Touch (The Pagano Family Book 2)

by Susan Fanetti

  Manny was wryly thinking now that what they should have done was hire a thug to assault her and knock her around for a while. That shit put a hug from Daddy in a whole new light.

  She didn’t feel normal—not that she’d know if she did—but she felt comfortable in a way that was new and unfamiliar. Luca’s big family and her little family were mingling together, and it felt right and natural, like she belonged with them all. At least with this group, she no longer felt like there was some kind of force field between her and everybody else. It was good.

  “Hey—they sleeping?”

  Manny turned around and faced Carlo, who was done with his call and had come up behind her. “Yeah. Both of them. Are you sticking around all night?”

  “Yeah. Pop wants somebody around at least until John gets the vent out. Joey had trouble with his after he was shot last year, so Pop’s worried about it. Are you staying?”

  Luca had asked her not to go as he drifted off into Oxyland. He’d tried to refuse pain meds, but the guy had basically been trampled by Godzilla, and a nurse had finally yelled at him that he wasn’t going to heal as well if he was fighting pain as well as damage. So he agreed to take them at night.

  “He wants me to stay. So, yeah. You can have that fold-out chair thing. I don’t sleep much, anyway.”

  Carlo searched her face. Manny began to get nervous, not understanding his sudden intensity. She still didn’t get people. Nope—not cured. Just better.

  He raised his hand like he wanted to touch her bruised face, and she steeled herself for the contact, but then he let his hand fall back to his side.

  “I’m sorry, Manny.”

  Still confused, she shrugged. “We got through it.”

  “No. I mean, I’m sorry. I was an ass to you. I underestimated you, made you carry somebody else’s weight. That wasn’t fair.”

  “Nope.” If he was looking for her to let him off the hook, he would be disappointed.

  He chuckled. “Anyway. I am sorry. Luc loves you. Loving you’s been good for him. You’re okay. Just wanted to say that.”

  “Great. Jury’s still out on you, though.” She smiled a little, hoping to convey that what she’d said was serious but not hopeless.

  He got it and smiled. “Fair enough.”

  oOo

  On Thanksgiving Day, the fifth day John and Luca were in the hospital, John was off the vent, and Luca could sit up partway. He was bound up in a back brace, and with both of his arms tied to his sides, but he could tolerate the head of the bed being raised.

  His uncles, Ben and Lorrie—she knew their reputation, so she knew they were involved somehow in their ‘mugging’—and their wives had arranged for Thanksgiving dinner to happen for everyone at the hospital. Their influence could not be overstated; what they wanted, they got. The administrators had given them carte blanche, from what she could tell. And they fed the staff, too. It must have cost a fortune.

  Because Manny didn’t want to leave Luca, her family had Thanksgiving at the hospital, too. Dmitri came with them, but he steered far clear of Luca, who literally sort of growled every time they made eye contact. Since most people there didn’t know what had happened between them, everybody else was nice, and Manny thought her brother had an okay day.

  Dinner was set up in a big conference room, and Luca and John had their beds rolled in. The meal was catered, a complete Thanksgiving feast, no standard forgotten, and it was amazing. Manny sat on Luca’s bed and fed him.

  She dropped a dollop of stuffing onto his chest from a fork headed to his mouth, and he laughed. His spirits were better on this day than they had been. The doctors weren’t encouraging about the state of his knee and how much mobility he’d get back after it was replaced again. Though he wasn’t pouting, and in fact had a just-happy-to-be-alive vibe, the thought of not being able to do all the things he’d done did leave him a little quiet.

  “It’s a good thing we’re not having kids, bit. You suck at this.”

  Unoffended by the criticism in his second sentence and exhilarated by the promise in his first, she only smiled and bent over, picking up the stuffing in her own mouth. Then she scooted up and kissed him, passing it to him. He took it and swallowed without chewing, then deepened the kiss. His arms were braced against his torso; as their tongues twisted together, she could feel his muscles instinctively struggling against the brace, wanting to hold her.

  Now that he couldn’t touch her, she wanted him to. Badly. All the time. Ironic.

  Joey’s voice rang out. “Hey! We’re…eating…over here!...Get a room!”

  Luca chuckled, his breath dancing on her skin. “Already got a bed right here.”

  John, who was still on a liquid diet and eating a bowl of pumpkin soup his girlfriend, Kristen, was helping him with, looked over. “Do not get any ideas, asshole.”

  Luca’s Aunt Angie, Uncle Ben’s wife, said, “Language! Boys! It’s Thanksgiving. And there’s a child present. Manners, please.”

  Trey spoke up at that. “It’s okay, Auntie. I’m used to it. Pop-Pop says ‘asshole’ all the time. Also ‘shithead.’ I tell him and tell him, but he can’t remember not to. He’s old.” He sighed dramatically and dropped his head into his hand. The whole room erupted in gales of glee. Trey looked around like all of the grownups had completely lost their marbles.

