by Bethany-Kris
It took John entirely too long to come back with something to say.
Lucia wished he wouldn’t have bothered.
“You come from the same privilege I do,” John said quietly.
“Except I can own it now. Can you?”
“I’m sorry, Lucy. Really, I am. I didn’t think that it was all going to lead to him being put away for—”
“Shut up,” Lucia forced through her clenched teeth, not even wanting to go there with John. Like he honestly gave a fuck that Renzo had been locked away. Like her father, he probably looked at it like a blessing to them. “I bet Daddy had that planned, and you knew about it, too.”
“Dad didn’t plan anything. I just came after you to bring you home. The rest was circumstance, and shit.”
Whatever.
She was done with this conversation.
Lucia turned to stare at the TV again, refusing to give him even one more second of her attention. Problem was, she knew her brother … he was going to keep pushing until she broke, and she just wasn’t going to let him do that. There was really only one way to get her brother off a conversation, and that was to turn it on him. To make it about him.
There was nothing John hated more than someone asking about him—it was like being diagnosed with bipolar had made her brother defensive from the time his disorder was handed down. He always felt like people were inadvertently judging him just by asking about him. Lucia tried not to make her brother feel like that, but right now, she really just needed him to get the fuck away from her.
“Why don’t we talk about you, John?” Lucia asked.
The shift in the room was instant.
She could feel the discomfort radiating from John.
“No, I’m good,” he said, crossing his arms.
Yeah, she figured.
Lucia almost laughed, but managed to hold it back. “Then we have nothing else to say here. Daddy and the rest of them are upstairs.”
Her brother still didn’t move from the entryway.
“So that’s it for us, then? You’re going to go back to California in a couple of weeks, and you won’t even bother with me at all while you’re here? Nothing at all?”
“Don’t take it personally, John. It’s all of them, not just you.”
There.
Let him take that however he wanted to take it. She didn’t know how else to make it clear to John. Thankfully, he didn’t say anything else. He was quick to leave her alone which was what she thought she wanted the most.
Maybe that was her problem …
Maybe she found comfort in loneliness now.
Who knew?
Not her.
Lucia wasn’t sure how long she sat alone in the living room before she felt yet another presence in the entryway. Long enough for the reality show to change to something else she wasn’t interested in, of course. Story of her life, lately.
She didn’t even bother to turn and see who was in the entryway this time. She figured they would get the hint that she wasn’t up for conversation if she kept ignoring them, but apparently she hoped for too much. This time, the voice was enough to instantly make her angry.
Hell, even with John it had taken a few minutes of conversation before she was ready to kill him with nothing more than her words. Not this time.
“Your brother mentioned that you weren’t very … welcoming to him,” her father said quietly.
Lucia sucked in a long inhale, and let it out slowly. “Maybe that should be a warning for you as well, Daddy. If you haven’t gotten the hint since I came home for this break, I’m not interested in spending time with you, him, or … well, anyone, really. Not really sorry about it, either.”
Lucian made a noise under his breath. “I was hoping that you might allow me to extend an olive branch, of sorts.”
She didn’t know what in the hell he was talking about, or what on earth he could offer her next to Renzo—impossible now—that might bring a bit of peace between them. God knew her lines were clearly drawn in the sand where her father was concerned. She wasn’t even trying to hide it. The fact that he continued to ignore them sounded like a problem he had to deal with. She wasn’t changing how she felt about him any time soon.
“Would you like an olive branch?” her father asked.
“Honestly, Daddy, I don’t care what you do.”
Let him make what he wanted of that statement.
Lucian sighed. “All right, Lucia. I tried … not that it changes what I planned to do, anyway.” She peered at him from the side, but he wasn’t even looking at her, then. “Rose and Diego Zulla. I have their contacts after pulling some information. I thought you may like to have it. Perhaps visit them, even, while you’re home. If you’re—”
“Yes,” Lucia said instantly.
She couldn’t even pretend to be disinterested in that.
She wondered about Diego all the time. She didn’t know Rose’s number to call her—her contact had always just been labeled as Rose in Renzo’s phone. Lucia tried looking for the girl’s number, but found nothing. Like it had been changed to private after the whole Renzo ordeal. She bet the damn reporters got ahold of it, and wouldn’t stop calling Rose for a comment. Not to mention, from the articles Lucia found, Rose had been the one to fight and win custody of Diego after he’d been placed in foster care.
Lucian smiled faintly as his gaze turned back on Lucia. He nodded once, and turned to leave her alone once more. Over his shoulder, he said, “I will get you the info, and make sure you have a vehicle to take with you when you’re ready to go visit them. Oh, and Lucia?”
“Yeah?”
“This olive branch isn’t meant to be an attempt to earn back your forgiveness. And it is not meant to be an apology from me. You’re not ready to give me anything, and you’re not willing to hear my apologies just yet. I know that—whether you believe it or not, I understand, too. Just so you’re aware. I love you, vita mia.”
