Page 84 of Unlock My Heart

White-hot anger propels me to my feet as I grab my keys from my pocket. Holding the metal edge of our apartment key out, I run it from hood to trunk, scratching Nobody on the driver’s side door.

Chapter Twenty-Four

Fabien

The present

Sienna spins on her heel, ready to storm inside the house, but I hop up and throw her over my shoulder. “Put me down!”

“Not until you listen to every goddamn word I have to say,” I warn her.

Fabien

Twenty-one-years-old

My knuckles rap on Vitto’s door. I’m supposed to pick Sienna up after class, and I’m hoping whatever song and dance my old man’s about to make me do won’t take long.

“Enter,” he calls, his voice paper-thin.

I slip into his former office, the beeping of medical equipment the only sound as Papà lies still as the dead. Shit, is he dead? “You summoned me, Papà?” I give his shoulder a gentle shake.

Peeling his eyes open, he silently lifts his hand, constrained by the IV cord, and taps a manila envelope on the bedside table.

My stomach enters freefall when I open it. “What’s this?”

“What if fucking says. A marriage alliance.”

“I’m not agreeing to this,” I start.

“You’ll agree to it if you want to be boss.”

“Who could be boss besides me? Coked up Michele? All the other capos have one foot in the grave…” I trail off.

“Like me, boy?”

I choose silence.

“Did you really think I would face death with no plan? Wheels are in motion for your brother’s return, should you choose to defy me on this.”

“Angelo?” I sputter. “Mr. Ivy League’s not even a made man. He doesn’t have the backbone to run this family. It’d be a disaster.”

“No bigger a disaster than you taking the most lucrative whore for yourself and parading her around as your girl. Discretion, my boy,” he chides. “Angelo has it. You do not.”

“Leave Sienna out of this,” I say through my teeth. “And why do we even need this alliance with,” I pause, scanning the contract. “Baltimore?”

“This marriage will make your mama happy. God knows she deserves it.”

“So because you were a shitty husband, I have to pay for it?” I say hotly.

“Careful, Fabien. We both know that you don’t have a backbone, either,” he taunts.

My chin lifts. “I won’t do it.”

“Then your brother will be boss. Have fun taking your marching orders from him. I’m sure Angelo won’t hold a grudge.”

“You’re the one who drove a wedge between my brother and me,” I grit. “Always comparing me to him. Always telling me how smart he is and what an idiot I am.”

“And I stand by that assessment.”