Liliana “The nerve of that girl! Ever since she was born she has been nothing but trouble!” My father’s words echoed throughout the house. Fabiano looked at me as if I knew the answers to his questions. My mind was a huge question mark. I wasn’t exactly sure what had happened, but I got the gist of it. Gianna had disappeared while in New York with Aria. Now everyone was looking for her. No wonder Aria hadn’t asked me to go see her, too. Not that I would have been very excited about going back to New York after my last awkward encounter with Romero four weeks earlier. But it still hurt that Aria and Gianna had been making plans behind my back, behind everyone’s back.
I walked down the stairs, signaling Fabi to stay where he was, and then slowly approached Dad’s office.
Mom was there, crying. Dad was on the phone, from his still angry but more restrained tone, I thought with his boss Cavallaro. Cavallaro was the only person Dad really respected. Mom saw me at the door and quickly shook her head, but I took another step forward and entered the office .
I knew it was best to stay away from Dad when he was in a mood like that, even though he usually lashed out at Gianna and not at me, but my sister was now gone.
Dad hung up, then looked at me with half-closed eyes. ” Did I let you in?”
His voice hit me like a lash, but I stood firm.
“What happened to Gianna?”
Mom gave me a warning look.
“Your sister ran away. She’ll probably get knocked up by some idiot and ruin her reputation and that of our family.”
“Maybe she’ll come back,” I suggested. But somehow I knew she wouldn’t. This was not an impromptu thing . He had been planning it, probably for months. That explained all the secrecy with Aria during our last visit to New York. Why hadn’t they told me? Did they not trust me?
Did they think I would run to Father at the first opportunity? And then another thought buried itself in my mind. If Gianna had left, if she had not married Matthew, who else would? Fear overwhelmed me. What if Father had made me marry Matteo? I hoped I could marry for love now that my sisters had already been given in marriage for tactical reasons. Perhaps it was a selfish thing to think in a situation like this, but I couldn’t help it. An image of Romero leapt into my mind. I knew it was foolish to think of him when it came to marriage. Even if Gianna came back and married Matthew anyway, it would be almost impossible to convince Father to give me to a mere soldier, especially one from New York. And then there was the problem that he didn’t even want me and that I had promised myself to forget him.
I knew all that, but that didn’t mean I couldn’t hope and dream, sometimes it seemed like that was all I could do.
“How many men will Gianna have had up to that point? She won’t be worth anything even if she comes back,” Father spat. I grimaced, horrified by his harsh words. Would we be worth nothing? Surely we were more than a commodity for him to sell. More than a thin piece of meat between our legs?
Father grabbed my shoulders, his eyes burning . I drew back, but he did not let go. “Don’t think I don’t see how you are making eyes at my soldiers. You look too much like Gianna for your own good. I will not allow another daughter to tease me.”
“I won’t,” I whispered. My father had never spoken to me in that tone before. His expression and words made me feel petty and unworthy, as if I needed to cleanse myself of my impure thoughts.
“That’s right. I don’t care if I have to lock you in your room until your wedding day to protect your reputation and honor.”
It was not about my honor or reputation. I didn’t care . It was only about my father. It was always about the men in the family and what they wanted and expected.
“Rocco, Lily is a good girl. She wouldn’t do anything,” my mother said cautiously. That was not what she used to tell me.
She was always warning me that I was too flirtatious, too aware of the effect my body had on men. But I was glad of her support because too often she had remained silent when my father had attacked Gianna in the same way.
My father let me go and turned on her. “It was your job to raise good girls. For your sake, I hope you are right and that Liliana does not follow Gianna.” The threat in her voice made me tremble. How could he be so horrible to his own wife?
Mother whitened. I stepped back and no one tried to stop me. I quickly ran upstairs. Fabi waited for me, wide-eyed and curious. “What happened?” he asked frightened.
I shook my head in response, not in the mood to recap everything for him, and rushed toward my room.
I had never been the focus of Dad’s anger like that. But now that Gianna was gone too, he would keep an eye on me, making sure I was the perfect woman he wanted his daughters to be. I had always felt free, I had never understood why Gianna felt so restricted from our lives, but now I was beginning to realize. Now things were going to change.
*** In the months following Gianna’s escape, things at home had been tense at best. Dad had lost his mind over the smallest things . He had only hit me twice, but Fabi had not been so lucky.
