I was injured, vulnerable. I had no gun. I couldn’t use my body, my Budo training, because of my injured leg. I’d trained for years to not be weak in situations like this. And yet, here I was. I needed to get to the fireplace poker. But I needed some advantage if I were going to be able to use it.
All I had left was my mind.
That’s what Budo taught me. The melding of spiritual, physical, and mental strength.
In this case, my words, not my hands or legs, were my only weapons.
I would choose them carefully.
The truth was my only weapon.
Turricci kept talking, occasionally leaning over me with a confusing glimmer of kindness in his eyes.
“You will inherit everything I have. You are my only flesh and blood. I will take you home to the villa — now it is yours. You will love it. Everything I have is yours.”
I pressed my lips tightly together and shook my head. At that moment despite myself, I felt pity for this unlovable man.
“No?” he seemed genuinely surprised. “Because I killed your mother? You will forgive me for that. It may take time, but I am a patient man. You are all I have left. You will learn to love me. She poisoned you against me.”
I narrowed my eyes. “Your name never crossed her lips. You weren’t important enough for her to talk about. She never said anything to me about you.”
He didn’t answer but the clench of his jaw said it all.
I waited a few seconds, trying not to look at the fireplace poker. I needed him to be upset. To lose his cool. I needed something crazy to happen if I were going to get to that poker.
“There is something you need to know.”
He raised an eyebrow.
“There are some letters in my jacket you need to see.”
I reached for my jacket, but the gorilla put out an arm and pressed me back into the bed. Turricci nodded and the gorilla reached inside the inner pocket of my jacket and took out the envelopes. He handed them to Turricci.
I held my breath watching as Turricci read his own love letters and then turned to the birth certificate. He took the paper and unfolded it with a smile.
“Look at the paper underneath.”
He shuffled the papers and began to read. The smile faded and his face grew ashen. He looked up at me, stricken.
I grinned. “I’m not your daughter.”
CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
“LEAVE US ALONE.”
His voice was broken, a shadow of the confident man he’d been seconds before. At first his henchman didn’t move. Turricci said something in Italian and the man slowly got up, casting a malevolent glance my way, and walked out.
It could not have gone any better. I could take on Turricci alone even with a bum leg.
He paced the room. “It can’t be true. That night, I know we made a child. I know it.”
He was talking to himself.
“I don’t want to die alone.” He stopped at the window and drew back the curtain.
As soon as he turned his back I was out of the bed in one smooth motion with the poker in front of me. Wincing in pain, I swung the poker around to him.
“You killed my parents and Vito and now you have to die.” My voice was steady. My hand steadier. I ignored the screaming pain shooting up my leg.
He turned and stared at me. “Have you ever killed somebody, Gia?”
His voice was calm. My heart sank. I was weak. He knew it. I swallowed back my fear.
He smiled. “You aren’t a killer.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I think I do.”
“You have to die. You killed my parents. I have to avenge their death. You are from the old country. You know this. You know that I have no honor unless I kill you.”
He shrugged. “Maybe the old ways are dying.”
“That may be true. But I cannot live with myself knowing you are alive.”
He closed his eyes and breathed in deeply before opening them again.
Then, he nodded.
For a second that felt like an eternity, we stared at one another.
“Freeze!” someone shouted.
Then, to my surprise, Turricci smiled and before I could comprehend it, he lunged for the poker, charging until it slid neatly into his chest. For another second, he was upright his eyes glimmering with something I didn’t understand. And then the light left them and he slumped. We both fell to the ground. I let go shrieking and crying and trying to get away from his body.
Distantly I realized that Sal and two police officers with guns drawn stood in the doorway.
Sal was instantly at my side, propping me up and holding me close.
“You were supposed to stay in Monterey.”
“I’m sorry,” I said.
“You’re free to go now. I just got off the phone with the judge. All charges against you have been dropped.”
I looked at him in confusion and he continued. “We’ve got Turricci for the murders of your parents and your godfather.”
“How’d you find me?”
“Wasn’t really you we found. We’ve had eyes on Turricci. He owns this place. When he showed up here early this morning, we headed up from Monterey. We knew he was behind it the whole time. It was just a matter of proving it.”
“Oh.” I didn’t know what else to say.
“Where do you want to go? You still own your place on Russian Hill. Want me to take you there?”
I nodded in a daze.
CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
I SPENT THE NEXT WEEK huddled in my old bed. Every once in a while, I took a sip of water or a small bite of cracker. Other than that, I kept a constant stream of sleeping pills in my body. I wished I could add a lethal dose of booze to the mix but someone had cleared out my apartment of all my hidden stashes of drugs and alcohol. I didn’t have energy to do anything but lay in bed.
Most of the time I was awake I replayed Turricci’s death over and over in my mind. Did he charge me because he wanted the police to shoot me? Or did he charge me because he knew I couldn’t kill him myself? Or was it something else?
