“Make a sound, and I’ll spill your dirty Vittorio blood all over the floor.”
That seething undertone in his voice makes my blood harden into ice. That deadly calm terrifies me more than anything. It means that he has nothing to lose and he’s not afraid to slit my throat.
Tony warned me. What the fuck was I thinking, coming here alone?
“Get off me!”
His arm tightens around my body, imprisoning me like a python coiling around my body, slowly squeezing me to death. “Why should I?”
Rafael drags me farther into the apartment, and my feet follow him backward.
“What are you doing?”
Arms pinned to my side, I’m fucking helpless. Every pause makes the knife cut into my throat, and something warm tickles down my neck. It’s not until he drags me into the bathroom that I see the line of red.
“Rafael, I’m engaged. He will fucking kill you!”
The door slams shut and he hurls me away from him. I slip on the tiles and fall on the toilet seat, gazing up at Rafael’s disheveled body.
He points the knife at me. “I’ll fucking kill you. We’re going to find out once and for all whether you are pregnant.”
His black jeans swim in front of me and the flat of his blade slaps my cheek. “I know it’s not beyond you to lie about something like this. You come from a family of rats.”
Burning, caustic rage explodes in my chest. “You just can’t stand the fact that I’ve found someone else. That I left you.”
I expect the blow, but it still hurts when his palm rips across my face. I catch myself almost immediately, gripping the edge of the toilet seat. He slams the knife on the counter and grabs a long box from a plastic bag.
It’s a pregnancy test.
My eyes burn as I take the box from him, shaking.
What the fuck am I supposed to do? I know that it’s going to be negative. I take my birth control pills religiously. It was a lie to make people believe our very abrupt, out-of-nowhere marriage.
Rafael takes the knife, his eyes simmering. “Take off your pants. Do it.”
He expects me to do this now? In front of him?
“At least give me some privacy.”
“What’s the matter? Are you afraid what it’ll say?” He smirks at me knowingly, giving the cheek where he slapped me a little tap. “Oh, I already fucking know you’re a piece of shit liar. I just need proof.”
“Then what? I’m still Tony’s fiancée.”
He leans in, his narrowed eyes almost gleaming with red as he presses his shaking lips to my ear. “You won’t be when Johnny finds out you paid Tony off with money that should’ve been given to Vince.”
A hole gapes inside me as though all my organs were sucked out by a vacuum. Dad never told me how he got the money, or where it was from. I never considered that it might not be entirely his, and I know Johnny. He doesn’t give a shit about me.
“Take off your clothes.”
Tears burn down my face as I look up at him, wanting to spare myself the humiliation of taking this test in front of him, but the knife doesn’t waver from my face. I stand up and pull down my jeans and panties in one swoop, opening up the toilet seat and sitting down before he has a chance to look.
Then I rip open the packaging and grab the pregnancy test. It looks like a thermometer. I take the cap off and tear the foil from the applicator, and then I just stare at it.
“Do it.”
I don’t have a choice.
Even though I know what it’ll say. Even though I know it’s hopeless, I point it toward my body and I relieve myself, jaw clenched shut. Then Rafael takes it from me.
“We have to wait three minutes. Here, do another one.”
To my astonishment, he shoves another box in my hand as he prepares a line of coke on my bathroom counter, cutting it with a small mirror before snorting it. Jesus. No wonder he looks like shit.
I wonder if I could just charge him right now—or maybe I should just grab my cell phone. It’s in my back pocket, sticking out. A few quick movements and I’d have Tony on the phone.
Not before he’d drag that knife across my throat.
I take the second test and give it to him. My stomach turns as the seconds tick by, and I see the cocaine coursing through Rafael’s system. The knife taps impatiently against the sink and then he looks down at the test.
The knife clatters against the sink—an ugly sound that makes me flinch.
He clenches the edge of the sink, his head hanging down, staring at the test results. It’s maddening.
“What the fuck?”
He says it in a soft voice that terrifies me, and I don’t know why it does. The second test—he grabs that, too.
“Oh my God.”
A shaking hand covers his mouth, and his head turns toward me, his eyes swimming with tears.
Tears.
What in the fucking fuck?
I can count on my hand the times I’ve seen Rafael cry. The first was when he hit me while my dad was still alive, when he was petrified for his life. The second is now.
“I’m so sorry, Elena.”
His words slam into my chest and I grab my jeans and panties, pulling them up as I walk over and push him aside. I look at the pregnancy tests. That positive, pink plus burns in my eyes. The other one has two pink lines.
Pregnant.
I’m actually pregnant.
WHAT THE FUCK?
I can’t scream it out loud, because Rafael’s arms wrap around my waist and he buries his face in my neck.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t know.”
His apologies are thick with tears, but I don’t feel a thing. Pregnant? How the hell is this possible?
Has to be a mistake. A false positive.
I can’t entertain the possibility that this might be true, that I might be pregnant, because how much of a disaster would that be? Assuming it’s Tony’s, he’d flip the fuck out. He doesn’t even want to get married. What’ll his reaction be when he finds out I’m carrying his child?
How am I supposed to bring a baby into my fucked-up life?
