didn’t you two go away to the Hamptons?”
I didn’t correct her on the exact location. It wouldn’t have mattered to Mamma, and she would have waved her hand in an impatient gesture. “After spending over two years apart, we’re just only becoming a family. I’m a different person.”
She looked me up and down. “And is this different person going to wear jeans and a T-shirt to dinner, or is this your way to spite me?”
“Mamma, what is really wrong with you?” I snapped. “You can’t be happy that your daughter is alive? Or are you blaming me for the constant hiding you and Papà had to go through because of the turmoil the Galluzo keeps going through?”
“I don’t believe your amnesia is real.” Her proclamation caught me off guard. “I think you just wanted to escape your life with Luca.”
“You think I would leave my son?” I whispered, my voice hoarse, because a pain in my chest that had planted itself since childhood grew so big, I thought I would throw up.
“You’ve always been selfish.”
“Are we referring to that time you had your heart attack?”
“What else?” she flared. “Do you know how depressed I’ve been? How I lived in fear that I was going to get another one.”
“And you still blame me…”
“It was always your fault.” With a huff, she yanked out the last of her clothes to hang in the closet.
Meanwhile, I stood frozen. I’d always been her punching bag. My heart cried for the girl who had never experienced a mother’s love. Elias’s whole life flashed before me and I knew deep in my heart with a mother’s instinct that I would never speak such venom to my son. Standing there as I took in Mamma’s petulance, I understood that not all people were meant to be parents, and especially not Elena Conte.
With that last thought, the last thread of my mother’s control over me frayed and snapped.
“I need to check on dinner.” I didn’t. Martha had it under control, but I wasn’t going to be Mamma’s punching bag anymore. “I’ll send Tony to get you or just get on the elevator. You can’t miss the button for the penthouse.”
“Why I never…”
I didn’t wait for Mamma’s tirade about why I was the worst daughter ever born and left the room, running into Papà and Luca.
Luca saw my face and his own grew scary.
“What did Elena say now?” Papà sighed. It was just words, and he wasn’t going to say anything to my mother. I understood his stance because if he defended me, then Mamma would bring up a litany of his shortcomings as a husband and Papà was allergic to that conversation.
“The usual.” I kissed his cheek and didn’t explain any further and he seemed okay with the response, but not my husband.
Luca stopped me from leaving. “Are you okay?”
“Yes.” I stared at the entrance to the room where Papà had disappeared before lifting my gaze to his. “I’m finally freaking okay with all this. Since you’re here, I won’t send Tony down to escort them.”
“I’ll take care of it.”
I nodded briefly. Though I didn’t want Luca fighting my battles, I couldn’t deny him the satisfaction. It didn’t escape my notice that he was hanging on by his own thread. And I might have a tiny bit of satisfaction about what was about to happen.
