No to the meeting. Dad would have taken it, but our offline illegal gambling operations are only in the low six figures. Too minor league for me to give much of a shit about these days, even out of politeness. Yes, to the loan, since we might have some need of the mayor one day. And as for Stone, “Let your brother decide if he wants to take the contract.”
Rock considers it, same as he would if I’d said, “you decide.”
“I’m going to turn the request down. Send Jax a referral for somebody else,” he says without any indication that he plans to tell Stone it was made in the first place. Twins, man. But I know from experience that it goes both ways with those two. Stone is always bossing Rock around, but he trusts Rock the same as his own gut. And if Rock says he’s not taking the contract, Stone ain’t taking it, no need to ask him the question to find out.
Truth is, I like their dynamic. That yin-yang of theirs is the reason I made the rather unorthodox decision to assign them the role of co-underboss when I took over the Ferraro throne.
“Plus, I don’t like the idea of taking on new business when we’ve got this new ADA watching our every move,” Rock adds.
“Agreed,” I say on a grunt. Not for the first time, I consider breaking the promise I made to my wife, who after all, has been my ex-wife now for way longer than we were ever married.
That business done, I’m about to dismiss Rock, but then I squint, noticing what’s going on with Rock’s right hand. The index and middle fingers tap the thumb like they’re hurting bad for a cigarette. However, I know for a fact, Rock wouldn’t walk in here without sucking his small Tobacco dick. So, this isn’t a nicotine craving, but something else. Something that’s got him nervous.
“Anything else?” I ask, throwing my fishing line out on the hunch.
His fingers tap a few more useless times, then he says, “Bella Peretti…you’re over that, right?”
My stomach kicks in. And though I don’t stop running, it’s only muscle memory keeping me on the belt. If my brain were still fully in charge of the jog, I probably would have tripped and splatted out backward on the hardwood floor.
That name. First of all, I never called her that. And second, it’s been years since I even thought it. To me, Bella’s still the girl, who against all expectations, decided to do the right thing and try to let me out of her father’s cage. Totally separate from the woman I married years later.
“Yeah, I’m over that,” I answer, keeping my tone as neutral as my muscle memory stride. “Why’re you asking?”
Rock shrugs and looks over his shoulder like he’s afraid the Upper Manhattan view might rat him out to his brother. Stone hasn’t spoken Bella’s or Amber’s name since I returned to my rightful post like I’d just decided to take a gap year or some shit like that.
“Tell me,” I say, dropping a warning note into my tone, as my feet pound the tread.
A little more hesitating. But I’m the boss now, no matter what I tell him to call me. And the days of Rock or anybody else questioning my orders are long over.
He confesses, “I was doing my due diligence, crossing all my t’s, so I did some technological on her after my D.A. office source told me Peretti was trying to take you down with an informant.”
My breath catches, not because of the running, but because “technological” means he did what I’ve been forcing myself not to do for almost five years now. Check up on her with some digital spy assistance. And despite the cardio, my heart pauses for a few beats, waiting to hear what he found out.
“Looks like she’s clean. According to her phone log, she hasn’t been in contact with anybody in the D.A.’s office for a while now that she’s taking on more divorce cases,” Rock says, his voice all business. But then he shifts his big body before saying in a much less casual tone, “Some private life stuff came up, though. Stuff I wasn’t sure if I should tell you about or not.”
Oh, that. My stone heart resumes its regular scheduled bpm program, with a bug for the “Ruthless Don” channel deliberately added on the bottom left side of the screen.
“Yeah, she’s fucking her martial arts teacher, I know.” I punch a knuckle into the treadmill’s stop graphic and pretend like my heart’s not constricting for any reason other than coming down from the cardio strain. “Sylvie told me.”
