“You need your family,” Charlie said. “Blood or not.”
“What about your mother?” Mia spun linguine onto her fork. It was time for a change in subject, because talking of religion and confession made her deeply uncomfortable. “How is she?”
He lifted a shoulder and wiped his mouth. “As well as she can be, I guess. She fell a couple months ago, and it’s taking her a while to recover.”
“I’m sorry to hear that.”
“So my Sundays are booked, too,” he said, then smiled.
The sight of it made a sudden rush of emotion fly through her. For the first time since she’d gotten home, the full weight of just how much she’d missed him hit her like blackjack over her head. She’d come to rely on him for so much—support, strength, wisdom. Not knowing who he’d become while she’d been away or if she could still trust him killed her.
“What is it?” he asked softly.
“I just…” Mia’s throat tightened suddenly.
He dropped his fork and reached across the table, laying his right hand on top of her left. “Tell me.”
The touch of his warm hand, so large it completely eclipsed hers lying on the table, made her heart beat swiftly. He stroked the back of her hand with this thumb.
“Tell me I can still trust you,” she whispered. “Tell me that with all of these horrible things we’ve been through, that—that I’ve done, all the terrible ways in which I’ve changed… Tell me you’re still the same. The same Charlie you always were.” She bit her lip. “My Charlie.”
His eyes flared at her last words, and his grip on her hand tightened slightly. “You can trust me,” he said. “I swear on my life. I promised your brother I’d always watch out for you. I’d always protect you. And I always will. I just…” He broke off, his jaw flexing. “I wasn’t supposed to fall in love with you, Mia. But here we are.”
Her heart jumped into her throat.
He leaned forward. “The day you left, I told you I’d wait for you. I meant it. I did. And I still am. You came home with this mile-high brick wall around you. Sicily was supposed to protect you, supposed to show you that you’re not alone in this world. But…it changed you. I don’t think it’s a bad thing. But I think you feel like you don’t know me anymore. I’m still the same guy, Mia. The same guy who’ll rip this city, this whole fucking world apart if it means keeping you safe.”
He stood up and knelt before her, cupping her face in his hands. “Every day you were gone killed me,” he said hoarsely.
“Charlie,” she whispered, leaning toward him. She reached up to take one of his hands, the other still on her cheek. She grasped it tightly and shut her eyes as she tilted her head toward his.
His lips captured hers with a careful but ravenous hunger, as though he were straining to hold himself at bay against his true feelings. The first time they’d kissed on the dock the day she’d sailed away from New York, she’d initiated it. She’d given it everything she had, fearing it would be the last time. Treating it as goodbye the kiss it was. But now, he was in control, and this was a welcome home she’d dreamed of every night she’d been in Sicily. Because as much as she loved the country of her blood, being away from him killed a little part of her, too.
Mia lost herself in the movements of his lips, letting him carry her on and on, higher and higher, forgetting they were in a public place, even if they were alone. Emotions she’d never felt before filled her to the brim, each one more intense than the last, and she wondered how she’d lived for almost twenty-three years without this feeling before. Wondered how she could ever live without it again.
She squeezed her eyes closed in case it was all a dream, and gripped his hand tighter to remind herself that it was real. Her fingers slid over his palm.
Then her eyes flew open.
She jerked back, startled, her lips still warm from his kiss. She flipped his hand palm-up and stared in horror at what she knew she’d find.
A long line of raised skin.
Charlie swiftly closed his palm, but it was too late. She’d seen it.
A scar.
The same scar Nick had had. The scar that had tied him to this life forever. The scar that had gotten him killed. And now, Charlie had it.
Her eyes filled with tears.
She looked at him, the tears spilling down her cheeks. “Why?” she demanded in a whisper. “Why? Why?”
“Mia,” he muttered. “I told you. A lot’s happened since you left.”
“Who? When?”
He sighed. “Masseria. About nine months ago.”
Masseria. She touched trembling fingertips to her trembling mouth. “Jesus Christ.”
