Chapter 14 Antonio

It’s one thing after another and I can’t help the anger building inside of me. I’m not mad at Gemma. Crossing paths with her on a random night with Ronan isn’t to blame for my decision to get involved with the Marzano family once again. Choosing to save her from Frankie isn’t her fault, and dismembering Frankie is just a necessary part of what’s happening.

My mind continues to drift down this rabbit hole of why I make the choices I make as I help Gemma pack her bags into my car. Shit. She doesn’t even have a car anymore. This isn’t right. Gemma doesn’t deserve to pay for the sins of her brothers or mine.

We’re fighting enemies on both sides and not knowing the one coming from Gemma’s past has me on high alert. I can’t stop scanning the street, wondering if the asshole from the garage is watching from afar. Or what if Verducci has one of his minions lying in wait?

“We need to get off the street,” I tell Gemma as she loads a duffle bag into the back seat.

“This is the last one,” she says with a look over her shoulder. Natalie and Damian come out of the house each carrying large suitcases. They load them into the car behind mine while Casper and Bash stand guard, diligently watching the street as we get into our cars to leave.

Gemma and Natalie take a moment to say their goodbyes. There’s something special about their friendship. While Natalie isn’t explicitly a part of any mob, everything about the way she’s handling this situation shows she’s not a stranger to this way of life. She’s not easily scared off and isn’t afraid to handle a dead body.

I notice the tears welling in their eyes as they part, but Gemma’s stoic gaze returns when she notices her brothers are watching. The moment we’re alone in my car, Gemma lets a sigh escape her lips.

“I wish we could go to Vegas with them.” Gemma pouts with her eyes glued to the scenery passing by.

“That’s not a bad idea. If Frankie hadn’t run off, we could leave.” I glance at the screen nestled in my dashboard, slightly paranoid that someone’s listening to us. I put my finger to my lips and point toward it for Gemma to see why I’m skirting around the truth.

She moves her head up and down slowly in agreement. “Thanks for letting me stay with you until the security system is put in. Do you mind if I take care of dinner tonight? I truly want to thank you for all of this. Don’t say I don’t have to. Let me do something nice for you.”

I agree to let Gemma have her way in my kitchen. After we make a stop to pick up some groceries, we head back to my place and pull into the underground garage of my building. I can’t stop my heart from racing. There shouldn’t be anyone waiting to ambush us, but I’m on high alert. The silence of the garage doesn’t help as I head toward a storage closet beside the elevator entrance.

One of the amenities is having a closet for the tenants who need a cart or hand truck to bring large packages and bags to their unit. I send Gemma upstairs to my condo and take my time loading the rest of her things and the groceries into a cart.

By the time I step inside my condo, Gemma’s playing music from her phone while rummaging through my cabinets. There’s so much joy and peace in her energy as we move together to unpack her stuff and the food.

“There’s a closet in my office where we can put most of your stuff,” I tell her, walking through the space separating my open kitchen from the living room.

“The entire space under your bedroom is your office?” she asks.

I push open a door beside the office door. “There’s a bathroom here, but for the most part it’s where I work. I had the space closed in a few months after I moved in. I can catch up on notes, patients, and harass some of my med school alum for donations to the hospital.”

The smile stops spreading across my face when I remember I don’t have that job anymore. It seems my loyalty doesn’t go as far as I expect it should. No matter what happens, I tend to give more than I receive to people whose loyalties are fragile in comparison.

“Are you okay, Antonio?” Gemma’s question cuts into my thoughts.

“I’m wondering what’s going to happen after all this dies down. I want to keep practicing, but I’m not sure if that’s even an option.”

Gemma moves around the kitchen, sorting through the groceries and making room on the countertop. Her eyes move from me to the pile of flour where a few eggs sit inside of a well she made with the back of her hand.

“I’m sorry, Antonio.”

“What are you making?” I ask her. I don’t want to dwell on a future that’s no longer what I imagined it to be.

“Homemade pasta. Lasagna to be exact.”

“What can I do to help? I know you said you wanted to do this to thank me, but I need to keep my hands busy.”

She smiles and nudges her chin toward a bowl of ingredients. “You can help me with the sauce. I think I got everything, tomatoes, garlic, onions, herbs.”

We work together to bring her dinner to life with music playing and our minds far away from the death and chaos. There’s a moment when we switch spots for me to knead the dough while Gemma tends to the sauce. It feels right, like this is how we were always supposed to be.

The more I work the dough the more I’m able to get some aggression out of my system. It’s therapeutic in a way I never pictured.

“Don’t overwork that dough,” Gemma warns while stirring. She pulls a wooden spoon out of the mixture simmering on the stove and blows on it before offering it to me. Piping hot, but delicious as it warms me from the inside out.

“That’s great. Maybe a pinch of salt and some more garlic,” I tell her, leaning forward to kiss her gently as she returns to stirring. “Do you prefer a bechamel or ricotta filling?”

“Cheese, cheese, and more cheese, please,” Gemma says with a giggle. “If we were doing like a family dinner where we have to serve a dozen or more, then the bechamel is better for a sturdy slice. But right now? I just want to indulge in decadence to forget what’s coming for us.”

