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“I missed you so much,” I said, my voice cracking. “I thought you were dead. Vito told me you were all dead.”
I couldn’t say how long we stood there. A tiny part of me was afraid that if I let go, he would vanish.
I held on tight, trying to figure out how I felt. Dominic was from my past, but I couldn’t place him in my present. He felt like a familiar stranger.
I closed my eyes. Memories flooded back in, memories I tried to bury down. Dominic taking me for a drive the day he got his license. Dominic letting me watch Bram Stoker’s Dracula with him even when our parents said no. Dominic bringing me home birthday cake when I was too sick to go to Aunt Ginevra’s seventieth birthday party—he kept it hidden from the other two until I was well enough to eat it. Dominic picking me up after school in the second grade when Matteo Bianchi kept yanking on my braids. That boy never bothered me again after that, though he did ask me to go steady with him in the fourth grade.
My brother was always there. As the oldest of us, he should have wanted nothing to do with his clingy little sister, but he never stopped me from following him around like a lost puppy. More than that, he never once made me feel bad about it.
I had just as difficult a time making friends in elementary school as I did in college, so it made all the difference in the world to have been able to hang out with my big brother.
Dom pulled away just a little, just enough to look at me again like he needed to confirm I was still here.
“How did you find me?” I asked, my voice thick.
He scoffed. “The next time you go looking for information, pick someone other than Harry Belemonte. No secret is safe with that man.”
“But I didn’t tell him who I was. How did you know?”
“I didn’t. Belemonte said a dark-haired woman was making inquiries about the Luca family, and he pointed me here. I assumed…” He swallowed hard and looked at my arm where his grip had left red marks on my skin. His brow furrowed.
“It doesn’t matter, Dom. I’m fine. Besides, I think I got you back pretty good.” I glanced down at his foot.
He smiled ruefully but then his expression turned serious. “Dio, Sofia, I’ve been looking everywhere. Dad, and Dante, and Leo are going to be so happy to see—”
“No,” I said, stepping out of his embrace. “I’m not ready, Dom.”
I took another small step back. It was happening too fast. Sofia’s heart had barely started beating again.
“What do you mean you’re not ready?”
“I mean, I spent half of my life thinking my whole family was dead. When I found out it was a lie, I was so heartbroken, and confused, and angry. I thought you all wanted to get rid of me, and I still don’t understand why our parents did it.”
But maybe Dominic knew why. Maybe he could tell me why they sent me away, letting me believe they were dead.
“Why did they get rid of me, Dom?” I asked.
I held my breath, waiting for an answer I wasn’t certain I was prepared to hear.
His shoulders sagged, and his expression looked torn. He was angry too, though he was trying to keep it buried beneath the surface. Like me.
“I don’t know, Sofia. I don’t know whatMamminawas thinking. We had your funeral. We…” He swallowed hard. “I don’t know why she did it, but I know she must have had a good reason. She loved you. We all loved you.”
By the way he was talking, it sounded likeMamminawas the only one who knew. It was only my mother who plotted to send me away with Vito, never to see me again? It should have provided even a modicum of relief to know at least one of my parents had wanted me, but somehow, it was worse.
I could picture my mother, her kind smile, her warm eyes. I could still feel her arms around me and the brush of her lips whenever she kissed my cheek. But this woman, whom I loved so much that I could remember every detail about her, didn’t want me.
“Not even our father knew?” I pressed.
As a child, I grew up admiring the way my father always kissed my mother in the morning before he left. I couldn’t imagine there being any secrets between them, never mind the death—or not death—of their daughter.
Dom shook his head, then held out his hand like he explained away everything and wanted me to go with him. Right now.
Panic flooded my chest. “I can’t. Not yet. Please, Dom, just give me a little time.”
“Give you a little time? Sofia, the minute I tell them I found you—”
“Then please don’t.”
