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1
GIGI
The Trapanis sure know how to throw a party. Here on our yacht, anchored off the coast of southern Italy, we’re a world apart from the rest of humanity.
Lights blink on the shoreline, a golden line dividing the dark ocean and star-littered sky. A warm breeze wraps its fingers around my hair, bringing with it that sweet-salt smell of the Mediterranean Sea.
I turn my back to the railing to have the wind in my face and watch my sister, Carla, whose eighteenth birthday we’re celebrating. She’s laughing with a bunch of girls her age. They’re all dressed as if they just walked off some catwalk at a prêt-à-porter designer fashion show. Nobody here is in a dress priced under five thousand euros. They’re slipping into a giggling fit, and boys are looking on, champagne flowing from several bottles and splashing on the deck.
What a waste.
And someone is going to have to clean that up.
It’s not only the luxury of this yacht and being out at sea that underlines the sharp divide for me. It’s the mix of company on the boat tonight: mostly Carla’s friends from boarding school.Rich, elite, entitled. In the shadows, the people who serve and clean up after them. Waiters. Chefs. Mixologists.Bodyguards.
When I turned eighteen ten years ago, I didn’t celebrate in such flamboyant style. I wanted to jump ship from this privileged life to one that lets you melt into the shadows.
I wanted to disappear, and not only because my mom had died of cancer earlier that year. I wanted nobody to notice me, unlike Carla, who’s living her best life in the limelight of the European young, rich, and beautiful. Let’s hope this abundance of zero caution isn’t going to bite my little sister in the ass.
Carla is of age now, and in the world we’re part of, turning eighteen comes with serious hazards. So far, Don Trapani hasn’t said anything about her future, but my stepdad—and her biological father—is progressive and has allowed us more freedom than I’ve ever imagined. For now, Carla seems safe, but I know better.
I was eighteen once and almost forced into marriage. I stood my ground and fought tooth and nail for what I wanted—a life free of the Mafia and the obligations that came with it. I’ll be forever grateful for my stepfather who bowed to my wishes and let me be.
A server approaches me with a fresh tray of filled champagne flutes, and I shake my head. I’m heading to London for an art auction in the morning. Now that the toasts are done, I can sneak off to my cabin, but the DJ has turned up the volume, and I might struggle to sleep.
With champagne, I can never stick to just one glass, and I can’t be hungover on the job tomorrow. Red wine, on the other hand, is a whole other ballgame.
“I’ll have some wine. Bring me a Merlot, please.”
The server nods. That will knock me out in thirty minutes flat.
As he walks off, my stepdad, Don Mario Trapani, puts an empty glass on the server’s tray and comes to take my hand. His fingers are warm, his skin soft, his hand a safe haven for the young girl I once was. It’s still a strong, firm hold, but gentle at the same time. He’s never raised a hand to me in anger or in malice, but I’m not naive—this hand must have blood on it, but it’s never been mine. Don Trapani has proven himself to be an unexpected protective shield against this world we live in.
“Gigi.” He steps away to look at me at arm’s length. After a few intense seconds, he swallows, his face pained. “You always look so beautiful. Just like your mother did.”
“Thank you, Papa.” I’m the spitting image of my mom. A walking reminder of her to this man who took us in and loved us. With the way he looks at me and the emotion playing over his face, it’s as if she’s here tonight. I blink away the swell of tears. “It was a lovely speech.”
He squeezes my fingers as he raises them to his lips for a peck.
“Walk with me,cara,” he says.
I let him guide me down the main deck towards a quieter spot away from the party crowds.
We take a wide berth around a couple smooching. They’re either too drunk or too high to notice or care that their elderly host is strolling past them, because they don’t stop.
“Quite a party, isn’t it?” I chuckle. We all know howthat’sgoing to end.
“They’re young and carefree.” My stepdad smiles and winks at me. “Let them enjoy it while it lasts. As for Carla, let me spoil her while I can.”
We’re spoiled, for sure, each of us in our own way, but the way he says it makes my heart clutch. At seventy-two, my stepdad looks fit, but his eyes are tired.
Mom was Don Trapani’s second and last wife, and when she married him, he adopted me as his own, surname and all. Don Mario Trapani is mostly a good man and a good father, but all the love and devotion from this man could never wipe my memories clean. My first experience of a father—and men in general—is forever tainted. Men have this switch in them which they could flip on and off without warning. As a child, I’ve been on the receiving end of that flipped switch too many times.
I shrug off my dark thoughts. Ever since Don Trapani married Mom, I’ve had little reason to fear men on that level.
To think my stepdad has three kids, each from a different decade as we all have ten years between us. My stepbrother, Vincenzo Trapani, is the only offspring from his first marriage and also his only son. For some reason, he couldn’t be here tonight, and I’ve been so relieved it’s almost comical. Vincenzo might never have raised a hand at me, but he has a mean streak and makes my skin crawl.
We walk in silence until we reach the other side of the yacht where the party is less of a distraction, my mind wandering to memories of Mom and the unrelenting passing of time.