I nod and we get to work finishing the dinner and while the lasagna bakes, we unpack the rest of her stuff. Some fits into the closet downstairs, while the rest fits into a section of my bedroom closet.

It’s only when Gemma is making room that she reaches into the back of the closet to pull out a sweater I haven’t seen in decades.

“Where did you get this?” she asks. Her voice trembles slightly as she runs her hand over the fabric.

“Your mother gave it to me after I got out,” I tell her.

“I remember watching her knit this. She said it was for someone special, someone who needed it. You talk so freely about serving time in prison.”

“I don’t have a reason to hide my past. I did something fucked up and I paid for it. I’ve been paying for it for a long time.”

“Why did you come back to our family? Didn’t you get into trouble working for my dad?” She asks.

“I wasn’t working for your dad. I was Bash’s only friend. I was in foster care after my father died and no one knew how to find my mother. I had to go to school and the first day I showed up, I saw Bash playing by himself.”

“How old were you?”

“It was around third or fourth grade, I think. We were nine, and everyone in the class was like, ‘don’t talk to Sebastien because he makes the kids he hates disappear’.”

She chuckles. “That sounds about right. That’s what a lot of kids said about me in high school, but Natalie was there for me. You still showed up for my brother. What happened?”

Her curiosity isn’t unexpected, and replaying some of the most troubling moments of my childhood isn’t where I want this night to go. Yet, I want her to know the depths of me as a man.

A smile crosses my lips as I reflect on the memory of becoming friends with Bash. “We had to be about a month or so into the school year. Every kid was afraid of your brother. It wasn’t just the reputation of your father, but Bash has a temper, too.”

“I’ve seen that firsthand” she adds with a light laugh.

“One day I’m heading outside for recess, and I overheard some kids talking about Bash. They were saying the rumors weren’t true and that his father wasn’t the godfather or some bullshit. But one kid, Mikey, he was massive, and he bragged about his father and uncle being a part of the mob.”

“There’s always one asshole.”

I chuckle. “Yeah, someone always wants to test their mettle against the kid of a mafia don. Mikey walks up to Bash and his friends are egging him on. Soon there’s a crowd gathering and Bash has murder in his eyes. He doesn’t stand to be disrespected, especially when he’s minding his business. This day gave me a glimpse of what Bash was capable of.”

“Were the cops called?” She asks.

“Yes. Mikey’s at least a foot taller and twenty pounds heavier than Bash, but he starts making fun of Bash in front of everyone. Bash cracks a joke or two back that piss Mikey off. Mikey swings and Bash retaliates. Even at nine years old, your brother was volatile.”

“That’s a mixture of my mother and father. They never wanted their kids walking the street without knowing how to protect themselves.”

“That makes sense,” I tell her. “Bash is beating Mikey’s face into the schoolyard. One of Mikey’s friends tried to jump in, but I didn’t like that because Mikey started it. I ended up fighting two boys off while Bash fought Mikey and another kid trying to get him off of Mike. When it came time to run down what happened to the principal, I told them everything I heard and got Bash out of trouble. We’ve been friends ever since.”

We head down to the kitchen where the aroma of dinner envelops me, and all that’s left for us to do is open the wine. Dinner tastes better in the living room as I close the curtains and turn on the TV that’s hidden inside of a painting. It plays low in the background because I like it best to have something moving in my peripheral while I’m down here working.

“And after the fire?” she asks.

My shoulders raise up and down with indifference. “I’ve always defended Bash because he never started the fights. People always brought their insecurities to him. After the fire, I stepped up, but your father stepped in when Bash tried to take the blame.”

“Was it really Bash’s idea to set that fire?” she asks.

“I’m sorry, Gemma, but it was. The main thing is I chose to help Bash out of that situation. I thought Bash was doing something your father told him to do. I didn’t know this was something Bash chose to get on La Familia’s radar. But it worked out that even with Bash confessing to his involvement, I didn’t have a family behind me. Bash, your parents, your brothers, they all did what they could for me. Becoming a doctor after everything I’ve gone through gave your parents and Bash a way to pay me back for my loyalty.”

“And you still came to my rescue.” She grins as I pull out a bottle of Pinot Noir to accompany our dinner.

“Of course I did, Gemma. I care about you and always have. It's one of the reasons I hated coming out here. I wasn’t ready to walk away from you, from that kiss, but I had to come out here for the family.” I wait for my admission to register, but Gemma doesn’t want to talk about us from six years ago.

“Should we turn on the news?” Gemma asks with a sip from her glass and desperate to change the subject.

“Are you hellbent on seeing if my handiwork washed up on shore?” I shift away from telling Gemma every emotion I felt in those days leading up to her graduation dinner.

“Or to see if mine did,” she lets out a sodden exhale with a mild shake of her head.

I reach over to rub her leg which ignites my need to touch her. I resist my sexual urges and opt to move my hands down to pull one of her feet into my hands. She moans as I gently push my thumb against the soles and rubbing small circles.

“I don’t want to be bothered with what’s going on in the world. I’m happy to be right here with you.”