But worse than the violence was his constant suspicion, the way he looked at me as if I were another scandal in the making. My gilded cage had gotten a little smaller, even though it had seemed almost impossible before. I hoped things would change now that Matthew had captured Gianna and was bringing her back to Chicago. Maybe that would appease Father, although he had seemed anything but appeased the last time I had seen him. I wasn’t quite sure exactly what had happened, but from what I understood Gianna had been captured with another man, and that was the worst-case scenario in our world. Father would probably have put handcuffs on me to prevent me from doing the same.
“When will they be here?” asked Fabiano for the hundredth time. His voice had a plaintive tinge to it, and I had to restrain myself from lashing out at him in frustration.
Fabiano and I had been waiting on the second floor landing for twenty minutes, and my patience was running out.
“I don’t know,” I whispered. “Shut up. If Mom finds out we’re not in our rooms, we’ll be in trouble.”
“But…”
Voices were heard from below. I recognized one, Luca’s. He managed to fill a house with that voice; now I wonder, considering how big it was.
“I’m here!” Fabiano rushed out, and I immediately went after him as we descended the stairs like a fury.
I immediately saw Gianna. She now had brown hair and looked completely exhausted, but other than that she was the sister I remembered. My father had often said that she would be a new person if she ever came back;
a horrible, useless person.
My father cast a glancing glare at Fabi and me when he noticed us, but I didn’t care. I ran to Gianna and wrapped my arms around her. I had missed her so much. When I first heard that she had been caught by Matteo, I had feared he would kill her, so seeing her unharmed was a huge relief.
“Didn’t I tell you to keep them upstairs?”
hissed my father.
“I’m sorry. They were too fast,” my mother said. I turned to look over my shoulder to see her sorry face as she came down the stairs. Since Gianna had run away, my father had always been nervous and had often lashed out at her. His screams had woken me up more than once at night. I wasn’t sure when he had become so violent. I didn’t remember him like that when I was younger, or maybe I was just less aware of those things.
“Lily, Fabi, go back to your rooms,” my father ordered. I let Gianna go and was about to protest, but Fabi beat me to it.
“But my father, we haven’t seen Gianna in forever,” Fabi muttered.
My father advanced toward us and I stiffened. He rarely beat me, but he looked furious. He grabbed Fabi and me and dragged us away from Gianna. Then he pushed us toward the stairs. “Now upstairs.”
I staggered from the force of his push, but when I regained my balance I stopped and did not move. I couldn’t believe he wouldn’t let us talk to Gianna after we hadn’t seen her in so long.
“It’s okay,” Gianna said, but her face told a different story . She looked hurt and sad, and usually Gianna was not a person who showed that kind of emotion. “We can talk later.”
My eyes were drawn to something behind her:
Romero. He was strong and tall, his eyes firmly focused on my father. I had not seen him in seven months, and over time I had thought I had gotten over my crush, but seeing him now my stomach fluttered with butterflies again.
My father’s outburst drew my attention to him again. “No, you can’t. I don’t want you around them anymore. You are no longer my daughter and I don’t want your rot to infect Liliana,” he thundered. It seemed that he would love nothing more than to kill Gianna. It frightened me. Shouldn’t he have loved us, his children, no matter what? If I ever did something he disapproved of, would he hate me too?
“That’s bullshit,” said Matteo.
“Matthew,” said Luke. “It’s none of our business.” My eyes darted between the two, then back to Romero, who had one hand under his vest. A twisted part of me wanted to see him in action. He was probably amazing in combat situations, and an even worse part knew that Mom, Fabi, and I would be better off if Dad was gone.
Mom wrapped her fingers around my wrist and took Fabi’s hand. “Come now,” she said insistently, dragging us toward the stairs and upstairs.
“That’s right. This is my family and Gianna is still subject to my rules, never forget that,” Father said.
“I thought I was no longer your daughter, so why do I have to listen to a word you say?”
My head turned, stunned by the venom in Gianna’s voice.
“Careful,” Father hissed. “You are still part of the Outfit.” He looked like he would have beaten Gianna if not for Matthew holding her by the waist. Mother tried to drag me with her, but Romero looked up at that moment and his eyes met mine. His rejection on my birthday was still fresh in my mind, yet I knew I still wanted to kiss him. Why did we sometimes want something impossible? Something that would only lead to pain?