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Mary slid onto the rickety stool of her vanity and picked up her tweezers. “I’ll get you both fashionable one of these days, you just wait and see.” Leaning close to the mirror, she met Sabina’s reflected gaze. “Izzy told me about the ambush the other night. Is Enzo okay?”
“Still getting headaches, but otherwise he’s fine.”
“Good. I’d hate to think of him starting his new single life with an injury.”
Sabina sucked in a breath and looked to Isadora for support. “About that. I’d appreciate it if you wouldn’t go around telling people that we broke up.”
“Why not?” Had she had eyebrows, Mary would have lifted them. “It’s true, isn’t it? Izzy said he came over to break up with you.”
Isadora sighed and leaned back against the wall at the head of her bed, closing her eyes. She looked as though she might fall asleep just like that, if given half a chance. “I also said he took a bullet for her, so I didn’t know where things stood now.”
When Mary turned around, expectation covering her face, Sabina had to force herself to look into her eyes. “It’s not fully settled, but he agreed to give me another chance.”
“Bina!” Mary tossed her tweezers back on the vanity. “Why in the world would you want one? He’s boring, he’s self-righteous, he’s—”
“A good man. I was terrified when I thought I lost him, Mary, can’t you understand that? I had a lot of time to think while I was sitting up with him that night, and it made me realize what a huge mistake I’d made. How much I wanted to make things work with him. How…how ashamed I was of what I’d become. Sneaking out, going to gin bars, carrying on with Roman like I’d done.” She shook her head, heat stinging her cheeks again at the thought.
A thunderhead clouded Mary’s eyes. Sabina hadn’t meant it as an indictment of her—but it probably sounded that way. “It was just a little fun, Bina. And after the way he’s ignored you all these years, you deserved a little fun.”
Isadora stiffened. Sabina had the feeling this wasn’t just a conversation about her, but one the sisters had been having for who-knew-how-long about their own choices. She’d have to tread very carefully. “That’s what I wanted to believe. But the cost—it was just too high. My bad judgment nearly got my father put away for life. If any of these charges stick, that’s on me.” She splayed a hand over her heavy heart. “I have to live with that.”
Mary moved to sit beside her on the bed, took her hands. “I get that. I do. But I saw the way Roman looked at you, and it wasn’t for show, pussycat. I swear it wasn’t. There’s something there—and the way you lit up with him! You came to life again. Can’t you see? If you go back to Enzo, you’ll just fade away again, and I can’t let that happen.”
“It won’t.” She looked deep into Mary’s eyes, begging her to see the truth. “I promise it won’t. We’ve talked through it, we know where we misstepped before. It’ll be different this time.”
“No. He’ll be just like he always is, and you’ll just let him, like you always do.” Mary shook her head, something a bit wild in her eyes, and pushed to her feet. “Why didn’t he just become a priest, like everyone thought he would? That’s where he belongs—taking vows like his cousin Teo, engaging in all that stuffy talk all the time. Why’d he have to drag you into all his nonsense?”
Sabina tried to swallow, but her throat felt swollen.
“He loves her.” Isadora’s words were quiet but sure. “He’s always loved her. Joey said that was why he wanted to go to college instead. So he could marry her someday. It was all for her, always for her.”
Sabina felt a flush steal through her—and then overheat her. It was heady, to think he’d loved her so much, for so long…but it was heavy too. Lorenzo had always taken matters of faith so much more seriously than anyone else in their families. It was no great thing for their mothers to go to daily mass and confession every first Friday like clockwork, but she remembered the way his brothers had mocked him for doing the same when he was no older than G.
The faith, the call to serve—that had been everything to him. Had he really given it up for her?
She hadn’t ever thought about it in quite those terms. She’d only been fifteen when he announced he was going to college. Sixteen when she realized he was courting her. Eighteen when he slid that diamond onto her finger and promised her a lifetime together.
She twirled it around her finger, watching the spots of light dance over the walls of Mary’s side of the room, with her posters and theater programs tacked up. Isadora’s side had nothing on the wall but the cheap tin crucifix that had been there forever.
Did Enzo regret choosing her? Was that why he’d hesitated when she asked for another chance? Was it about far more than her bad choices with Roman?
Maybe that was why her prayers all these years had gone unanswered. Maybe God dealt harshly with puttanas who lured His chosen priests away from their vocations. Maybe God was so real and present to him because he was chosen for something special, called to sainthood—and maybe He would never extend the same to Sabina.
Mary huffed. “He doesn’t love her. He wants to change her.”
“No.” Isadora’s proclamation was soft, but it resonated deep inside Sabina’s heart. “He may want her to change—for her own sake, for the good of her soul. He may want her to leave behind the behavior that got her into this. But that doesn’t mean changing who she is.”
Didn’t it? When she read that poem last night, she hadn’t been so sure. Lorenzo talked about the inclination of the heart; those poems talked about a beauty that stretched into eternity. She was only a woman—not a saint. A woman whose heart had been cold as ice for so long. What if she could never stretch beyond who she was now? What if she could never figure out how to walk the line between Enzo and Papa, God and the Family?
What if she spent the rest of her life disappointing all the people who mattered most?
The old clock on the cabinet of the police station ticked into the silence, effectively measuring the disbelief of the homicide detective before whom Roman and Cliff sat. Detective Bannigan eyed Roman with a gaze shared by all good cops—measuring, probing, wary, and more than a little cynical. Roman didn’t blame the guy for the doubt that oozed from his posture—he would have shared it had he been on the other side of the desk.
He’d used that look himself whenever some joker waltzed in with a cockamamie story and wild accusations. A few years ago, he’d have been the one tapping a finger to his stained blotter, trying to weigh information against gut instinct and reason. He’d have been the one looking from the tired old clock on the cabinet to the busy bullpen full of friends and strangers, cops and criminals. He’d have been the one debating whether this case would make or break his career—see him promoted or send him into a gutter with a gangster’s bullet in his head.
“So let me get this straight.” Bannigan waved a finger in a circle, glancing from Cliff to Roman. “Two months ago you were out at an illegal bar with a known gangster. When you were there, you saw a prostitute come in on the arm of another known gangster who ended up dead later that night. So you assume that the gangster you were with is responsible because you just realized the other one’s moll is really his?” The detective leaned forward, his eyes bright with mockery. “Son, you’ve got imagination, I’ll give you that, but you’re sorely lacking in common sense if you think we can make an arrest based on evidence as flimsy as that.”
Cliff sent him an I-told-you-so look, which Roman ignored. He leaned back in his uncomfortable chair, projecting an air of supreme ease. “You left out a few key details that make it slightly less flimsy, but I’m well aware that it’s a stretch right now. Let’s call it a gut instinct.”
