Page 74 of Unraveled

Corrado’s body was still waiting to be buried because of the frost in the ground. Another month, and the ground would be soft enough to dig. Gian didn’t plan to attend that event, but he figured that he didn’t need to.

“Do you come here often?” Gian asked his father.

Frederic set his newspaper aside. “Once a week to say hello to Ma. She used to threaten me that if I didn’t come to chat with her—even when she was dead—that she would haunt me for it. Turns out, this is like a haunting of sorts, anyway.”

“What about for Corrado?”

His father pointed to his temple. “That’s all in here. I hear him all the time there, Gian.”

Strange …

“I don’t hear him there. Or rarely.”

Frederic lifted his brow and said, “Perhaps you’re not listening close enough, son.”

“Or maybe he thinks he told me enough when he was alive that he shouldn’t need to be repeating it now.”

“Or that,” his father agreed, chuckling. “What did you want me here for today?”

Gian stood straight again, and crossed the path to sit with his father on the bench. “There have been some ongoing problems lately.”

“You must think I’m completely out of the loop because I’m not a made man.”

“I assume nothing about no one, Dad.”

Frederic looked over at his son. “And why is that?”

“Assumptions make for dead men.”

His father tapped the side of his head. “See, Corrado is in there, Gian. He simply doesn’t manifest to you the same way he does to me.”

“And how is that?”

“I often hear him voicing my failures, or his lack of approval. I never gave him what he wanted—except for you—after all.”

“But how do I hear him?” Gian asked.

“You hear yourself, son, because you’re too much like your grandfather to find the distinction at the moment.”

“We weren’t entirely the same.”

“It’s enough,” his father said, vaguely. “I know you’re having problems with Edmond and his older men. I figured you would, Corrado probably did, too. I think he hoped to make it longer than Edmond, but knew that wasn’t going to happen what with the cancer diagnosis. Nonetheless, here you are. I also hear you’ve found yourself a … friend.”

Gian’s expression blanked, and he was determined to keep his emotions that way on this topic with his father. “I don’t need to hear your opinions on that side of things.”

“Yes, well—”

“I also don’t want to hear it, Dad.”

“But what exactly are you going to do with the Rossi girl, Gian?” His father scoffed. “It’s not like you can have any kind of acceptable future with her.”

“Who says?”

“Cosa Nostra, and you know why.”

Gian clenched his jaw. “For a man who didn’t want to be a part of la famiglia, you’re well-versed on things you have no business knowing.”

“Thank your grandfather for that.”