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We get seated in Joe’s office after grabbing a bottle of bourbon and some glasses. Watching Sia and her brother reconnect after all this time apart, I know they’ll need the drinks. Looking at Luca I feel a strange familiarity. One that has nothing to do with seeing him fight. I think it may be because I might have seen him when we were kids. He was around eight years old when his parents were killed, so it’s likely that our parents threw us together more than once. He’s not someone you’d forget either. He’s built like a linebacker, bigger than Marco but still not quite my size. The tattoo above his eyebrow saysvivi o muori, live or die, in a complicated script, but it’s a phrase known to made men. I’m wondering if he’s a made man himself or if he plans to be.
Coming back to the moment, I sit back and watch my girl be filled with joy at having her brother back.
“Sorellina, how did you find me? I’ve been looking for you since I turned eighteen, and I’ve never had luck. I went to all the city case workers and they all said you weren’t in their system,” Luca asks while pouring us all drinks.
“I’ve never been in New York until my last birthday. I’ve been in Dallas, Texas. I was a child of the state there and as soon as I aged out and got my state fund release, I bought a bus ticket and came to Manhattan. My birth certificate only had my information. Not mom or dad’s names. I got a job here in Medusa’s Lounge as the singer and that’s when I met Gavriel.” She looks over at me with a sweet smile and grabs my hand.
Luca sees but doesn't say anything about it. Which is good because I’d hate to have any bad blood with my woman’s brother.
“I never thought to look anywhere else. I was taken to San Diego, California, and became a ward of the state. I spent most of my childhood in juvie and detention centers. Every time I was put into a foster home or a children’s shelter I tried to run away and find you. The only way they could keep me from running was to lock me away,” Luca says with an edge to his voice. His is raspy like Sia’s but deeper, with a surfer’s accent.
Sia is breathing hard, fingers twitching like she’s itching to spill someone’s blood. “Did they hurt you, Luca? Did they harm you like they did me?” She slams her mouth shut, realizing she said something she planned not to tell yet.
Luca jumps up immediately and knocks his chair over, making me jump up as well. “Who hurt you?Dimmelo ora e gli taglio loro la gola!Tell me now and I’ll slit their fucking throats, Anastasia!” He looks over at me with the same fire in his eyes that Sia has when her knife is out to play. Sia jumps up and steps between us, but she’s not seeing what I am. I see a man looking for someone to point him in the direction of her abusers.
“No, Luca, Gavriel would never hurt me. He’s the one who found out who our mother and father were. He’s been on the hunt for their murders and even has one in a cell dying a slow death.” I hold a hand up to her so stop her from saying more.
“It’s okay,amore,” I tell her but turn to Luca and say, “Fratello, calmo. Calm, brother. I love your sister and her safety has been top priority to me and my family. You know who I am and who my family is, yes?”
His stance changes as he straightens. “Yes, capo. I know who you all are. I’m not a made man, but I work for the east side Renzetti capo, Alessandro DeLucci. I was planning to seek your father out and ask for help finding my sister, but I was never able to get word to Hangman. Something would always come up preventing it. Four weeks ago, my car was blown up in the parking lot of my apartment. I had been asking around about Andino Renzetti trying to find a way to speak with him. DeLucci said he told the underboss but nothing ever came of it. I figured my car getting blown up was a way of saying fuck off.”
The fuck?
“No way would we pull some outlandish stunt like that,” I say, bewildered.
All we’d have to do is send asoldatoout to warn him to stop seeking an audience. Putting the light on us and our dealings is not something a boss does. Not a good one like my father, at least.
“Fucking Adriano.” Sia hisses and she’s right. The fuckface would do some bullshit like that.
“Sia is right. Adriano, my father’s underboss, is most likely the culprit for that. He is who I have in a cell. He will die a painfully slow death. My family, aside from the traitor Adriano, had no idea you or your sister were alive. Everyone inla famigliathought you had perished in the fire along with your parents. When Anastasia and I first met I still hadn’t known who she was, but when she mentioned she was looking for information on her parents I had my mother call in a favor with the governor’s wife. We’d been looking for you since figuring out her parentage, but you’re using a different name.”
We all sit back down and continue the conversation.
“Yes, it’s the name on my birth certificate, but I knew my original name,” he tells me, but then he looks at Sia and asks, “Do you remember the woman who stole us away before the fire reached our room?”
“No, I don’t. Who was she, a maid?”
He shakes his head. “I can’t remember much either, but I can never forgetZiarunning with me on her back and you in her arms. I just don’t know why my name was changed and why we were separated.”
Sia looks at me in shock, but I see the anger rising too.
There’s only one woman who is theirzia. Marcella Franco Renzetti.
“We’ll find out everything. There’s a lot we need to catch you up on, though,” I tell him and pour us more drinks.
The next few hours we filled Luca in on all the events of the past few months. It’s a long conversation, but it’s worth it because every time Sia looks at me I see her eyes filled with love and appreciation for me, but she doesn’t know that it’s her whom I love and appreciate more with each tick of the clock.
As we’re leaving the office, we see the bar is empty except for Marco and Carla, who are in the corner of the bar—fucking? Are these two really fucking in a booth in Joe’s bar? When Carla sees us, she giggles and stands. I guess they weren’t fucking but from the way Marco is adjusting himself I can see how close they were to doing just that.Il fottuto ragazzo. I don’t say anything, just shake my head.
“Where’s Silver?” Luca asks while putting our glasses on the bar and looking around for his woman.
“Last I saw her she was saying goodbye to that cute friend of hers.”
Marco growls and pulls on her hair lightly, making her giggle.
“Then she went to the restroom, but I didn’t see her come out. I was—uh, I was a little preoccupied. I’ll go look.” She turns to go but something doesn’t feel right and Sia feels it too because she pulls out her switchblade in her right hand, and in her left she has the matte black one I bought her to match my own.
“No, Carla, stay with Marco. Sia, is there a window in the restroom? A way for someone to climb in?” I ask, pulling out my gun and clicking the safety off.
