Page 37 of Sacred Blood

When I let her go, she fell forward, and stretched out on the mattress. Grabbing a warm wet cloth from the bathroom, I cleaned her up and then myself.

“So, you have my full attention,” I said lightly. “Now what was so important that you had to steal a gun and point it at Vincent?”

She rolled onto her back and scooted to lean against the backboard. “I shouldn’t have done that and I feel bad about it. Vincent’s a nice guy, for a muscle-bound goon.”

“Watch it,” I said, smiling thinly in spite of myself.

She sighed and grew serious. “I understand the importance of keeping me safe and I don’t want to compromise that, but I feel trapped. I have nothing to do but think, and the things I end up thinking just spiral into anxiety. I never know where you are or when I’ll see you again. I feel so isolated and afraid. And I do think I’ve actually thought of real important things, but I’ve got no way to tell you, I just have to sit with them going round and round in my head until I feel sick! And I know you’re going to say, oh, you’re just bored—”

“I would never say that.”

“Oh no? Then why did you tell Vincent I don’t need a phone and I can just journal if I need something to do? Why stop there? How about crayons and a coloring book for the big baby?”

“That’s enough.” But I had to admit, she had a point. “I will get you a burner phone. Now tell me these important thoughts.”

She crossed her legs and wiggled her behind into the mattress, getting comfortable. “Okay, here it is. I think my mom may not be Italian. I mean, I think my mom may be Russian.”

That would make more sense than Knyazev reaching out to Calabretta or vice versa. If the connection was through the mother, then we’d been looking in the wrong place.

“Why do you think that, piccina?”

She grimaced. “Well, she doesn’t have an accent or anything, but she’s blonde with light eyes, very fair skin, kind of thin lips and a very tall forehead? Oh, saying it out loud, I feel silly,” she grumbled, rubbing at her face.

“No, I see what you mean,” I said slowly. “Is there anything else?”

Gaby sat up a little straighter. “We have never met anyone on my mother's side of the family, not even a cousin. When I asked about her family for ancestry day at school, my father told me my mother was orphaned as a young child and didn’t like to talk about her family, it was too painful. I accepted that at the time, but it’s strange. She doesn’t have a single photo from any time before her wedding to my father. Not of herself, not of her family, nothing. I can trace every branch of my father’s family back to the fifteenth century, but my mother seems to have appeared out of nowhere.”

That was odd, especially for an Italian family, who would naturally boast about their ancestral roots.

“And then there’s the way she acts. She took such a hard line with us, with me in particular, always trying to control what we did, how we behaved, who we knew. Yes, I know, most parents do, but she was…different. I can’t explain it. She’d swoop down on me like a raven, pecking and cawing, and then my father would wave his hand and she would just…walk away. At the time, I thought it was only natural that my father’s word was final. He’s the head of the household, but it never sat right with me. It was like…she was pretending to be the strict, caring parent until she was told her part was played and then she would shrug her shoulders like it wasn’t her problem.

“I could be wrong, but once I started thinking about it…Oh, and there is one more thing, Tano.” She swallowed and when her eyes found mine, they glittered with emotion. “I'm sure you’ve noticed that I don’t have the olive skin that is quite common for us. Not that my coloring is unique, I mean, there are some lighter Italians, but out of us three sisters, I’m the odd one out. My sisters look just like my father, but I don’t. And I don’t really look like my mother, either. When I say it out loud it sounds stupid. Maybe I’m just being paranoid.”

My poor piccina was questioning who she was and I didn’t like it one bit. She deserved the world and all of its pleasures, not to be stuck worrying about who she was. I vowed to get to the bottom of this and reassure her. Maybe it was time for me and Romeo to go to the source.

“Come here, Gabriella.” I scooped her onto my lap as she crawled closer and helped her snuggle into my chest. “Now you listen to me. There are many reasons you may look different to the rest of the family. Our baby brother, Vincenzo, looks nothing like the rest of us, but he is our brother. I’ll share a secret with you. My parents were killed when I was just a child. My father was Romeo’s father's consigliere. He and my mother were the casualties of some blood feud.”

Her eyes filled with sympathy and she held me tighter.

“Such is life,” I said. “But when my parents died, Romeo’s parents, Isabella and Luciano Vitale, took my brothers, Massimo and Antonio, and me in. They adopted the three of us. We were born Di Mauro but became Vitales when we joined the family. The first few months were difficult. Massimo barely spoke. Antonio cried himself to sleep most nights. As for me, I processed grief differently. I understood loss, and was angry about it.

Looking back, I wasn't the easiest child.

I fought.

Argued. Tested every boundary they set.

Part of me expected them to give up and send us away. Instead, Isabella loved us harder.

She made sure we sat together at dinner every night. She attended school events, remembered birthdays, and somehow always knew when one of us was struggling before we said a word.

Luciano was different.

Quiet.

Patient.

Steady.