“Mia—”
She stood abruptly. He did too. He reached for her. “Please, Mia—”
“No.” She pulled away as though he’d brandished a knife. In a way, he had, since her heart was stung and bleeding. “You know. You know what it did to him. What it did to his family.”
“Whether I’m made or not, the risks are still the same,” he said. He held up his palm. “This? This buys me protection.”
“It ties you to him for the rest of your life,” she countered, her voice shaking. “To this life. You can’t leave, Charlie. You can never leave. Until you die. Tell me, how long do made guys live? Nick made it to twenty-five.”
“Masseria is the most powerful man in New York right now,” Charlie said.
“That’s why Luciano was there last night,” Mia said. “Everyone knows he’s Masseria’s right hand. He was there because of you.”
“Luciano is a big reason why the business has taken off the way it did,” Charlie said. “Nick was friendly with Lucky. He appreciated your show of respect and wanted to repay by helping grow the operation.”
“And he brought you into the fold.”
“I’m Sicilian,” Charlie said, avoiding her gaze. “He couldn’t bring Moritz for obvious reasons. This…this is an honor.”
She stared at him, horrified. “An honor.”
He straightened his shoulders. “Yes. An honor.”
“You always gave Nick crap for being a made guy,” she said. “You said he sold himself. That he could have been his own boss.”
“I didn’t understand at the time. Now I do.” He encircled her wrist with a gentle hand, but his eyes were hard. “Come on, kid. You know better than anyone than to be naive about all this. Look what you did after Nick died. You can’t have one foot in this life and one foot out.”
She tugged against his grip, and he released her immediately. “I—”
“You’re as much a made man as I am, as Nick was.” Charlie held up his hand. “This scar? It’s the only difference between me and you. When are you gonna stop lying to yourself?”
She knew he was right, deep down in her soul. Knew it as truly as she knew her own name and that the moon came out at night. But she cringed away from that truth. If she accepted it, it would mean she had become a monster in her own right.
“I’m still the same man, Mia,” he said quietly. “You have to know that. This doesn’t change anything between us.”
She stepped away. Her heart burned from the phantom knife slash. She wished the tears would stop spilling from her eyes. Wished she could accept the truth, about Charlie, about herself.
Behind Charlie, she caught sight of the owner peering out at them from the kitchen, a worried look on his face.
“Thank you,” she choked out, “for a very lovely dinner.” She turned on her heel and walked to the door.
“Mia,” Charlie said. “Don’t leave. Please.”
At the door, she hesitated, shutting her eyes as she swallowed several times, working to regain her composure.
How she wanted to run back into his arms.
Instead, she pushed the door open and strode out into the cold night.
Chapter Seven
Early Sunday morning, her eyes burning from lack of sleep, Mia followed Gloria, Emilia, Aunt Connie, and Uncle Joe into Most Precious Blood
Catholic Church for Mass. She wore a black shift dress with elbow-length billowing sleeves, white lace insets down the front, and plain black T-strap heels. She was so tired from tossing and turning all night since she’d made it home from her disastrous, hurtful date with Charlie that black had been a poor choice. Her olive skin was wan, and the starkness of the color would only make her look more so. Despite this, she’d forgone any makeup. Aunt Connie frowned on that sort of thing. In Sicily, so had Cousin Isabella. Luckily, her snug-fitting black hat was fitted with a lace veil, somewhat allowing her to hide.
It was automatic reflex borne of weekly habit from her childhood that dunked her fingers into the font. She touched her wet fingertips to her forehead, chest, and shoulders, noting the way Aunt Connie performed the same action, and with such reverence, her lips already moving in silent prayer.
Mia prayed for the strength to stay awake.
She strolled behind her family toward their preferred pew, roughly in the middle of the church. The beauty of the building, with its white domed ceiling and bright, tall archways, frescoes painted on the ceilings and in between the huge panes of stained glass, and the stunning altar and tabernacle, did not impress her as they once had, as God had once impressed her. But since He’d robbed her of the things that had mattered most to her—her parents and her brother—she could not bring herself to prioritize Him as she once had.
