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Until Zedd spoke to me.
Until Zedd looked at me.
Looked at me like I was his.
Now that urgent desperation rips through me again. That sense like time is running out, like choices need to be made now or else the window of opportunity will slam shut forever.
It’s ridiculous, of course. Just the anxious panic of being forced into a new life, becoming a new wife. In three weeks I’ll be Amelia Romero, and there’s really nothing I can do about it.
Sure, I can throw a tantrum, threaten to leave the Family, pack up my Louis Vuitton roller-bag and hop onto a boxcar heading north, make my own way in the world.
But that’s not me.
I don’t run away from my fate.
I’ve absolutely enjoyed the privilege of wealth and security, grown up in a world where every need was met, where I truly am treated like a princess, a treasure to be guarded. I understand that all of society’s rules exist to restrain and control the basic human drives of sex and violence. And those rules are even stricter in the violent world of the Mafia.
So yes, I could tell myself I’m being brave and rebellious by protesting now when it’s time for me to pay the price every privileged mafia princess must pay. But by doing it I’d hurt our Family’s reputation, lower our standing in this cruel society of organized crime, embolden the other Families to perhaps make moves on our territory, perhaps even take a shot at Father, maybe even my kid brother. It sounds far-fetched, but a simple act of childish rebellion could snowball to where people I love might die because of some fantasy to hold out for true love.
And what would I know about love, anyway?
Mother loved Father, didn’t she? Yes, there was always a sadness behind her strong gaze, but she accepted her role in this world, understood that every woman makes choices and tradeoffs when it comes to marriage and family, that the inconvenient truth is that marriage is a crapshoot anyway, that more than half of all American marriages end in divorce—which means the odds areagainstyou once you say “I do” at the altar.
A familiar sense of despair washes over me. Even if I did protest, on what grounds would I do it? It’s not like I have some secret lover I can insist on marrying until Father relents. This isn’t that kind of story.
Now Zedd comes to mind again—not that he ever leaves my mind. But I force the silly thought aside. I don’t even know the man. Whatever I think I feel is just the frustrated lust of a young woman who’s been sheltered from the world of sex and desire.
Besides, Zedd obviously has a woman. He asked fortwopasses to the U.S. Open, didn’t he?
So there’s your answer from the universe, I think gloomily. There’s fantasy and there’s reality, and never the twain shall meet.
The rest of our father-daughter meeting passes in a surreal haze. The date’s already been set. Three weeks from today, just after my twenty-first birthday. At least I’ll be able to legally drink on my wedding day.
Now Carlo knocks twice and enters. Something about Father’s next meeting. Trouble in one of the casinos near Tampa. One of the bookies in Miami is stealing. An enforcer in Gainesville got picked up on a DUI charge and needs to be sprung.
Business as usual. Life goes on. Father has his role to play, and I have mine.
So I slide my sulky butt off the chair and make my exit, my hands hanging limply at my sides like a doll, my gaze dragging along the hand-woven carpet leading out the door to the marbled hallways. My heart feels dead, my body lifeless, my future bleak.
Maybe Mother was right. Maybe I’ll come to love Ralph Romero once I get to know him.
And if I don’t?
Well, tough shit, sister, I tell myself with dark resignation. This is the life you were born into. You’re going to enjoy the privilege of wealth and security all your life. So you can’t sulk when it comes time to pay the price. You think married couples working three jobs each and surviving paycheck-to-paycheck are living some fairytale romance of eternal joy and everlasting happiness? Grow the fuck up, you spoiled brat. You’ve got it easy. Be grateful, not grumpy.
My phone vibrates where I’ve shoved it into my sports-bra beneath my black tennis top. It’s my tennis coach politely checking to see if I’m still coming. I text back a thumbs-up emoji even though I’d rather stomp upstairs to my room and lose myself in a tub of Chunky Monkey ice-cream and some melodramatic movies about women submitting to their fates in a man’s world.
I head past the balcony doors, which are open for some reason even though I know I closed them before heading to Father’s office. Through the open doors I see my book on the glass tabletop, my bookmark sticking out like a flag.
Except wait, that isn’t my bookmark.
A chill snakes up my back when I see a shiny laminated rectangular plastic card that someone’s slid into my book where my home-made bookmark used to be.
“What the hell?” I mutter, hurrying over and sliding it out.
It’s one of the VIP passes Father gave to Zedd a few minutes ago.
Oh. My. God.
