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Alessandro frowns. “I don’t know. My grandfather never told me anything about that. But then, he wouldn’t. Information was always on a need-to-know basis with him.”
***
We cook a late dinner together, pasta with a jarred sauce. As I’m straining the noodles into a colander, my phone buzzes. It’s a number I don’t recognize, but some weird instinct tells me to answer it.
“Hello?” I say, putting it to my ear.
The sound of my father’s voice almost causes me to drop the phone. “Hello, Ava.”
Alessandro glances at me sharply, noticing my reaction.
It’s my dad,I mouth, and put the phone on speaker.
I try to keep my voice steady. “Since when do they allow cell phones in jail?”
He cackles. “There are a lot of things they don’t allow in jail. Funnily enough, it isn’t a problem for me.”
“I saw they scheduled your arraignment. How are you going to plead?”
His reply is mocking, the words slightly slurred. “I will be pleading not guilty, of course. I am wounded,wounded, that my own daughter could possibly believe otherwise. A murder? How could you think me capable of such a crime?”
“Oh, I know exactly what you’re capable of.”
“I guess that means you and your husband will be watching your backs, then.”
I freeze, a chill coming over me. Alessandro puts a reassuring arm around me, his face serious.
“You’re really going to threaten your own daughter?” I ask, trying to keep my voice from breaking. “The only kid you have?”
“What daughter?” he replies harshly. “You’re no daughter of mine. You fucked everything up. You were going to continue my legacy, and you ruined it. You ruined all of it. I could give a fuck what happens to you.”
I wish I could turn off the part of myself that cares about his words, but I just can’t do it. He’s still my dad. I choke back a sob as Alessandro holds me, stroking my back. He makes eye contact, silently offering to take over the conversation. I shake my head.
“Funny,” I say, pulling myself together, “I remember when you told me that marrying Alessandro would continue your legacy. I thought our children were going to inherit Bover City?”
“And how’s that going? Are you pregnant?”
“When I do have kids, you won’t ever meet them,” I practically spit. “They won’t even know who you are.”
“Then I guess you just answered your own question,” my father growls. “You’re not my legacy, and your kids won’t be, either.”
“So why did you even call me? To give me a chance to gloat over the fact that you’re still in jail?”
“Maybe I just wanted to hear my darling daughter’s voice.”
“Somehow, I doubt that.”
Through the speaker comes a muffled noise that I’m pretty sure is a can being opened. Suddenly, the slur in my father’s voice makes sense. He was always mean when he drank. Someone must have smuggled a six-pack and a phone into his cell, and he drunk-called me.
“You know, I hated the way things went down even more than you did,” he says, his tone now surprisingly conversational.
“I’m not really sure that’s possible.”
“You sent me to jail. You really think you got it worse than I did?”
“Oh, you definitely have it worse. But I didn’t send you to jail.”
“If you say so. But your husband did.”
