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Murdered.
And none of you care.
The crowd parts, and I see Dad staring back at me, his expression as grim as his black suit. Did he see me talking to Salvatore? Does he know how much I want to scream to everyone about what happened the night Salvatore, Vinicius, Cassius, and Lorenzo came to my birthday party?
Which of them will killmeif I let one word of the truth drop from my lips?
I go and sit up on the second-floor landing, listening to the jumbled conversations downstairs. Every now and then a word floats up to me.
Sometimes it’s my name.
Mostly it’s Dad’s, orcampaign, orvotes, orstrategy.
I don’t hear Mom’s name. Not even once.
Hours pass, and then the voices start to thin out. Soon there’s a little conversation, but mostly the clink of plates and glasses as the catering crew packs up. As dusk falls, even those sounds recede.
I draw the black veil from my hair, leave it on the stairs and get to my feet. It’s the moment I’ve been anticipating and dreading, the moment Dad and I are finally alone together.
I find him in the empty living room, tapping away on his tablet. I suppose he has lots of emails to catch up on after a day wasted on his wife’s funeral. I stand in front of him, rigid with hatred, until he finally looks up.
“Yes, Chiara?” he asks, fingertip poised over the screen.
It’s the first time we’ve talked since he came into my room three days after my mother’s death and informed me that I’d be marrying Salvatore.
“A good day’s campaigning?” I ask, my throat tight.
I search his face for a hint of the father I once knew. He was always austere and more interested in me intellectually than emotionally, but he was never this cold. Something happened to him these past few months that made him switch off from Mom and me completely.
Now, looking into his eyes is like gazing into a dark abyss.
Dad turns his attention back to his tablet. I dart forward and snatch it away from him. “Why didn’t you prepare me for this? Why didn’t you prepare Mom? She didn’t have to die. You should havetold—”
Dad’s temper suddenly flares and he snatches the tablet from me. “I taught her to do as she was told! I thought she knew her place. Not well enough, apparently. Not when it came to you.”
“Shelovedme. You were supposed to lovebothof us and protect us. Nothing you did could have prepared me for this.”
“What’s done is done. You’ve had weeks to accept that you’re promised to Salvatore Fiore, and you have a year to prepare yourself for the wedding. I’m not rushing you into anything.”
I stare at him, unable to believe what I’m hearing. “I could go to the police. What would become of your plans then?”
“Shall I call Salvatore and tell him, or will you?”
I step back and swallow hard.
“I thought so,” Dad sneers. “You’d better think long and hard about this world and your place in it. There are consequences if you don’t marry Salvatore. If you refuse, what else are you good for?”
I scream and fling myself at him, fists raised to beat his face, his chest, anywhere I can land a hit. He grabs my wrists easily and throws me aside, and I go tumbling to the carpet.
He looms over me. “You’d better learn to behave. In one year, you won’t be my problem anymore, and I can assure you, your husband won’t spoil you as much as I clearly did. Prepare yourself, Chiara. What happens next is up to you.”
“Nothing about this is my decision,” I seethe, getting to my feet. “Nothing.”
I stay where I am and stare at my father for several silent minutes, watching him work, but I may as well be staring at a brick wall. I’m waiting for some sign of feeling.
Regret.
Humanity.