Sal stopped by and said that Vito had spent every last dime from my father’s seafood company trying to repay gambling debts. I didn’t care. But then he said I was far from destitute, Turricci had left his vast fortune to me.”
I wasn’t sure if I was having a mental break or was in a deep depression, but I didn’t do a whole lot except get up to use the bathroom maybe once a day. Some lady Sal had hired let herself in once a day to set a bunch of finger foods by my bed and occasionally I’d take a bite or two, even though it all tasted like cardboard.
On the fourth day, Dante let himself in with my spare key.
I cried and told him everything as he held me in his arms.
Finally, when he had wiped all my tears and snot away he held my chin up with one finger and looked me in the eyes.
“Your mother loved you, Gia. I know that for sure.”
“Dante, she died thinking I was the product of her rape.”
“That didn’t matter to her, did it?”
“I don’t know.”
I stared at the ceiling until he left.
The next day he came back.
This time he made me shower and eat some fried eggs, but I threw them up.
Later that day, I woke to find my bedroom filled with faces. Taking in my friends, Thanh-Thanh, Trang, Kato, Susie, their kids, Darling, even Django.
Dante and his mother stood in the corner with their arms around each other, beaming.
I took in all the faces before me and burst into tears.
I did have a family. I had people who loved me and that’s what family really was. It wasn’t the people I was tied to by blood. Despite being brainwashed my entire life by mother culture and family — my family was much more than those who shared my bloodline. My family was of my own making.
That realization gave me the strength to live.
CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN
THREE
MONTHS LATER ...
Before the opening night party, I stopped by the Sunset View Cemetery in Berkeley carting two dozen red roses. I had made sure Ethel was buried in a spot high on a hill that overlooked the San Francisco Bay.
I spread the roses out on her grave and tried not to cry.
“I’m sorry you got such a bum break in this world, Ethel,” I sniffed. “You didn’t deserve it. That man, your husband, the creep you killed a long time ago. I’m glad you killed him. I should’ve told you that when you were alive. That I’m happy you killed him. I hope he’s looking down seeing how I’m bringing you two dozen red roses instead of his cheap dozen he thought would convince you to put up with his crap. I made arrangements, Ethel. You’re going to have a dozen roses delivered here every week. It’s the least I can do. I should’ve been a better friend to you. I’m so god damn sorry. I’m so, so sorry. It’s my curse. Everyone who knows me ends up dead. I’m so sorry we met. All I can do is tell you that you mattered. You mattered to me. And there are going to be roses on your grave for as long as I live. That way everyone who walks by this grave will know you were somebody who mattered. And you know, what? You’re right. You were free. You lived your life the way you wanted and you were free.”
I suddenly had something in my eye. I walked away, blinking.
When I walked into Café Katrina, my tears had dried and I’d fixed my makeup. I was excited to see the inside of the place. Katrina had been so secretive about it the past month.
When I walked in, I was astonished. It was gorgeous, with tall ceilings, giant silver and crystal chandeliers, plush purple velvet booths, blue velvet wallpaper, wall-sized silver framed mirrors and black marble floors.
“Unbelievable,” I said when I saw Katrina. “You are a true artist. This is stunning.”
“That’s what I was going for,” she said dryly.
Katrina led me over to a booth raised on a small platform. It has black velvet curtains on each side.
“This is your booth.”
“What?”
“Look,” she led me over to the plush purple velvet booth. There was a silver plaque just above the cushion that said, “Gia Santella.”
“You’re kidding?”
“Nope. Why don’t you sit down and test it out? It has the best view in the place.”
Again, I felt like something was in my eye. I gave her a kiss on the cheek and said, “Go greet your guests! This is your night. I’m going to sit here and relax while you be social. That’s what a silent partner does. They don’t have to talk.”
She threw back her head and laughed.
Just then the mayor walked in. I was impressed until I saw the governor behind him. I watched Katrina greet them and lead them to another velvet booth. I saw the mayor nod approvingly at the governor as they followed her. A few minutes later, a famous Hollywood actor walked in with a New York socialite on his arm.
The Tenderloin would never be the same again.
Smiling, I sat back in my booth and raised a silent toast to the people in my life. My family. Those who couldn’t make it and those who could: Dante, Thanh-Thanh, Darling, Katrina, Trang, Kato, Susie, even Sal.
I’d spent way too much time and energy feeling sorry for myself, calling myself an orphan, whining that nobody loved me and that I had no family.
What a fool I’d been.
As an Italian-American, I’d been raised to believe that blood is thicker than water and that nobody could ever love you like your blood relatives did. And that might be partly true, but it was also true that your family is comprised of the people you love and who love you.
We can all make our own family.
I was unbelievably rich in the love of my tribe, my family. It took almost losing my life to realize this. The people in my life were the ones I had chosen to make up my family.