A smooth hand cradles my belly, and a wave of revulsion rises inside me. I shove Rafael’s body away from me.
“I fucking told you!”
Regret flashes over his eyes. “Baby, I—I didn’t know. This changes—holy Christ, I can’t believe I’m going to be a father.”
The fucking arrogance.
“What makes you think it’s even yours?” I seethe, enjoying the hurt transforming his face.
He raises his fists and my back hits the wall. He’s close enough so that I can feel his breath billowing over my face. “Don’t fucking push me, Elena.”
“Do you actually think that I would allow you to be in my child’s life? Look at you! You’re a fucking junkie.”
His nostrils flare. “Our child. And I’d like to see you make me stay away.”
“A few minutes ago, you were willing to slit my throat!”
His face pinches together. “I made a mistake—”
“—I would be dead, along with the baby. You’re not fit to be a father!”
“FUCK YOU!”
I scream as he punches his fist through the drywall next to my head, cowering as bits of plaster rain down. Rafael steps back, looking at his bloody hand in mild shock as he moves away from me.
That hole in the wall could’ve been me.
“You’re fucking crazy. Stay away from me!”
“Elena—”
He reaches forward with an apologetic hand, but I smack it away. He has the balls to look at me with a wounded face.
“I won’t tell Tony about this as long as you leave Montreal tonight. We both know he’ll have every reason in the world to kill you after this.”
Before he can respond, I sweep out of the bathroom, eager just to get the fuck out of this apartment and mull over everything that happened.
My chest feels incredibly tight, and the moment I step outside I gasp for a
ir.
The tests could be false positives. Don’t freak out yet. Find out for sure.
But I just know that I am. I don’t know how or why, but some kind of sixth sense tells me that I’m carrying a child and I should be thankful.
Otherwise who knows what he would’ve done to me?
I can’t think about it until I know for sure.
Using my phone, I find the nearest hospital and walk through the doors, blinking at all the French signs. An hour later I’m staring at a nurse as she congratulates me on my pregnancy. It’s positive. I’m pregnant.
“How effective is this test?”
“Up to ninety-nine percent. Mademoiselle, do you want me to schedule a prenatal appointment?”
As I stare into the nurse’s happy, young face, tears well up in my eyes. I can’t be fucking pregnant. There’s no way—I take those pills every day.
But you might’ve forgotten a couple days. During that first night with Tony. You were upset. The pills were at home. You didn’t take one.
Fuck, that’s right. I might’ve missed a few days—shit, what was I thinking?
This is such a mess. I don’t want this baby—
Get an abortion.
It burns in my head, the forbidden word blazing, almost tangible on my lips, but I know that I can’t. The very idea fills me with horror. Not because it’s a sin. I don’t know—I just can’t do it. I can’t snuff out a life.
The nurse tries her best to comfort me, and sends me home with a thick envelope of pamphlets and forms and numbers of doctors I need to see and how am I going to tell this to Tony? How, exactly, am I going to break this to him?
I play with my cell phone, miserably contemplating phoning my sister about the news. My thumb hovers over his name.
I just can’t do it.
I don’t want him to hate me, too. So far, he’s the only person in the world who gives some semblance of a shit about me.
He’s the father of your child. He should know.
Not yet, I whisper desperately to the voice. Not fucking yet.
“Where were you?”
The question slams down on my shoulders the moment I walk through the door.
I didn’t expect him to be back so soon.
Tony walks into the foyer, dark hair tousled and his smoky eyes narrowed in suspicion. The moment I see him, it’s like a little jump to my heart. It’s as though my body knows that he’s the one who got me pregnant.
I take his hands and look into his gruff face, which demands an answer.
Tell him.
I open my mouth.
He deserves to know.
“I went out for a bit.”
“Where?” The heat in his voice makes me flinch. “I kept calling you, and you never answered. I thought something might’ve happened to you.”
You’re a coward.
My body feels tense, like a taut rubber band. I’m stretched way too thin, and any moment I’ll snap. Pressure builds behind my eyes: the baby, the wedding, Rafael, all of it. It’s one giant clusterfuck, and now he’s giving me a hard time.
“Well, I’m fine.”
In seconds he’s in my space, hip bumping against mine. Eyes narrowed in disapproval capture my gaze. It’s hard to look at him without feeling incredibly guilty.
“Are you giving me attitude?”
“Yeah, maybe I fucking am.”
He doesn’t deserve this. I know that, but I’m pissed and there’s no one else to blame but him. Because he did, after all, get me fucking pregnant. It was never supposed to be like this. I never wanted to get knocked up from a one-night stand. How fucking trashy is that?
He laughs as I try to push him away and catches my elbow. “Good. I like a girl with attitude. Makes it all the more satisfying when I shove my cock in her mouth.” He runs his thumb over my bottom lip, giving me a look that makes me smolder against my will.
I can’t help but want him.
“You promised me a blowjob, and I intend to get it.”
His sweet breath blows over my lips, and I lean forward, irresistibly drawn to his mouth. I kiss him, and my chest heats up as he deepens it, tongue sliding in my mouth. Damn, I love his fucking body. But—no!