  It was the weirdest and best Thanksgiving Manny had ever had.

  oOo

  When the day was over and Luca and John were back in their room, their uncles and aunts came in to say goodbye. They chatted briefly about nothing, and then Ben patted Luca’s leg. “We’re grateful, nephew. You rest. We’ll talk more soon.”

  Luca nodded but didn’t respond otherwise.

  Then Ben came to Manny and held out his hand. She took a breath and shook it. Though he’d been around a little during these days at the hospital, they had not interacted much. He was an old, dapper man, probably in his seventies, but he had a strong grip and wise eyes under his heavy, white brows.

  “Today was a good day, yeah? We needed one, I think.”

  She nodded. “I think so.”

  “You are a brave little miss. I’m sorry we’ve met under such conditions.” He brushed a finger over the fading bruises on her face, and she didn’t flinch. She didn’t like it, but it didn’t hurt. “Very sorry. Something tells me that we’ll have many chances to get to know each other, however. I would like that.”

  Though she didn’t know what to make of this conversation, and though she knew that he was at the root of what had happened—and boy, oh boy were she and Luca going to talk when he was up to it and they were alone—Manny liked Ben Pagano. There was something in his eyes, she thought. So she answered, “Me, too, Mr. Pagano.”

  “Uncle Ben, sweetheart. Call me Uncle Ben, as Luca does. And I will call you Manny, which is a strange name for a beautiful girl.”

  “But maybe a beautiful name for a strange girl.”

  He laughed. “Maybe so, maybe so.”

  25

  Luca stared at the closed door, through which his orthopedist had just left. Extensive damage. Weakness in the surrounding tissue. Likely permanent loss of flexibility. And the kicker: I’m sorry, Luca, but I don’t see you on a board again.

  Call him a selfish fuck, but setting aside what he still didn’t know about what Manny had been through, sitting through that post-surgery report about the likely limits of his revision total knee replacement was the worst fucking thing about what had happened. Anthony’s death hadn’t hurt his heart like the thought of never catching a wave again.

  And fuck that, anyway. He’d get a longboard if he had to. He wasn’t even thirty-five years old yet. He would not be beached. He would not.

  Yeah, he was a selfish fuck.

  Waking up in the hospital, finding out that both Manny and John were alive, that Manny had simply been held for observation, and that John, though hurt even more badly than he, was stable and expected to recover fully—Luca had felt real joy, the kind that co
mes only after a reprieve from certain death. It had overwhelmed his pain and erased his grief over Anthony. In fact, it had taken him maybe an hour even to remember that Anthony had been killed. He really was a selfish fuck.

  But his girl…she was okay. She’d come to him as soon as they’d sprung her, and she’d stayed with him constantly for the first several days, when his pain was most impressive and he’d caved to the pressure to take meds—which, besides easing the pain and making him sleep half his life away, also turned him into a whiny, needy bitch.

  She seemed different. Settled. The change was subtle, but he saw it particularly when other people were around. Usually, before, Manny would tense up a bit, carry herself differently, around a group of people or outside in the world. She had a word for the way people tensed up around sore areas during a massage—guarding—and he thought of that same word when he watched her in the world. She guarded her whole self. But now, even when the room was crowded with Paganos, she seemed more relaxed.

  Every time that fucking ball gag rose up in his head, with its connotation of sexual submission, he felt sure that they’d done something heinous to her. But she wouldn’t say. It wasn’t like Manny to evade, and that only cemented his certainty. She been raped, or at least assaulted in some way. He knew it. He knew it, and it ate his insides up. He said nothing, though, because there was no point. She wouldn’t talk about it—and she seemed better.

  He’d feared that whatever had happened would totally kill her ability to be touched, but it seemed, strangely, to have had the opposite effect. With him, though there wasn’t much touching he could do, trussed up like he was, she seemed quite free with touch. He watched her with the people around his bed, too, and she seemed to tolerate incidental touch better now, as well. He didn’t understand, but he wasn’t going to question a boon like that.

  At least something good might have come from this otherwise utter disaster.

  The Uncles had been to see him a few times, but they had not stayed long, and they had not talked business. They were unwilling to do so with an audience, and John was his roommate. Luca figured John had earned with his blood the right to hear whatever they had to say, but Ben and Lorrie disagreed. It pissed him off, because he had some fucking questions.

  But just after his lunch of turkey roll, canned green beans, and orange Jell-O, which he was pleased to be able to eat with his one newly-freed arm, Nick came in. They’d rolled John out not five minutes before for some scan or another. Luca didn’t think the timing was accidental. Good. Maybe now somebody would give him answers.

  Still stewing about the morning’s post-op conversation and—though he would never admit it out loud—pouting because Manny was at work, he was in a dark mood when Nick opened the door.

  “Hey, coz.” He was wearing a plain, dark grey pullover sweater and jeans. Usually, Nick dressed more like the Uncles, in a suit and collared shirt, though he tended to skip the tie. He’d let some scruff grow on his face, too, about a couple of days’ worth. It struck Luca oddly that Nick would be so casual, unless he wasn’t on Pagano Brothers business. But they weren’t exactly close, so he didn’t know why he’d be here on his own time.