It didn’t mean I wouldn’t love and miss my parents until the day I died. It didn’t take away from my love of them. My love for my new family only increased the love I felt for everyone and everything.
When all this was over I was going to call Bobby. I needed to clean out my parents’ house and then I wanted to fly to Sicily to figure out what to do with the villa Turricci had given my mother. I was going to see if Bobby would go with me. The thought of seeing him again filled me with both fear and excitement.
Maybe he didn’t look at me like my father looked at my mother. Not yet. But I couldn’t deny there was something there. And hey,
I’m still young and have a long time to figure it all out. I’m not going to waste any more time feeling sorry for myself when I can be out there feeling and living and loving.
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EXCLUSIVE EXCERPT
READ book two in the Gia Santella Crime Thriller Series NOW:
THE GRAVEYARD WAS MY sanctuary.
With nearly everyone I loved dead, it was the one place I felt at home. The only place I truly felt comfortable in my skin.
Today, I was visiting my friend Ethel Swanson’s grave. I made the trip across the Bay to the Berkeley cemetery every few weeks so I wouldn’t forget that she had died because of me. I had vowed—well, made a promise at her grave—that I would make sure she was never forgotten.
My favorite time to visit Ethel was at sunset, when the dipping sun made the Golden Gate bridge glow and turned the waves of the bay into sparkling silvery shimmers of light.
Yesterday, I’d driven to Monterey to put flowers on my family’s graves. Pink roses for my mother. Sunflowers for my father. Nothing for my brother. I often found others had left flowers on my parents’ plots. My brother’s grave remained barren. His was closer to the fence and set apart from the other family plots. The grass around it was less green, more overgrown with weeds, as if even the caretakers were wont to neglect his final resting place.
His murder was still unsolved. And I didn’t care.
The man who killed my parents had died at my hands. That was all that mattered.
After a cursory glance at Christopher’s grave, I’d crossed my legs and sat on the grass to talk to my mother and father about my life. It was pretty much the same script every month: I told them that I was a failure, that I had moments of clarity when I stopped drinking and doing drugs, and sleeping around, but that I was still a hot mess. I told them about Bobby and our long-distance relationship. About how he seemed wonderful and how that scared the hell out of me.
Of course, I never shared like that with Ethel.
Today, I stood at her gravestone and rearranged the red roses I had delivered there every week. Once upon a time, Ethel had confessed to me how she ended up on the streets. Her jerk husband used to beat her nearly to death and then in typical abuser-fashion would beg her forgiveness by offering red roses and empty promises.
The only thing that stopped his abuse was a knife to the heart one night when he was sleeping. Years later, when Ethel was released from prison, she couldn’t find work and turned to drinking. Soon, she ended up on the streets begging.
We’d become pals when I moved into the Tenderloin neighborhood and she camped outside my building.
And then, a few months ago, she’d ended up dead. Strangled with a playing card, the one-eyed jack, stuffed down her throat.
The Tenderloin newspaper ran a brief obituary.
ETHEL SWANSON had dreamed of being an actress ever since she was a little girl. She certainly had the personality and name for it. However, when she fell in love with the wrong man, her dreams were shattered, said friend Gia Sante
lla. She never quite recovered from her abusive marriage and ended up on the streets of the Tenderloin where she was beloved by all. She died violently, but she will never be forgotten. She is buried underneath a flowering tree in the Oakland hills and has red roses delivered to her grave every week. “Because she mattered,” Santella said. Ethel Swanson was 70.
As the sun set and the stars rose above, I traced my fingers over Ethel’s gravestone.
“I’m sorry, Miss Ethel. I’m so goddamn sorry you’re there and I’m here. It’s all my fault. I wish I could make it up to you.”
CHAPTER ONE
THE NEXT MORNING, DANTE side-eyed me as I stepped out of the elevator into the penthouse lobby of my father’s company. Instead of his usual brilliant white smile, Dante frowned.
“What?” I asked, scowling. I was in a bad mood. Getting up at the freaking crack of dawn—okay before noon—did not suit me. The fog hadn’t even lifted from my San Francisco neighborhood yet.
And meeting with stuffy board members was high on my list of things I never wanted to do in my lifetime.
But now that my father, brother, and godfather were dead, I’d been left in charge. For whatever reason, I was now the CEO. Something I had never wanted and still didn’t.
The penthouse lobby looked nothing like it had when my dad was alive. It now had plush red carpet and was scattered with black onyx pedestals holding oddly familiar-shaped obelisks nearly as big as me. Two walls were covered in mirrors. I drew my gaze back to my agitated friend. While his silky black hair swept back from his face like the Italian Stallion he was, his olive skin was slightly ashen.
“What’s wrong? Are you feeling okay? You look a little pale.” I reached over and felt his forehead. “Yeah, you’re a little clammy.”
Dante let out an exasperated sigh and as always, perfectly enunciated his words. “That is what you are wearing?”
Gia in the City of the Dead Page 17