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“I don’t have any idea,” I finally answer. “He hasn’t said anything to me.”
Angel scoffs and tosses his drink back in a single jerky motion before setting the glass down with a solidthunkagainst the table. “You’d say that regardless. I’m sure if you gave it some thought, you could come up with something.” His tone turns wheedling. “Come on, Lu. What is it? Exciting new business venture? Someone we need to steer clear of?”
I don’t know!
I shout the words mentally but press my lips more tightly together instead of replying.
“You know that whatever it is, he should’ve told me—”
I can’t remain silent. Angel just… doesn’t get it. He makes no effort—nothing I’ve seen, at any rate—to be the man Father requires him to be. If he wants to be involved in Valachi business, at some point he has to grow up. Even five years younger than he is, I’m more of an adult. “I don’t have anything to do with that, Angel. Maybe if you didn’t sleep until noon and tried to be helpful, he would confide in you more than he does.”
Mother shifts suddenly on the sofa, agitation in the wave of her thin hand. “Viviana, do sit up straight and stop flopping about on the couch. Your hunched posture is doing nothing to slim you, you know.” Her mouth turns down, faintly disgusted.
Vivi casts a wounded glance in my direction, but she dutifully pulls herself taller without argument, settling the tips of her slippered feet onto the textured rug that covers the hardwood. My jaw tightens as I watch. Vivi exploded into budding adulthood almost overnight, just days shy of her sixteenth birthday, an… enthusiastic… bloomer after years where we were beginning to wonder if she’d ever get her first period, ever develop.
She’s developing with abandon now, bursting from her childish cocoon into what I imagine will be Sophia Loren-style glory.
Mother seems to be chronically put out by her recent rapid changes, though. Instead of helping her navigate her foray into womanhood, she acts as though it’s an embarrassing curse Vivi brought upon herself and the family.
I’ve been the one to teach my sister about her body, about everything that’s happening to her. And for the most part, she’s good with her development—until Mother starts spouting stupidities like she is now. While Vivi’s breasts came in seemingly overnight and with voluptuous inhibition, she still carries a bit of baby fat, making her appear overweight to someone inclined to be cruel or someone with no imagination.
Not that I want anyone imagining any sort of thing about my little sister.
Her lush frame does nothing to detract from what is plain to any observer—Vivi Valachi will one day be a stunning woman.
In fact, sometimes I think it’s jealousy that makes our mother snipe at her, because it’s clear—to me, at least—that one day her youngest daughter will be far more beautiful than Nina Valachi, lounging there now in all of her alcohol-soaked misery.
I refuse to give that misery the company it craves. “Mother—”
The double-hung mahogany doors to the drawing room swing open abruptly, cutting off what I was about to say. Sending Vivi a commiserating look, I turn my attention to Father and the young man he ushers in with him before pulling the doors closed once again.
Young-ish, anyway. He’s definitely older than my twenty-two years, but younger than many of Father’s made men. And handsome. Even though I’m not interested, because it would be a veritable death sentence for him if I were, I can’t help but notice that fact. It’s all…right there. In front of me.
I eye him from beneath my lashes as Father begins to speak.
He’s tall. Taller than Angel, even, who stands nearly a foot higher than my own five feet three inches. His hair is dark, his skin an unusual blend of pale with olive undertones. Is he Italian? I can’t quite tell. His gaze roves, as curious about us as I am about him. It brushes each person in the room briefly before landing on me. His eyes begin to slide past me, then pause and return, narrowing as he returns my perusal.
I shiver.
His eyes are the blue of a deep, dark ocean when the sunlight cuts through it, electric in their intensity.
I can feel them.
It’s like… I struggle for context long after he pulls his gaze from me and turns to my father, finally finding a way of explaining the sensation to myself when he’s no longer studying me. It’s like when a freezing raindrop manages to find its way beneath the collar of my coat, slithering down my neck and along my spine.
Cold, bright lightning.
I quell a second shudder of sensation and focus on Father.
“…Damon Papparado. He’s going to be lending me his assistance from here forward. I know you will all afford him the respect—”
Papparado. Italian, then. The name is familiar to me, the Papparados being a comparatively minorfamiglia. Most of them are still located in Sicily, but there are a few here in New York. Although small, they’re powerful in their own right in Italy, and I’m fairly certain my father has done business with them.
My brow contracts with confusion as I run through what I know, one thing standing out above everything else. He’s bringing someone we’ve never met before into our home, our lives, to… assist? Assist with what?
I can’t help the rush of irritation at his seeming callousness. What about me? Have I not been there for every one of his requirements, taking care of every family need when he’s not available? Have I not played peacekeeper ad nauseam between Angel and Mother? Mother to his youngest daughter?
Angel doesn’t seem to care for Father’s announcement, either.