A few months ago, when she called herself to invite me to her and Holt’s co-ed baby shower (which I think is happening this weekend if I remember right), she’d said, “Amber will be there, but that should not be a deal breaker for you. She will be bringing her boyfriend along, you know, the same man who taught her to do the martial arts so well she could save me from that gunman. I believe they have been dating for two years already now. So really, Luca, there is no reason for you not to join us, too. It is history between you and Amber, and you are truly one of Holt’s best friends in the world. He would never say this to you as I am, but I know he would love to have you there.”
I’d still turned down the invitation—mainly because a baby shower in Greenwich didn’t exactly sound like my kind of party. And hadn’t I already flown all the way to Jahwar for that no alcohol wedding of theirs? “Sorry, Sylvie. Can’t make it, but trust me, I’ll send one hell of a baby gift for the invite,” I’d said, pretending her light announcement about Amber having a serious boyfriend didn’t gut punch the hell out of me.
Ruthless Don. Ruthless Don channel all day, as I grab a couple of forties off the dumbbell rack and go into my Friday Total body routine. I focus my thoughts on the various real estate deals we’re using to wash cartel money. And the warehouse we burned down in Trenton last week, the same day it finished construction, just to warn the Armenians off trying to do business in our territories. Or better yet, how about that Silent Triad issue, because right now, they’re the only mafia outfit on the Eastern seaboard more powerful than mine. Anything, I’ll think about anything other than my ex-wife.
10 military presses…not thinking about Amber…12….or that Brazilian Do-Right who…15… couldn’t be any more opposite from me…18…because I’m definitely over Bella fucking Peretti….20…
However, Rock lingers. Watches me kill the first set of presses, before asking, “Yeah, but did you know they’re trying to have a baby?”
I lower the weights. Da fuck…
21
Accidents Will Happen
Amber
“Oh my God, I’m so sorry this is happening to you!” Mika, Sylvie’s and Holt’s nanny, says for about the thousandth time during our conversation about my recently discovered fertility issues at Holt’s and Sylvie’s baby shower.
Tinkling music plays somewhere in the background, and we’re sitting together on a bench, sipping champagne, in front of what’s smells like a small lake, plants floating in water with an undertone of living fish. This is the “backyard” of Holt’s Connecticut home. Not a house, but a full-on estate, if the step count I lost somewhere between the huge echoing house and the humongous slope of grass behind it, is any indication.
Which is fine by me. After I asked for a private word, Mika was easily able to lead me to this bench, just far enough away to be out of hearing distance of the lovely smelling people at Holt’s and Sylvie’s co-ed baby shower, but not so far, that it would come off as rude. I can still hear the party’s steady murmur, along with pretty stringed music in the background of our conversation.
“Thanks,” I say, trying not to feel self-conscious or broken as I talk with Mika. “But, you know, this diagnosis has made a lot of things clear to me, actually. Completely clear. And I’ve decided I really do want to have a child, even though I’m blind.”
“You’re literally a kick-ass lawyer. I’m sure you and Pascoal will be able to handle raising an equally kick-ass kid,” Mika assures me with what sounds like a semi-permanent grin in her voice.
“Thanks.” I decide not to correct her about Pascoal. “But obviously, I’m going to need a lot of help in the beginning, and I remember Sylvie mentioning a friend of yours who sub
bed in for you when you went back to Hawaii last summer.”
“Oh, you’re talking about Candy, my grad school friend with the blind little sister—oh my God, she’s always looking for extra work, and she’d be perfect for you if you’re looking for a nanny. Are you looking for a nanny…?” she asks, her voice leading.
“I hope so,” I answer with a smile. “I mean, I haven’t begun the fertility treatments yet. It’s a process.”
“Yeah, I’ve heard,” Mika says, her voice sympathetic. “But I just know it’s going to work out, so I’m sending you Candy’s info right now.” There comes the small clink of her setting her glass of champagne aside on the bench. “What’s your number?”
I tell her, and the bench shifts as she pulls out her phone. A few seconds later, my earpiece informs me that I have an incoming text message from an unknown number.
“Thank—” I start to say, only to cut off, my head whipping toward the direction of a new smell.
