AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Charlie and I exchange glances, and I can tell that he’s absolutely dying to say something snide about her.
“Don’t, just let her be. She’s doing the best with what she’s given,” I say before he has the chance to open his mouth.
“Yeah, we’ll see, I guess.”
It takes her forever and a day to come back down, but when she does, she looks like a different person. Her hair, typically a cascade of blonde waves, has been replaced by straight chocolate brown. Her eyes are brown as well, and it’s uncanny to see what she would look like with such features. Her face is so beautiful that she can pull off any hair color or style, and it’s exciting to see her playing a character.
The dress she’s chosen is olive green, which is a respectable choice. I’m proud of her for being able to blend into this role so seamlessly.
I change into my clothes, and within twenty minutes, a luxury town car has pulled up to the front of the house to collect us.
“Okay, here we go. Do you have everything?” Charlie asks June and me.
We both nod, each of us working on projecting the calmest demeanor that we can possibly find within ourselves. For someone who doesn’t have any experience with being this terrified, June is absorbing each moment effortlessly. It’s admirable and a little bit of a turn-on. I’ve never met a woman who would stand by my side in the way that she is.
After we’ve both steadied ourselves, we part ways with Charlie and step into the car without another word.
ChapterThirty-Two
JUNE
Arriving at a wedding for criminals feels surreal. The venue is like something I’d only ever seen in movies before, and it takes me a minute to realize that places like this do, in fact, exist in real life.
Just not for people like me.
Every five minutes or so, I’ll forget that we’re here to kill someone. The only thing that reminds me of our mission here is the stark realization that I donotbelong here.
Given the high quality of my clothes, makeup, and even my hair, I’m able to walk through the crowd as one of the elites. Being led through a huge crowd of crooked socialites feels dangerous, but not in a sexy way at all. The atmosphere is so tense that I’m worried someone in my vicinity could burst into tears from the mental stress of it all.
“Hey, make sure that you don’t really engage with the other guests much, okay? I don’t need anyone asking how we know the couple,” Marcello whispers to me as we enter the ceremony.
Fortunately, we’re only two of hundreds, so we don’t stick out to anyone at all. How could he even be worried that someone would recognize us? Not to be mean, but there are at least fifty guys here who could be his brother. Even if the man he’s imitatingdidshow up, I doubt anyone would notice anything strange.
I look around at all of the different kinds of people here, all of them closely-related versions of each other with subtle differences. Even though I have no knowledge of the brands that insanely rich people surround themselves with, I start to notice a trend with some of the wives based on how they’re dressed.
As the ceremony starts, I realize that I’m just distracting myself to keep myself calm. I’m a bit alarmed by how easy it is for me to keep myself under control through all of this. Did I break the part of my brain that knows when to be afraid? Am I going to be oblivious to threats for the rest of my life after spending so much time entrenched in the mafia?
When the bride begins her walk, I notice that she’s around the same age as me. She’s absolutely glowing, her eyes focused straight onward toward her future husband. I feel the sting of jealousy deep within me, wondering what it must be like to know that someone wants to commit themselves to you.
Maybe I’ll find out someday.
There’s still hope.
The rest of the ceremony is a Roman Catholic mass, which bores me to tears to the point that I wish Marcello would just open fire at this Franco asshole. At least I know he has enough time to lock his eyes on him so we can get the hell out of here sooner.
When I look around the room, I play a game with myself where I try to figure out which of these men could possibly be Franco. Marcello has hardly described who he is, and it’s fascinating to me to picture any of these men betraying someone as brazenly as Franco has.
I glance over at Marcello every few minutes to try and figure out if he’s found Franco yet. I’m expecting him to appear angry, or at least discontent when he finds him. That’s how I’ll know.
At one point, I do notice that Marcello seems more restless than when we got here, and I begin to feel nervous all over again. This mission is the most insane thing I’ve ever been a part of in my life. Why the hell do I have a gun strapped to me under my dress? Who is expecting me to be fearless in the face of mortal danger?
Charlie might have been right, I don’t belong here, and I shouldn’t have chosen to come if I knew I was going to get progressively more terrified as the wedding drags on.
When I fully realize the sheer number of criminal potential in this room, I feel overwhelmed and out of my depth. The worst thing I ever did in my past was use a bad fake ID to buy drinks for a party, and I was able to talk my way out of getting ticketed.
Almost every person in here, at least of the men, is a hardened criminal. They’ve all fucked people over for sure, and I’m sure that half of them have killed more than one person. When I consider how severe the implications are, I feel a drop in my stomach as I ask myself – how many people do I thinkMarcellohas killed?
Sure, he had to kill people in order to get to where he is now. But how many of those people didn’t truly deserve to die? How many of them were just in the way, just collateral? It seems unreasonable for me to judge all these other men for killing when the father of my own children likely has as high of a kill count as some of the more seasoned mafia veterans in this room.