That was another problem.
She didn’t think he understood at all.
But he was right, too.
She wasn’t ready.
Not to forgive.
And not for his apologies.
She might never be.
• • •
“So, you just went back to California?” Rose asked.
Lucia was sure Renzo’s sister didn’t mean for that question to sound accusatory, and yet, it still did. Or maybe that was just Lucia’s guilt making itself known again by hearing things that didn’t really exist. Her guilt, on the other hand, was very real. It never really left, even if it did sometimes give her a break occasionally.
It wasn’t like she could forget about it, though.
She was free.
Renzo was … not.
What did it matter if he was locked up in New York, in Iowa, or somewhere else they had decided to send him to serve out his sentence? The facts would remain the same at the end of the day. She was here, and he was not. She could watch his little brother jump from the bars of the jungle gym to the puffy snow on the ground, and he could not.
That was the reality.
Her guilt was a killer.
“It was that, or stay here and feel like I couldn’t breathe,” Lucia murmured.
Rose nodded on the bench, and tightened her coat a little more around her neck like she was trying to keep the wind out. “Yeah, I guess I can understand that. After it first happened, it kind of felt like everything was hopeless. You know what I mean?”
Lucia shrugged. “Probably for a different reason than you, but yeah.”
“I bet.”
Looking over at Rose, Lucia gave her a small smile. “You got Diego, though. I bet he was happy when you brought him home.”
Rose laughed. “I mean … terrified might be a better word. It was like he was convinced someone was going to come and—”
“Take him from you.”
“Exactly that, yeah.” Rose shrugged. “Sometimes, I think he still believes it, but he just doe
sn’t talk about it now. The counselor told me to try to make everything feel permanent for him. Let him decorate his bedroom. Fill it with things he wanted and liked. Let him claim spots in the apartment that feel like his, or whatever. It helped, and then other days, it just feels like those are more things for him to lose if someone comes and takes him away.”
Lucia frowned.
She couldn’t even hide it.
“I’m sorry—we really messed up, huh?”
Rose looked over at her. “I don’t see it like that, no. I know why Ren did what he did, and why you went with him. You have to understand, too, that nothing has ever felt very permanent or stable for us growing up. Diego was not really the exception just because he had Renzo to fall back on. He still moved around a lot. He never got to keep very many things that were supposed to be his. I’m trying to do different for him, now. That’s all.”
“What about school, and stuff? Does having him make it impossible to—”
“I finish this year anyway,” Rose interjected quickly. “At first, I thought I was going to have to quit, but the caseworker attached to our file helped me a lot with different programs. Daycares for low income, and stuff like that. Renzo had paid for my housing up until this month, but I ended up finding a cheaper place that we move into at the end of the month. I’m trying to work Diego into it slowly, so I actually have been paying the rent for two months now, and taking him over there every other day. Each time, he brings something else to his new bedroom.”
“But it’s still hard.”
She heard what Rose didn’t say.
Rose nodded. “The money I had tucked away is running out, you know? Everything costs something.”
That guilt was back tenfold.
Lucia’s bank account had more zeroes that she cared to admit. Her trust fund was a constant source of stability for her. She never had to struggle for anything. If she wanted something, she always had the money to go get it.
“Could I help—”
“Please don’t be offended,” Rose said quickly before Lucia could even finish her statement, “but we’re not a charity case, Lucia.”
“I know, I didn’t mean it like that. I just … I’m sorry.”
She should have known better.
Rose was just like her brother.
The thing was … Lucia was smart, too. She knew the name of Rose’s school, and that they sold the artwork of their students in a gallery, but especially the pieces that were done by the most talented. Students like Rose. She knew this because of her friend that had attended not long ago. And eighty percent of each sale went directly to the artist. It wouldn’t take Lucia long at all to find out how many pieces of Rose’s work that the school had for sale, or for her to buy every single one of them and have them stored away. If Rose wouldn’t let Lucia help, then she would figure out another way.
Simple as that.
“I’ll figure it out,” Rose said, leaning back on the bench and staring across the park at her brother. “I always do. I promised Ren, you know, so I gotta make it work for Diego.”
At just the mention of his name, Lucia’s mouth decided to work before her brain could properly think about the question that slipped out far too easily. “Does he call you?”
God, maybe she could get the inmate number attached to his file. Or the facility he was now in … anything that she couldn’t seem to find on her own no matter how hard she tried to look.
Rose shook her head. “Not anymore—he did when he was in New York, you know? And then they moved him, and it stopped. He said that might happen, though. That when he got a chance, he would call again.”
Lucia’s brow dipped in her confusion. “How long ago was that?”
“A couple months,” Rose whispered. “But when he calls again, I’ll let him know you’re asking for him, and stuff.”
