AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Yeah.” I toss back over my shoulder, “I already decided that staying for dinner could be awkward. So. If I don’t see you, eat shit. Fuckface.”
CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
Iwill not cry.
On my way back up the stairs, I call Mikey. Packing doesn’t take me long. I never really got around to properly unpacking.
I will not cry.
I can’t wait inside the house for an instant longer than I have to. I haul my sorry shit down to the huge gothic front doors, and onto the cold stone step. I would drag it all to the road but as I remember, the driveway is at least half a mile long.
I will not cry.
After what feels like hours, and was probably twenty minutes in reality, Mikey shows up in a flashy SUV. When he jumps out, I want to hug him, but it will have to wait. I am not going to cry. Not here. He understands so well, it’s almost impossible for me to hold the tears back. I jump in the front of the car and curl up in the seat, like when he took me to school.
As Mikey flings my bags in the back, I see Carlo’s face in a misted second-story window. His mouth is tight and his head shakes, slowly.
I can’t let myself think about how good it all was. Or nearly was. And so very fucking nearly. Because then I’d have to look at what a wreck I made of it all.
“Onward and offward, Mikey.”
He doesn’t ask me ‘where to’ until we’re off the premises and a good mile away.
CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN
Daddy is furious when I tell him I want to use the plane. “What did you do? It was all arranged. What can have happened, how have you fucked this up in so short a time?”
The hush of the big conservatory has always put me on edge. When I was little, I was hardly ever allowed in here with Daddy’s precious orchids. If I was summoned, it was either to be on my best behavior in front of guests, or it was so Daddy could deliver me one of his lectures.
In case all my feelings weren’t jumbled and messed up already, that’s what I feel like now. Like I’ve come to ‘explain myself,’ as he used to say.
“Daddy, I just have to get away from a little while. Not long, probably. But I really want to be a long way away.”
“You want to go to Hawaii?” I know his sulky growl. It comes like a warning.
“No.” I tell him. “Further away. I want some Mediterranean sun.”
His eyebrow raises and his head cocks. “You going to Italy?”
“Maybe, Daddy. But I’m not going to look up family history or take a tour of the relics.” That was what I called all the old Italian and Sicilian relatives, living in the shade in their big, ancient villas like cold, dusty museums.
When I was little, Daddy dragged me all over the Camorra and the islands, ‘paying respects,’ he called it. All of the family were very kind and charming, and incredibly hospitable, but we had nothing to talk about and nothing in common.
I remember Daddy being obsessed that I would misbehave and show him up. And all the Italian relatives tutted about how I was too quiet and acted like I was ‘kept in a jar.’
The life of a mafia princess in a nutshell. Whatever I do, I know I can’t win.
“No, Daddy. I just need some time away. Time to relax and recharge.”
Grouchy, he says, “The yacht is in Cyprus now. I can have it go meet you in a few days.”
“Thanks, Daddy, but no. I just need to get there and back. I have my own plans.”
Accurate. If not strictly true.
Mikey drives me to the airfield. Trusted old Mikey, driving me off into some new and unpredictable trouble. For a moment it feels like old times. But as I catch the watery shine in his eyes, I realize that it’s not the old me in the back of the car.
I nearly crack when he pulls up by the Gulfstream and holds the door open for me.