Lingering traces of a woodsy aftershave and big donor cologne, which I learned was called Creed Aventus back in the day when I tried (but couldn’t afford) to buy him a new bottle for his birthday. And then just in case I was thinking of mistaking his smell for anybody else’s, the bench shifts again, and Mika calls out, “Luca! I didn’t know you would be here,” while standing up.
Her soft footfall shuffles across the grass, and I hear the fabric whisper scrape of two people hugging.
“Hey Mika, what’s what?” the voice I haven’t heard in nearly half a decade says. “Good to see you, beautiful.”
Beautiful…An unexpected stab of jealously lances my heart, because Mika isn’t a fawning law school student. She’s sweet-voiced and friendly, not to mention, smart. And it’s hard to explain how I can tell about a person’s level of prettiness without ever seeing her features, but trust me, she sounds cute. Like the peppy Hawaiian version of Sylvie.
She also sounds like she’s glad to see Luca. But glad because he’s charming to every woman he meets? Or glad because they’ve hooked up?
The question burns in my chest for one blazing moment before I remind myself of who this is. Luca. The guy I don’t think or speak about, even to myself.
Tightening my heart against the unexpected jealousy, I turn back around on the bench, praying Mika, who probably has no idea about our history, doesn’t get it into her head to introduce me.
But before I’m fully done with my silent plead, Luca says, “Hey, I haven’t seen Amber in a while. Mind giving us a few moments alone?”
“Oh…oh…I didn’t know you two knew each other. Sure, I can leave you alone…”
Mika sounds like she’s been caught off guard. And I can just imagine her, looking between the two of us, wondering what Luca and the blind woman about to embark on a complicated fertility journey could possibly have to talk about.
That’s when the memory of Mika’s and my conversation stops my thoughts cold. Oh God, the baby. We’d been talking about the baby I was planning to have with fertility treatments before I smelled Luca standing behind us. How much of that had he overheard?
The bench depresses beside me. This time with a much heavier weight.
And for seconds on end, nothing is said. By him or me.
I still can’t believe he’s here. Right here, sitting beside me. Not in a dream. In the actual flesh. But it’s true. I can feel his presence big as day, even though we aren’t touching.
“So your eggs are drying up, and now you think you’ve got to have a baby with this Mr. Miyagi fuck,” he says, breaking the tense silence.
Wow. So, I guess that answers my question. All of it. He heard all of it.
Enough to cobble together my story and make a few assumptions. Mistaken assumptions. I didn’t bring it up to Mika, so he doesn’t know that I broke up with Pascoal the day I found out that I was going to have trouble conceiving kids.
Pascoal doesn’t want them. Hasn’t wanted them from the start of our purposefully vague relationship. And until I was told sooner rather than later might be all the time my ovary reserve had, I didn’t know just how much of a deal breaker that was for me. I didn’t need marriage or even overnights, but a baby, yeah, that’s what I need. What I want in my life right now. And as nice as it had been for two years, Pascoal and I drifted away from each other like leaves on a sudden summer wind.
But it’s not like I’m going to tell this asshole any of this. In fact, I say, “I’m not discussing any of this with you,” and set my glass of champagne down before rising to stand.
But when I reach out for my stick, a hand snakes out and grabs it before I can.
“Give it back,” I demand.
“I looked that boyfriend of yours up. From what I can tell, he’s probably hemorrhaging money. That’s why he has to live above a studio in a building he doesn’t even own outright.”
“Yes, I understand that Pascoal doesn’t make a lot of money,” I answer, my voice dripping with icicles despite the perfect summer temperature. “I also understand that he’d rather live above his studio than cancel any of his classes, including an absolutely free one for victims of domestic violence—because unlike you, not every man in this world is purely motivated by money. And some of us are out here trying to live meaningful lives.”