What did that mean?
Was he even—
“Lucia! Come play with me!” Diego shouted across the playground.
Lucia didn’t even think about it. She got up from the bench, and headed for the little boy who, even after everything, still smiled at her like he loved her, too. Diego turned, and darted up the slide to climb the playground equipment again. While she had a second to do it, Lucia pulled the phone out of her pocket, and turned the screen on.
She typed out a single message to her father.
It simply read, Thank you.
It was the best she could give him. For now. The contempt she constantly harbored in her heart now still raged on, though.
Would it ever leave?
Lucia couldn’t say.
CONTEMPT
RENZO + LUCIA, BOOK 3
BETHANY-KRIS
PROLOGUE
Compassion is contempt with a human face.
—John McCarthy
I miss New York.
It was the first thing that drifted through Lucia Marcello’s mind as she strolled through The Annex for the first time in almost a year. She’d visited the market shortly before heading out to California the year before, but that was only to grab a few jars of her favorite homemade loose tea. She wouldn’t be able to get it anywhere but here.
California was … exactly what Lucia needed. It gave her space from her family, and allowed the bitterness and contempt she constantly felt for them to stay hidden, for the most part. Oh, sure, it was still there. Festering and living well, but it just didn’t show itself nearly as much when she didn’t have to face people like her father or brother day in and day out.
Except … California wasn’t one thing.
That one thing being home.
New York was always going to be home to Lucia.
Maybe that’s why she felt so goddamn nostalgic as she took in the many vendor tents, and the new faces filling up The Annex. It had always been a melting pot of races, religions, and cultures. There was something for everyone here. That’s part of the reason why she loved it so much.
Despite the way she wanted to enjoy being here when she hadn’t been here in so long, Lucia couldn’t settle into that comfort as easily as she wished. She might have been able to blame it on the fact this was her first trip home in almost a year, but that wasn’t it at all.
More like the man walking a few paces behind her. Her brother—John. Sure, he’d kept quiet as Lucia became acquainted with the woman he simply explained that he loved. He’d said it so surely, so honestly, that Lucia had no choice but to believe her brother when he introduced her to Siena Calabrese. She didn’t think she had ever heard her brother sound so entirely sure about anything before.
Not like he had when he told Lucia about Siena.
So, maybe it made her feel a little sick to her fucking stomach that her brother was happy in a way. That he’d found someone to love; someone he wanted to protect and adore for the rest of his life; someone he needed as much as he needed air. Because that was all the things John dared to explain to Lucia when he brought Siena along for their trip out—one her mother had all but demanded she take. To let John apologize; to fix the burned bridges, her mother offered like Lucia gave a single damn.
She wasn’t sure if she did.
Lucia did know that the fact John had found someone he loved felt like a gut punch for her. Why was he allowed to have someone he wanted and loved when he had practically ripped that very same thing out of her arms?
He’d helped to take her love away.
He’d done that.
And she was supposed to be happy for him right now? God knew she tried—over the last year, she’d tried damn hard to forgive her brother for all the shit that had gone down with Renzo.
That was the thing about feeling such a strong contempt for the people you also loved, Lucia had found. It was relentless, and vicious. It didn’t just draw lines in the sand, no. It painted them with the blood of memories from happier times, ruined and stained. It was like a damn poison, slowing taking over a person’s body.
Because that’s how it worked. It killed a person while
they waited for it to kill someone else. Despite knowing all of this, Lucia couldn’t let it go. She was infected with it—dying from it slowly.
Being angry was easier.
She didn’t know how to be anything else now.
It was funny.
Sickening, too.
A year could change so fucking much for everyone else. But a year changed nothing for her. She was still just as raw as she had been. Still just as hurt, and angry. Everyone else’s world continued to turn, and hers was stuck in this standstill she couldn’t seem to escape.
Lucia wasn’t sure if she wanted to escape it, honestly. Again … easier.
John continued to stay far enough behind them to give Lucia some breathing room even as they headed further into The Annex. She was grateful he made the effort,, but John had always been the type to give people their space when he got the impression they needed it. Mostly because he wanted people to afford him the same thing.
Despite being slightly uncomfortable because of her brother’s constant presence that day, Lucia couldn’t deny the fact that there was something … sweet about Siena Calabrese. Lucia had taken to her almost the second she said hello with a bright smile. Like she had heard all about Lucia—the woman probably had, knowing John—and couldn’t wait to make friends.
It was kind of hard to be angry with a woman who just wanted to like you. Plus, Siena didn’t have anything to do with the whole Renzo episode a year earlier. Lucia found herself surprised at how easily she wanted to make friends with Siena, too. Like maybe she was in desperate need of another friend in her life.
She had so few of those.
It sucked.
“I think he’s lonely back there,” Siena said to Lucia. “John never does well as the third wheel, does he?”