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There were cars everywhere, and it was getting extremely dark by now. The fountain in the middle of his driveway had little floating lights, and then toward the back of the house, lanterns.
“She said to follow the light.” Santino gestured toward the lanterns. “I guess that’s where everyone is?”
“Yeah, maybe.”
“Are you okay?” He wrapped an arm around me.
I sniffled against his chest. “Yeah, I will be once he’s at rest.”
Santino kissed the top of my head as we rounded the house and walked by the pool toward the backyard. Once we made it down the hill in the back, there were more lanterns, and over two hundred, maybe more people.
All dressed in black.
Roses lined a pathway with the lanterns down to the middle of the field, and a small Christmas tree farm seemed to have been planted just beyond the brim of the hill.
“It’s time,” Santino whispered.
I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. Some faces I recognized from the different families, Abandonato, Nicolasi, Sinacore—but one Family I didn’t; it was a Family standing toward the front next to Andrei. There was a man with dark hair, another woman with brownish hair who had my features, and a few others, who were not Italian, and the closer I looked, the more I saw.
Once we made it to the front, I realized everyone was holding a rose. Andrei stepped out from the front and nodded to Santino, taking my other arm as we walked toward the black casket. “The Petrovs,” Andrei said with a thick voice, “have come to honor their own.” He held up a single white rose, dropped it onto the casket, and then pulled me aside. No grand words were said at the funeral and no amazing speeches that made people cry.
No, it was all action.
As the entire Petrov crime Family—my Family, one I never even knew—one by one, paid tribute to my brother, they each laid a white rose on his casket and, as they walked past it, dropped a red rose to the ground.
“They honor them both.” Andrei stared straight ahead as a tear slid down his cheek, falling off his chin.
I touched my pearls, then looked up. There was a headstone. “Andi?” I asked.
“Andi Petrov Abandonato,” he confirmed. “Pace won’t be alone anymore, Katya. He’s next to Andi. She’s bringing him home.”
I broke down and started to sob against my brother. Santino rubbed my back as I cried and as every single person paid tribute to him, honored him with a single white rose.
When the final person walked up, I knew in my soul it was Sergio. I glanced up, and there he stood with Val, his wife, clinging to him. They stared at Pace’s grave and then at Andi’s.
“You can finally rest now, Pace. Don’t let Andi give you too much hell, and know how much you were loved, Pace, without even realizing it. Thank you for saving your sister.” Sergio pulled out a card from his pocket as Nixon, Phoenix, Chase, Dante, and Tex approached. Each of them, my brother and Sergio included, slit their palms and squeezed a drop of blood onto the card. “We give you the saint of Saint Kolbe as a memory of how you sacrificed for love.”
He took a step forward along with the rest of the men as they surrounded the grave. He lit the card with a lighter and held it over the casket. “As burns this saint so burns my soul. I enter alive, and I will have to get out dead.” He dropped the card onto the casket.
“What does this mean?” I asked Santino in a shaky voice.
He shook his head, eyes full of tears, and then shook his head again like he couldn’t get the words quite out. Then finally, he took a deep breath and exhaled. “He was just made. Even in death, he’s a made man by honor of the Capo and the Five Families—they bury him as one of their own.” His voice cracked. “As a brother.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
“I respectfully decline to answer because I honestly believe my answer might tend to incriminate me.” —Joey Gallo
Santino
I had a lot to think about as I walked back up that hill, got into the car with Katya, and drove to Andrei’s, mainly that I was an idiot, a jackass, and that I’d had it wrong all along.
They were truly brothers. Honorable, loyal, and a bit unhinged, but they were the epitome of Family.
They put mine to shame.
I’d always been so proud of my heritage, my Family, where I came from, and within days they’d taken that notion and made me feel like a fool.
It was my pride, my own twisted prejudices, and beliefs about what others said about the Cosa Nostra. I let it bleed into me like a poison, and I drank again and again, thinking I was validated in wanting to ruin them.
