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When I opened my eyes it was to see the wavy, out of focus visage of Claudia sitting at my bedside.
“Hey you,” Claudia said softly and ran the rag over my temple and down my cheek. “Scared the hell out of all of us.” More sounds of water sloshing, of dripping, and then the soft sweep of the rag on the other side of my head. “Gio arrived late last night. He’s freaking out, of course, going all beast-mode on everyone, threatening to kill anyone who gets too close to you?—”
“—you’re okay,” I cut her off and lifted my arm—which felt far too heavy—to place my hand on her thigh. “I thought, God, Claudia, I thought you were going to get shot.”
She gave me a sad smile and shook her head, a stray tear sliding down her cheek. “I’m fine. I’m fine. And it’s because you acted, even if it was dumb and crazy and I hate you for getting hurt because of it.” She smiled sadly and for the first time my sister didn’t seem like she was a girl. She held herself like a woman who’d already seen far too much. “But…” She looked away.
“But what?” I tried to sit up but gasped in pain, my side burning, searing, like I was consumed by fire.
“Hey, hey, hey,” she said and shook her head vehemently. “Stay put. You’re going to ruin the work the doctor did and then that’ll piss off Nikolai and he’ll either kill someone or kick Gio’s ass again.”
I stilled and Claudia chuckled. “When Gio first arrived he strode in here like his ass was on fire. You woke up but you wereout of it. You started thrashing on the bed. Nikolai dragged him out by his throat, kicked his ass in the hallway, and told him the next time he hurt you—even inadvertently—he'd put a bullet in each of his knees caps.” Claudia rolled her eyes and exhaled. “Men.” She said that lone word like it explained everything and I smiled.
I had no recollection of Gio coming in here or thrashing around. But that wasn’t important. Because the longer I stared at her face the more I knew something was wrong. Really wrong. “Tell me,” I croaked out.
She exhaled on a huff and tossed the rag in the small bowl on the bedside table. “Francesca shot off three rounds. One of them hit you in the side, but thankfully Nikolai acted fast and got a Russian doctor here. He was covered in your blood.” Her face blanched. “Pressure on the wound, and was the only one not freaking out. As long as there isn’t an infection and you don’t strain yourself, he said you’ll make a full recovery.”
I closed my eyes and wet my dry lips. “But?” I knew there was more.
“The first bullet hit father, and the last got Francesca and she’s dead, too.” I slowly opened my eyes and stared at my sister. “Father is dead.”
I waited for the shock of that to hit me, the sorrow, that sadness of losing a parent. There was… nothing.
She looked down at her hands, her fingers twisted together in her lap. “Is it bad that I don’t feel anything?” Her voice was low, strained.
“Oh, Claudia.” I tightened my fingers around her thigh until she glanced up at me. “I don’t feel anything either.” I rested my head fully back on the pillow, staring at the ceiling. “In fact,” I said harshly. “I’m glad he’s gone.”
I should’ve felt callous for saying that, but I felt so numb at the moment that I didn’t want to bring up any of that. I didn’t want to talk about my father or what he’d done with Francesca.
I know if I hadn’t stopped her she would have shot Claudia, maybe even my mother, God maybe Nikolai if she’d been quick enough. I was glad things happened the way they had because if not everything would’ve been so much worse.
I closed my eyes and breathed through my nose slowly. “He was a bastard. Cruel and heartless and deserved what he got.” I squeezed my eyes tighter and felt acid rise up my throat. “Francesca was lost, lost in the grief and her love for a piece of shit who could never give her the love she deserved.” I rubbed my hands over my eyes, my chest tight. “How is mother?”
When I heard Claudia sigh I opened my eyes and looked at my sister. “She’s fine. Shaken up, but I'm pretty sure it’s not because she saw father bleed out in the foyer.” She gave a humorous laugh and shook her head. “I’m sure she’s trying to process everything that Francesca told her, although you and I both know he was no saint, and obviously didn’t take his marriage vows seriously.”
She ran a hand over her face and for the first time I noticed the dark circles under her eyes.
“I can’t believe he was having an affair with Francesca of all people, and when they started she was so young.” Claudia made a disgusted face. “And the baby, Amara..” She looked at me with sad eyes. “She was pregnant. Possibly with father’s baby–”
“--hey, let’s not think about any of that. Because at the end of the day it doesn’t matter. What’s done is done.”
“He could have survived,” Claudia whispered, her eyes wide.
“What do you mean?”
She moistened her lips and looked at the closed bedroom door. “Father.” She glanced back at me. “He might have survived, but Nikolai wouldn’t let the doctor he brought in help.Nikolai demanded he only focus on you, and told everyone to stay where they were. No one, not the staff, not us, were to call anyone for help. He said he’d take care of everything.”
My heart was beating a mile a minute at the revelation.
“And as the doctor was working on you, Nikolai had the coldest look on his face as he stared at father, who was bleeding out all over the tile. Mother was crying and kneeling beside him, but she wouldn’t touch him, just kept shaking her head and staring at where Francesca lay dead.”
My breath hiccuped in my chest. Oh God. Nikolai had let our father die, and had watched him. And I knew why he’d done it, why he hadn’t saved Marco. Because if my father died at the hands of Francesca, this way it wouldn’t cause a war between the Cosa Nostra and the Bratva. It would look like Francesca, a scorned lover, had shot my father and killed him in a fit of rage.
If Nikolai had killed a Capo in the Cosa Nostra, family or not, alliances or not, our families would have been at war. The organizations would be at war.
And as I thought about all of that, as I thought about the circumstances that led up to it all, and pieced together the calculation Nikolai had done to make sure my father died the way he had, my chest felt like it was closing in.
“Oh hey, I didn’t tell you to upset you, Amara. Calm down. Calm down. It’s okay.” She softly murmured and pulled the blanket up to my chest.
