【You'd better not forget, half the tribute that bought those animals came off your own envelope! If she runs to the Feds, you don't walk away clean either!】
Marco:【I've been at her side for days now. She trusts me. She won't go to the Feds.】
Serafina:【Then when are you coming to me?】
Marco:【The moment she's asleep.】
My breathing turned ragged, my fingers shaking beyond my control.
He'd left me sitting there in my wedding dress, the vows barely cold, and gone to Serafina's bed.
He was the one who paid to have me destroyed.
I slid the backup phone back into the drawer.
The door of the room opened.
"Tesoro, why aren't you asleep yet?"
He came to the bedside and tucked the blanket up around me, the picture of a devoted husband. A made man playing his part for an audience of one.
"About to. The Family's busy this season. You don't have to sit with me."
"How could I do that? I've already told the crew I'm taking time. Once you're stronger, I'll take you somewhere far from all of this. Clear your head."
Marco stroked my hair.
"All right. Then we'll settle the paperwork and go home tomorrow."
All I wanted now was to be out of there, away from him.
The day they let me go, we went home.
Every scrap of red wedding trim, every symbol of the union our families had sealed, had been stripped from the front room, replaced by pale beige curtains and a beige rug. As if the pact had never been signed in blood at all.
Marco poured a glass of warm water and set it on the low table, then took out his phone and tapped at it a few times.
My phone buzzed.
A message: twenty thousand deposited into my account.
"Tesoro, take this. Twenty thousand. Buy yourself whatever you want, clothes, something that catches the light. From now on every envelope I earn goes straight to you."
Marco sat down beside me.
"Keep it. I don't need your money."
I was about to send it back when he closed his hand over mine.
"Take it. I want to make it right."
Just then came a knock at the door.
Marco's brow drew tight. He stood and went to answer it.
Serafina waited in the hall in a scarlet, thin-strapped dress, the Don's goddaughter dressed to be seen.
"Well. I heard Gioia Ferraro was let out, so I came to pay my respects."
She craned her neck, trying to see past him into the apartment.
Marco filled the doorframe. "What are you doing here? Get out."
"Marco, why are you blocking the door?"
Serafina let out a soft laugh, and for half a second too long the smile held while her fingers pressed flat against her thigh. "Afraid it'll upset her to see me?"
Marco seized her wrist, hauled her out into the hall, and shut the door behind them with a heavy bang.
The two of them were in it together, thick as thieves, bound by the same secret, yet here they were performing this show of being at each other's throats.
I badly wanted to know how they truly moved around each other, behind my back, when no one was meant to watch.
I got up, crossed to the door, and pressed my eye to the peephole.
The stairwell's motion light had come on.
Serafina flung his hand off and jabbed a finger into his chest.
"Marco, what's the sour face for?"
She dropped her voice low. "What, feeling sorry for her now that you've seen the state she's in?"
Marco caught her finger. "I told you to leave her alone."
Serafina gave a cold laugh. "Don't forget, the getaway tribute for those thugs came out of your pocket."
"If you can't keep her quiet and she runs to the Feds, we all go down together."
"Fine. I'll walk in right now and tell her exactly where you were on your wedding night."
She stepped forward, reaching for the handle.
"Shut your mouth."
Marco yanked her back and pinned her hard against the white stairwell wall.
He lowered his head and covered her mouth with his own.
Serafina braced both hands against his chest, pushed twice for show, then wound her arms around his neck.
They were tangled together, right there outside the door, in the open, where any soul on the landing could have seen.
His hand even slipped up beneath the hem of her dress.
I let go of the handle and stepped back. Twice.