  He merely nodded to return the greeting.

  “You feeling better?” Nick walked up to the side of Luca’s bed. He still had the table across it from lunch, not for any reason other than laziness. It was clear of clutter.

  “Yeah. Coming along.” He wanted out of the hospital, like yesterday, but he’d just gotten his new, new knee the day before, and with his back broken, too, they were saying another week, minimum. The break in his back wasn’t severe, but it could be if he got jumpy too soon.

  “Good to hear.” Nick shoved his hand into a front pocket of his jeans and pulled something out. “Thought you’d want this.”

  He dropped a thick gold chain onto the table across Luca’s bed. The links were fashioned like a utility chain.

  Mouse’s chain.

  Luca stared at it, knowing exactly what it meant and feeling relieved and furious in equal measure. He turned his eyes up to his cousin. “I wanted him. Him and the shits who had Manny. I want them.”

  Nick shook his head, slowly and with emphasis. “No. They’re all taken care of. And you know how Ben feels about family getting hurt. They suffered. I made damn sure of it. We’re trying to get you clear of this. All three of you. You already took out Tino Jones and one of his guys. That was self-defense, not retaliation. Looks like Church makes a distinction, but we’ve had people on you two and your girl anyway, just to be sure. We’re at war now, Luc. Besides how long you’ll be off your feet, if I’d waited to let you take them down, you’d be right in the middle of it, and I’m trying to get you clear.”

  Though he found no humor at all in what Nick had just said, Luca laughed. “Get me clear. Right. You’re the ones who fucking dropped me in the middle in the first place—and got Manny and John hurt in the bargain.” He knew that coming at Nick so hard was dangerous, but he didn’t care.

  Nick shoved his hands into his pocket and looked down, his jaw twitching. Luca had pissed him right off. When he looked back up his eyes were laser-hot. “You’re walking a line, Luca. But you’re right. Uncle Ben and my father underestimated Church. They saw him as a street thug—which he is. But there’s action on the street that they don’t see. Or won’t see.”

  “Church told me that the Uncles were too old, that they were playing the wrong game. Something like that.”

  “He’s right.” For several beats, Nick said nothing more. He stared across the bed out the window. Luca watched him, waiting. Finally Nick faced him again. “You got fucked hard, so I’m going to be straight with you. But Luc, this is not for anyone else to hear. Understand?”

  Luca nodded. To get some straight talk, he’d agree to just about anything.

  “Things have been going off the rails since Auberon’s out. The balance is off. Power used to be in a few hands, and the people holding it had legit public reputations to maintain. There was a way things were done. What’s filling Auberon’s void is a bunch of street assholes, and their rep is different. Ben and Dad want to restore order. I don’t know if we can. Not to what it was.”

  James Auberon. Sabina’s former husband and tormentor, whom the Uncles had killed to free her, after he’d abused her horribly. At Carlo Jr.’s request.

  “And if you can’t? What’s that mean?”

  Nick’s openness visibly closed. He shifted and took a step back. “For you, it means you’re out, and you stay out. Ben wouldn’t have sent you in the way he did if he’d fully understood the reach a prettied-up street rat like Church had. He won’t say it, but he’s rocked. Your girl getting caught up—you know how he is about innocent women. That’s how we ended up in this mess in the first place. But we’ll handle it. Get well, and go back to your life. We’ll keep somebody on you until we get this straight.”

  “I’m supposed to carry on like this shit isn’t going on around us?”

  “No other choice, Luc. Trust me, living under siege is exhausting. Just live.”

  oOo

  Carlo and their father came in a couple of hours later, just as Luca was starting to get impatient for Manny to get back. He was disappointed to see his brother and father come in. John’s girlfriend, Kristen, had been around most of the afternoon, cooing and loving all over him, and it had pissed Luca off. Or made him jealous. Whatever; he’d been damn glad to see her go off to work at her job hostessing at Dominic’s. God, they were disgusting together. She did this baby talk thing that made Luca want to beat her with his IV stand.

  John hated the baby talk, too, but he was too invested in her hospital bed handjobs (fuck, was that an unfortunate thing to hear with only a curtain between them) to shut her the fuck up.

  He wasn’t getting hospital bed handjobs. He might have to finagle a little auditory payback. He bet Manny would be into it—if he could convince her that his back could take it.

  But right now, Carlo and Pop we
re pulling up chairs between the beds. They watched ESPN for a while and shot the shit. Luca kept checking the time, waiting for Manny. It was getting late. Not late enough to worry, but late enough to prepare to worry. When they’d talked in the morning, after the doctor had left, she hadn’t mentioned having a late day at work. He hadn’t heard from her since.

  He looked at his phone on the bedside table. But Nick had said he had somebody on her, and Luca was not such a pussy that he couldn’t go a few hours without her.