I push his chest gently with my hand, and he gives me a puzzled look. “What’s wrong?”
I’m pregnant.
It hangs over my lips, but I desperately want to keep it a secret. This marriage might as well be real now that I’m pregnant, and I have no idea who this guy is. No idea at all, and I’m having his baby.
“I don’t know you, and we’re getting married in a week.”
“I don’t know what to tell you,” he says with a grin. “This was your idea, not mine.”
A sharp, desperate gasp echoes in the room as I imagine the white dress, the ceremony, doctor visits, and all the while, dealing with my ex. Meanwhile I’m pregnant and he has no idea. There’s not an inkling of suspicion in Tony’s eyes that I just might be developing feelings for him.
“I can’t do this anymore. This was a mistake—a stupid, stupid mistake!”
The pressure on both my shoulders increases and suddenly I collapse into a chair, Tony’s fierce face in front of mine.
“Oh no you don’t. You’re not fucking backing out now.”
I bristle under his gaze. “Says who?”
“Aside from the fact that it’s a piss-poor idea, because that lunatic will follow you wherever you go, I say so. We already told everyone about it. It’s too late for last-minute regrets.”
I rise to my feet defiantly, and he pulls my waist toward him. “I want to know the man I’m marrying, even if it’s not real.”
He rolls his eyes. “What difference does it make?”
“It’ll make me feel better.”
Then his arms drop around from my sides and he gets his coat from the closet, handing out mine.
“Where are we going?”
“We’re going out.”
Now it’s my turn to roll my eyes. “Why?”
“To get to know each other.”
Chapter Eight
Tony
The silent white stones lean out of the grassy knoll like strange growths. There are hundreds of them. Faceless tombstones, some of their words unintelligible through countless years of wear and tear. I’m walking over bodies. A cold, clammy feeling flattens my stomach as I climb the hill, Elena not far behind me.
“You brought me to a cemetery?”
Nothing can disguise the fact that one of these days—sooner rather than later—I’ll be sleeping under the ground just like Dad.
“You wanted to know me.”
I slap my hand over my father’s tombstone.
VITO ANTONIO VIDAL
BELOVED FATHER AND HUSBAND
(1956 - 1995)
Three lines of text and a hole in the ground. That’s all you get for a lifetime of service to the family. Your kid gets to watch you get buried, gets to watch his mother cry every goddamn day for the rest of his life.
I never wanted to be like him. I never wanted to join the Mafia.
Her eyes pinch together as she reads the inscription, and I suddenly wonder why the hell I brought her here. What does it matter whether she knows me or not?
But she wants to know me—she asked. I never let anyone get close enough to ask me questions. I’d get naked with them before I’d let them ask me a single goddamn thing about myself, not that any of them cared.
All I know is that I just can’t keep this inside me anymore.
She takes a cautious step forward and touches my chest. “How did he die?”
“He was big time. A captain. He became a huge target during this war between several biker gangs in the city. The family backed Les Diables, which made all members targets of the Machine MC. One day, they just popped him. I was ten.”
The pain of that loss still smarts, but it’s duller now.
“I told myself I’d never join the life. I didn’t want to go the same way my father did,
leaving behind a wife and kid.”
With a small push off the tombstone, I turn away from Elena and walk down the hill. Her footsteps trudge behind me and then her arm curls around mine. It’s as if the landscape brightens. I don’t feel as fucking bad when she’s around.
Christ, I’ve really changed.
Gradually, though, I’m shutting down. The closer and closer we get, my insides twist and bunch together. My skin freezes—I haven’t been to visit her in years.
Then finally I get there.
It’s a small, modest tombstone because her family didn’t have any money. I scraped together what I had and paid for her funeral and burial. Elena stands stock-still in front of the stone, her lips moving silently.
MARIA ELIZABETH DESBIENS
(1985 - 2002)
“She was my girlfriend. And she was the reason I joined.”
Elena’s mouth widens, and I don’t blame her. I’ve such a shitty reputation for sticking my dick into anything that moves, it’s hard to believe that I had a girlfriend. That I was once in love. That we were going to—fuck. It doesn’t matter.
Nothing matters.
“She was killed. I went to the boss at the time and asked him for vengeance. He would only give it to me if I joined their ranks. So I did.”
And I’ve regretted it ever since.
I think she can see it in my eyes. Fuck it, I don’t care about holding back. I don’t want to do this anymore. The killing, the violence, the pain I inflict every day numbed me to every feeling, good and bad. Following my father’s footsteps was never something that I wanted. I joined because I was young and stupid, and it’s a mistake I have to live with for the rest of my life.
Maybe if I turned off everything, I’d be fine.
But I can’t become yet another one of the dead-eyed assholes I work with. I just don’t have it in me. Part of me is ashamed to admit that.
“So you never wanted this life?”
“Don’t tell nobody.”
She smiles weakly, her eyes shining with pity. I don’t need that—I don’t want it. It’s my fault. The decision to join was mine. I’m just having a hard time living with it. Pussy and booze just doesn’t cut it anymore.
“How old are you?”
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