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I bite my bottom lip before I smile.
“Piccolina, you’ll meet her, and you’ll get along like long-lost friends. I know your loyalty is to Laura. But I think you’ll like my sister and the others.”
“I don’t doubt that.”
“You’re worried they won’t like you.”
“I have an Italian last name, but that’s about as far as it goes. And to top it off, my best friend is thepakhan’swife.”
I know little Russian, but I know that’s what they call their leader. It’s the equivalent of don, which I know is Enzo’s uncle’s position.
“It’s not just Italian, it’s Sicilian and southern Italian. Do you know when your dad’s family came to America?”
“Yeah. 1906. I read once that more than a hundred-thousand Sicilians came to America that year.”
“Do you know what part they came from?”
“Trapani. They went to New Orleans and settled there for a few years before coming to New York. It was my grandparents who moved to Jersey. They sent my grandfather to Vietnam as an engineer. He got injured and met my grandmother while she was a nurse. When they both came home, they got married and moved close to her family. He did well for himself, so it meant my dad went to private school and a good university for undergrad and grad school. It meant we got to live in the same neighborhood as Laura, and Juan and Pablo Diaz.”
“How well did you know Juan?”
“He was Laura’s oldest friend. They’d lived next door to each other since they were toddlers. Laura and I became friends in elementary school. Sometimes I wasn’t sure if I was following them, or Juan was following us. During high school, we added our friend Lanie, and Juan hung out with the guys more. But the Doyles and Diazes always had Sunday dinner together. I went plenty of times. I — um — had a crush on Pablo in high school.”
“You did?”
“You can wipe that shit-eating grin off your face.”
“And why’s that?”
I look around, spotting Pasha and Sumiko again. I know Sumiko went out with Pablo for a few months, but had no idea what he was or what it meant. I’ve always known his family was into something with a Cartel. It just wasn’t until college that I realized Pablo’s dad, Luis, was a big deal and that Pablo would become a big deal one day. But I never learned any specifics.
“Because Pablo was the first guy I had sex with.”
“What?”
He stops, and a couple bumps into us. He looks around before picking up the beat.
“It was the summer between my junior and senior year of high school.”
“Were you seventeen?”
“Yeah.”
“That motherfucker is a predator. That was statutory.”
“He was nineteen. The age of consent in New Jersey is sixteen. It wasn’t a crime.”
He shoots me a look. It’s easy to understand.
“Igothimdrunk.”
“He knew what the hell was going on. Being drunk only meant he was lucky he got it up.”
“That was a long time ago, Daddy. It only happened a few times, and it’s been over—”
“Just how many is a few, Chellie?”
I look over his shoulder.