And yet, the weight of her guilt as she gazed up at His form on the large crucifix nearly brought her to her knees. She was a murderer, entering the House of God.
But she was not sorry for what she had done.
She genuflected before entering the pew, then knelt on the knee-rest, hands clasped in front of her. She was the perfect picture of piety, though her mind was blank.
“Psst,” she heard from the aisle.
Everyone in the family turned their heads toward the sound.
A humbly dressed man holding his hat wore a sheepish smile, but stretched out a hand. “I come to pay my respects,” he said with a heavy Italian accent. “To Signor and Signora d’Abbruzzo.” He shifted his gaze to Mia and gave her a serious nod. “And to Signorina Scalisi.”
Mia drew her head back. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Gloria turn to stare at her in confusion.
Me?
The man maintained his serious expression, his hand still out.
Mia scooted back onto the bench and reached for his hand. “It is my honor to meet you,” she said in Sicilian, and his eyes gleamed with pleasure. At her mastery of the language, or that she’d said it was an honor to meet him, she wasn’t sure. “You are?”
He bowed, still holding her hand. “Bruno. I am a great friend of Signor d’Abbruzzo.”
Mia nodded. “Signor Bruno.”
Uncle Joe reached up to pat his back. “We were each other’s first friends when we arrived in America. We were on the same boat.”
“I come to his shop to buy my family’s food, and he come to the dock to buy my fish,” Signor Bruno said, smiling.
Mia returned it. “Any friend of my uncle’s is a friend of mine.”
He fixed her with an eager stare, nodding. He seemed to be waiting for her to say something else.
Then it dawned on her—Signor Bruno was approaching her as he would approach any man of respect. She hoped her shock wasn’t written on her face.
“If—if you ever need anything at all, please, come to me,” Mia said. “I…would consider it a great favor to assist you.”
They were words she’d heard Nick utter hundreds of times to the poorer tenement families before they’d left New York, and even in Chicago.
Signor Bruno beamed, bowed several times, and released her hand. “Grazie, grazie.” He waved at Uncle Joe and Aunt Connie, at Gloria and Emilia, before backing away.
“What the hell was that?” Gloria hissed in her ear.
Mia kept her gaze forward. “You’re in church, Gloria.”
She felt the stares of Uncle Joe and Aunt Connie from her other side, but when she met her uncle’s eyes, he only gave her a solemn nod.
As if he understood.
When the Mass began, Mia went through the motions as she used to, the words meaningless on her lips, the hymns echoing hollowly in her ears, the message of Father Alessio’s homily flying over her head. When the time for Holy Communion came, she rose and dutifully followed her family out of the pew and into the aisle, her hands folded prayerfully in front of her.
Mia glanced around the cathedral. Every face her gaze landed on was the picture of holiness, of gratitude. These churchgoers were giving and receiving of their spirits and hearts in communion with that of Jesus Christ and all the saints.
She, on the other hand, was numb.
Would she ever stop being angry with Him? Would she ever feel the way these people did, the way her aunt and uncle did? Would she ever feel gratitude for the Lord, and come to rely on and trust in Him again?
Perhaps her relationship with Him was as dead as the men she’d had killed.
She neared Father Alessio in the Communion line, watching him feed Aunt Connie a wafer. Her throat tightened.
When it was her turn, the wafer between his fingers might as well have been a cockroach. She couldn’t eat of His Body. The thought of it was almost repulsive.
Because I’ve done murder.
Because I’m going to hell.
The priest’s brow creased. Mia placed a finger over her lips and shook her head rapidly. He dropped the wafer back into the ciborium and quickly traced the sign of the cross into her forehead with his thumb.
She dropped her hands and turned away from Father Alessio, the Eucharist, the tabernacle, the crucifix. All of it was simply too much to look at. She could not bear it.
