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“I know you can turn it around. I’m glad it’s you instead of Vinny.” I’m not excusing my father. As a capo, his men would never dream of challenging him. I also can’t help but think Vinny enabled my father to overindulge in cocaine and alcohol. I do know Vinny is dead, and I can’t say I’m sad about it.
The car is drawing up outside Carlo’s home. There are three other SUVs littering the massive driveway. I wonder who is here. A pang goes through me as I run a hand over the white lace dress. It’s a pretty cocktail dress Lydia helped me find. This is nothing like the wedding and wedding dress I dreamed of having.
Carina’s mother and her father’s housekeeper opens the door. “You look lovely dear. The judge and men are waiting in Carlo’s office.”
I follow her through the house. The office door is open, and she stops at the doorway.
Manuel, Carlo, Dominic, and an older man with white hair and glasses are standing around, talking. Well, Manuel isn’t talking. He’s on the edge, simply watching the men. The moment I walk through the door he straightens.
“Beautiful as always. Why couldn’t my girls be like you?” Carlo sighs as he motions to Manuel. “You are getting a jewel of a wife.”
A pang of guilt hits me at the way he moans about his daughters, women who I don’t think I’m the slightest bit better than and often wish I could be more like. Carina and Celia have the kind of strength and resolve I often marveled at.
“I’m aware.” Manuel reaches out a hand. I take it, marveling at the pulse of electric current his touch sends throughout my body. He draws me against him tight enough I lose my breath. Seeing it, his jaw goes tight. He looks to the judge. “Let’s get this done. We need to be in the air in thirty minutes.”
It’s over so quickly. My hands are cold, my fingers are trembling within Manuel’s grip. Yet my voice is steady, without hesitation, when I put the ring on his finger. I watch as he clenches his hand as if to keep the ring on. A thrill goes through me at how his wedding ring matches my own. He continued the ruby and diamonds in a thick eternity ring set in platinum. His ring is the same except wider.
Once my ring is on, his satisfaction is clear. A press of his lips to my cheek, then he lets me go.
I’m presented with a pen and pointed to a line to sign my name. Manuel does the same.
I swear it’s less than ten minutes from the time I come through the front door to the time I leave again. This time, I’m in the back of an SUV with Manuel.
My stomach is twisting so badly I’m glad I didn’t eat this morning after all—even if I’m starving.
“I apologize for rescheduling to earlier than previously planned. My mother died this morning in surgery. I don’t like the children being left unsupervised with the nanny. With her death, my brother is not able to watch them, after all. He needs to fly out and inform our father. While my father and mother were not in love, after almost forty years, my brother is convinced it’s a bad idea to tell him over the phone. There is breakfast waiting on the plane.”
“Oh no, I’m so sorry. What happened to your mom? Why did she have to have surgery? And I think your brother is right. If he can tell your father in person, it’s the best thing to do.” Seeing it, the lack of emotion as he says his mother is dead brings it home. He could be talking of the weather instead of his mother’s death.
His sigh fills the back of the SUV. “Fine. I’ll apologize to my brother for being angry he left the children with the nanny. She found out she had skin cancer and was going to have the cancer removed. It was a reaction to the anesthesia.”
I’m curious. “You mentioned it before. Why can’t the children be left with the nanny?”
“Because I don’t trust nannies. When I was a toddler, my nanny grew frustrated with me and beat me badly enough I was in a coma for a week.”
“Oh my god. How old were you?” No wonder he won’t allow a nanny alone with his children. Now, neither will I.
He shrugs. “Four years old. I have no memory of it. It was my brother who told me what happened when I was older. Nannies are the norm for people in our world, yet we never had any. I asked my mother about it. She didn’t want to talk about it. My brother is a year older, and he remembered it all. Up until that point my mother was rarely home. After, she never left us alone with a nanny.”
“Is that why your parents weren’t close? Because your mom was with you kids?” I’m wary of walking into a family in mourning.
The shake of his head is immediate. “No, my mother wasn’t spending the hours she was away from us with my father—she was shopping and living in Paris. My father prefers a home in Los Angeles. While Medellin is our home base, we all spend quite a bit of time in the US. My father in Los Angeles. Felix prefers Chicago and Miami, but he’s often in Paris for business.”
“Your family’s cover is coffee? And where do you prefer?” With most families, they have more than one cover as a way to account for all the money they make illegally. Dominic saying they made more money than god has me wondering how rich they are, considering Dominic is one of the richest capos in the Outfit.
He nods. “We also have a boutique hotel chain we keep our names off. The coffee is the only one we want anyone aware of. Our coffee is served in some of the most popular coffee houses in the US and the world. We distribute whole and uncut. The same with our beans. I don’t have any preference. Since I travel with our shipments if they are big enough and we need to communicate with our buyer I spend a lot of time traveling not just across the US, but the world.”
“How many mistresses do you have?” I hate the question flying out of me. He’s going to be annoyed.
An eyebrow goes up. He is annoyed. “None. Now. I informed them our time had come to an end. They were given a month’s worth of expenses and informed they had two weeks to leave the residence I paid for.”
Does he see my relief warring with curiosity of why he won’t give the number. “If you must know, it was seven women. Please remember, those women didn’t and still don’t mean anything to me. They were selected for the ease with which they came when I called, that’s it.”
Seven women? “You travel a lot?”
He nods. “Yes. We have shipments moving every day. I’m not in Medellin for more than a few days in a month. Blanca and the kids lived in a home in Houston. The children have only been in Colombia since Blanca died. My mother was recovering from a face lift there. She preferred having work done and recuperating afterward in Colombia to prevent her friends in Paris finding out.”
Paris, he grew up in France?