“Meaningful, is that what you call taking on Sylvie as a client when she was going through her thing with Holt?” he asks, his voice pitching to snide and incredulous. “You’re trying to tell me you suddenly decided to take on her case out of the kindness of your heart?”
“No,” I shoot back. “I did it for the very petty reason, of fuck Holt for trying to bully Sylvie into giving up her whole life—by the way, still can’t believe she ended up marrying that jackhole. And you know what? Fuck you for coming at me right now, like I’m a dummy you can mansplain out of my own decision to do what I want with my own body.”
“I never called you a dummy, but if you’re feeling like one, maybe that’s because you and I both know it’s crazy to have a baby with some karate asshole who’s probably just using you because he doesn’t have enough money to eat out.”
My arm shoots up before I can stop it, and my hand cracks across his face. Shocked at myself, I drawback, rubbing my other thumb over my sharply tingling palm. And that’s when I notice…
The low murmur from the party has come to an abrupt stop. I freeze, able to tell without being able to see it that absolutely everyone at the baby shower is staring at us.
Five years.
I haven’t spoken to Luca in nearly five years. Haven’t touched Luca in nearly five years. And the first time we speak, we end up yelling. And the first time we touch, it’s a slap.
I stand there, frozen. Not sure what to do. Or what to say next.
But then Luca says, “Well that’s one way to say hello, Mrs. Ferraro,” with a grin in his voice.
“Luca…Amber…is everything all right now?” Sylvie’s lilting Jamaican accent floats over to us on top of all that shocked quiet.
Before I can answer, Luca calls out, “Sorry, sorry about that, Sylvie. Things got a little heated. But we’re leaving now, so.”
He takes my hand, and starts leading me across the grass, like I came here with him. Like we’re still together, and I’m still his wife.
But none of that is true, and even though I don’t pull away, not wanting to cause another scene, I drop my voice to inform him, “I’m not leaving here with you.”
“So, you wanna stay here and explain all this to the nice nanny who you asked to recommend somebody to help you raise this kid—since obviously your boyfriend’s too fucking important at his no money dojo to quit his job and become a stay-at-home dad like he should?” Luca asks, his voice vicious and low.
Arggh!!! The only thing that would have made that sentence any more insulting would be if he tacked “for his blind baby mama,” on the end of it.
But then Luca adds, “Plus, this place is huge. No way you’re getting out of here without asking for an escort. And
do you really want to have that awkward convo with Sylvie or the jackhole you still can’t believe she married?”
No, no, I guess I don’t.
“Just to the front of the house,” I tell him, more than a little ashamed of myself. “Then I’ll wait there for a Lyft.”
He doesn’t answer, and maybe I shouldn’t be surprised when instead of letting me go after walking back through the house and down a short set of stairs, he says, “Alright, here’s your Lyft,” and all but shoves me into the back of an idling car before slamming the door behind me.
I’m still yanking on the handle, trying to get myself out of the back seat, when the door on the other side of the car sounds. “Those childproof locks are a bitch and a half, right?” Luca says, his body filling the seat beside me before I can make a dive for his open door. Then we’re moving, which leaves me with the choice of buckling up or jumping out of a moving car.
“Joey, this is Amber. Amber, this is Joey,” Luca says, tone casual, like we all just ran into each other on the street.
“Hey, nice to meet you, Amber,” Joey says. His voice has the nasal confidence of a New Yorker born.
“Ambs, give Joey your address, so he can take you there,” Luca says.
I give Joey the address of my apartment in Astoria between clenched teeth.
“So, you decided to move, but stayed in the same neighborhood,” Luca observes. “Just couldn’t live in that apartment without me, huh?”
I don’t answer, and I refuse to tell him that no, the apartment became unbearable nearly as soon as I returned from the hospital. And that I barely managed to serve out the lease before I moved to another one free of his ghost.
LUCA - Her Ruthless Don (Ruthless and Obsessed Duet, Book 1): 50 Loving States, New York, Pt. 2 (Ruthless Tycoons 3) Page 15