Page 23 of Thin Lives

Calisto had to depend on those around him to fill in the blanks, and point him in the right direction. The one person he trusted above everyone else was the same man who would probably kill him just for remembering it all.

It killed her.

But Emma walked out of the office, tears in her eyes and a sob already catching in her throat, and closed the door behind her. Calisto had to remember on his own—he had to do it without her help, because if Affonso caught her doing what he had forbade, it would all end terribly.

Everything.

Their lives.

The love.

Her world.

Emma had to let Calisto do it on his own. Her hands were tied.

What else could she do?

Calisto

“Took you long enough, Donati.”

Calisto shot his sparring partner a grin as he let the gym worker tape his hands up properly. “Best I could do on a last minute call, Gio. Next time, give me some more time to get out of shit.”

Giovanni bounced on his heels, slapping his hands together from the other side of the cage. “I wondered when you were going to be back up on your feet and ready for another go in the cage with me.”

“Been a rough few months.”

“So I heard. Sorry about that, amico.”

Friend.

The softer tone of Gio’s words weren’t lost on Calisto, but he let them be said without much of a response. Giovanni Marcello wasn’t the kind of man who was openly affectionate, even with friends. Frankly, no man in their business was.

Gio belonged to a fellow New York family, the long-reigning Marcellos, actually. His older brother was the Don of the family, and the most powerful man who sat at the Commission table once a year when all the major crime syndicates got together to chat about territory, business, and issues.

Usually, men from different families didn’t mingle. That’s just how Cosa Nostra worked. Calisto had his own shit to handle being Affonso’s consigliere, and Gio had his thing to handle being who he was in his family.

But the two had been friends for a long time—about a decade.

Calisto didn’t see the problem with meeting up every once in a blue moon to shoot the shit with Gio, and pass a few punches in the cage. If anything, it helped to keep the peace between their families and on the streets of New York, given that there was a camaraderie and an old friendship there.

That was good for business.

With his hands taped up properly, Calisto turned to face his old friend. A mouth guard dangled from Gio’s fingertips. The gym worker passed a new one to Calisto before he left the cage.

“Heard your head is kind of scrambled,” Gio said, smirking just a little.

Calisto couldn’t help but laugh. “Yeah, you could say that.”

“How would you say it?”

“Two and a half years of blackness.”

Gio lifted a brow. “Completely?”

Calisto shrugged, wishing the weight on his shoulders would leave. “Basically.”

“Shit. That’s …”