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My biggest fear is that he’ll say no.
“Delilah, not that it matters because this is your right, but yes. I think the family will be overjoyed to welcome you in. Welcome a piece of your father, a strong, smart woman like yourself.”
“Oh,” I say, looking to Marco. His eyes are locked on me and I see it clear in his face, his body language. He’s ready to leave if I ask him to, but also, a small smile is there on his lips.
A friendly reassurance.
It’s then that Alfredo stands, his chair scratching on the floor as he does before he puts his hand out to me.
He doesn’t ask for an answer then, whether it’s because he knows it already or he wants to give me time. Instead, he says, “Come. Let’s meet your family.”
My family.
Shit.
That feels really fucking good.
And so, I take his hand and I’m led to another, similar room where men sit around.
Waiting for me.
And as I walk in, the men in the room smile, cheering, giving me a chorus of, Welcome homes and Finallys, and I know I made the right choice, taking his hand.
In coming here.
Because in a way, I’m home.
NINE
-Lilah-
It’s about an hour later when it happens—the moment I’d been waiting for since I left the contracting firm a few months ago.
Or, really, since I read that letter from Arturo, if we’re being honest.
I’m chatting with a few Capos, one who knew my father way back when, and they walk in.
Sal and Roz.
Instantly, her eyes lock on mine and her jaw goes tight.
And then she has the gall to roll her eyes like I’m an irritation.
Months ago, when I met her, I was Delilah Turner.
I had no idea who I was, really.
A princess in a tower with no idea of what lay before her.
Roz met a woman she could boss around and, from the look of it, she thought that would be the end of me. She thought her small push would stop me from standing.
“One minute, fellas,” I say, then I stand and I hear it.
From behind me, Marco murmurs an, “Oh, fuck.”
I fight the laugh.
In the last hour, I’ve fallen back into the new version of me, away from the nervous little girl who feels like she belongs nowhere and toward the queen I turned myself into, starting my first day at Jerzy Girls.