“Looked like you was gonna choke on that little cracker,” a voice behind her whispered.
Mia whirled.
Jake Morelli grinned at her. “Didn’t know you went here.”
“What are you doing here?” she demanded in a whisper. “You following me?”
“Attending church like all the good little boys and girls.” He rested a hand on her lower back. “Just like you.”
She arched away from him. “I told you what would happen if you touched me again without invitation.”
He leaned close to her ear. “But I don’t see your bulldog anywhere around.”
She narrowed her eyes. “That’s the point. You’re not supposed to see him coming.”
Jake smirked. “It’s Sunday, Miss Scalisi. This is God’s house. That’s not very Christian of you, is it?”
“You don’t strike me as a holy man, Mr. Morelli,” she said. “I know what you’re up to in this neighborhood. I’ve been meaning to talk about that with you.”
“Have you?” He cocked his head. “Let’s discuss it, then. How about over dinner and drinks?”
“Mia?” Gloria said, coming up on her other side. She looked doubtfully at Jake. “Excuse me. Are you…a friend of Mia’s?”
“Oh, yeah,” he said, stepping away. “A real good friend. See you later, dollface.” With a wink, he disappeared toward the back of the church.
Mia gritted her teeth as she reentered the pew and knelt beside her aunt.
“Do I even want to ask who that was?” Gloria asked under her breath.
“Just some jerk,” Mia murmured back.
“Why didn’t you take Communion?”
Mia finally lifted her gaze to the huge carved crucifix, to the serious countenance of Jesus Christ. The Son of the God who’d allowed her family to be taken from her.
“I didn’t confess,” she whispered. But that wasn’t the whole truth.
I don’t deserve it.
“I hope you not too tired of Italian food,” Aunt Connie said that afternoon from the stove in her kitchen.
They were the same words Charlie had uttered at the start of what should have been a beautiful night. Mia’s heart seared a little, but she forced the pain away to smile at the older woman.
/> “I could never grow tired of your cooking, Aunt Connie. My cousins in Sicily were wonderful cooks, but you’re in a class by yourself.”
Aunt Connie beamed with pride as she bustled around the small, tidy kitchen. She and Uncle Joe, currently in the small parlor having a glass of anisette with Paolo, lived above their grocery in a cozy, well-furnished apartment. It always smelled of something baking, either tomatoes and cheese, or the delicious biscotti she sold in the store that never seemed to stay in the display case.
Mia sliced a great, warm Italian loaf, dusty with flour, and stole marinated vegetables from the antipasto dish on the counter. Gloria supervised Emilia setting the table and sipped a glass of Uncle Joe’s rich, red wine. Aunt Connie pulled dishes from the oven—chicken cacciatore, meatballs in gravy, spaghetti in simmering Bolognese. Beef braciola sautéed on the stove in the special olive oil Uncle Joe imported.
“Ah,” she said, sounding pleased. “Now we just about ready to eat.”
Mia dunked a little corner of bread into the meatball gravy and popped it in her mouth, just before Aunt Connie swatted her away.
“Put the bread on the table, girl,” she ordered good-naturedly. “Before you eat the whole kitchen.”
“She could eat the whole store and never gain a pound,” Gloria complained, lifting a hand. “You should have seen her in Catania, Aunt Connie. Breakfast, lunch, and dinner, plus a whole jug of wine every night. Look at her. Not one single pound.”
“Cheeks look fuller,” Aunt Connie argued. “So does the…” She mimed pushing up her breasts with both hands. “Much better than when she left. Too skinny. Good Sicilian girls needa meat.”
Mia chuckled. The banter reminded her of her family in Sicily, and of her days growing up on Elizabeth Street. Nothing was off-limits among the women as topics of conversation went. “Well, I can’t have too much meat. I have to be able to fit into my evening gowns for Mr. Goldberg’s nightclub. He’d have quite a few things to say about that.”
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