“It’s not about love!” I swallow hard, forcing back the frightened tears burning behind my eyelids. I can feel the life I’d hoped for, the one I’d been looking forward to at the funeral, slipping away from me.You just have to get through the day.What a fucking joke. I should have known better. I’d never be able to get free of all of this.
I can feel all of my hopes for a life free of the Family, free of men, free of expectations and demands, disappearing. Vanishing without a trace.
“I didn’t love Franco either,” I say, forcing myself to sound calm, to steady the tremor in my voice. “But I can’t be married to another cruel and brutal man, Luca. I can’t do it.”
“Caterina—” Luca runs a hand through his hair, his expression clearly unhappy. “This wasn’t my doing. But I’ve spent more time with Viktor these past weeks than I might have liked, and there is some honor in him, whatever else might be true about him and the rest of the Bratva. I think he might not be as bad as some of the others.”
“As bad?” I choke out the words, staring at him in horror. “Luca, think about who you’re selling me to!”
“I’m notsellingyou.” Luca’s jaw tightens. “I wouldn’t give you to someone that I thought would truly hurt you, Caterina. But in the end, I don’t have a choice. After the betrayal of Franco and the rest of the Irish, there needs to be peace. You know that. You know how this works, Caterina!”
“I do, but—”
“Then you also know that marriages are usually how this sort of peace is brokered.” There’s a finality to his voice, and it terrifies me more than anything he’s said so far.
I feel sick. I look down at my lap, at the wet material sticking to my thighs, and I try to slow the racing of my heart. “What will you do if I say no?” I ask finally, lifting my chin to look at him. “What then?”
Luca returns my gaze sadly, suddenly looking very tired and older than his years. “You don’t have a choice, Caterina.”
I’m reminded suddenly of standing in Sofia’s kitchen, having a very similar conversation with her about her marriage to Luca. I remember, vividly, her saying to me bitterly that she hadn’t had a choice. And I remember just as clearly what I’d said to her in return.
There’s always a choice.
I square my shoulders, looking Luca directly in the eye, reminding myself of who I am. OfwhereI am, in my own house. “There’s always a choice, Luca,” I say calmly, my voice steadier now. “And I’ll tell you what mine is tomorrow after I’ve slept on it.”
He looks at me, his face still very grim. “Caterina—”
I stand up in one swift motion, gesturing towards the doorway. “I want you to leave, Luca. I’m very tired, and I’m still grieving. I need time.”
“Caterina—”
“I am still the daughter of Don Vitto Rossi,” I continue as if he hadn’t spoken. “And I’m still in mourning, even if my husband was a traitor. So please, leave.”
Luca stands up slowly, reluctance clear in every line of his body, but I think he can tell that I’m not backing down. “Alright,” he says tiredly, walking towards the doorway. But before he steps out, he turns back towards me, and I can see both sympathy and resoluteness in his eyes. “Caterina—you’re right. All of those things are true. And that’s why you know what the wisest decision is.” He pauses, tapping his fingers against the doorjamb, his gaze fixed on mine. “I’ll be looking to hear from you tomorrow.”
I manage to stay on my feet until I hear the click of the front door that tells me he’s left. I rush out of the living room towards it, turning the locks frantically, my hands pressed against the heavy wood as if at any moment Viktor Andreyev might try to knock it down and scoop me up, carrying me away like a villain in a fairytale. I wish I could barricade it somehow, board it up, but the locks will have to do.
And then, my hand on the cool metal of the lock keeping the outside world away from me for now, I press my forehead against the door.
For the first time since my father’s funeral, I start to cry.
* * *
What I’dthought would be my first good night in this house alone since my marriage to Franco turns out to be a sleepless one instead, lying wide-eyed in the dark and trying to imagine a life married to Viktor Andreyeva.CaterinaAndreyva.It sounds so foreign, even in my thoughts. I can’t imagine hearing it said aloud.
I try, speaking the name aloud to the darkness, whispering it to my ceiling.CaterinaAndreyva.It sounds elegant, rich, like caviar. An acquired taste, maybe.
But one that I can’t ever imagine personally acquiring.
I’m no stranger to arranged marriages. As a mafia princess, I’d always known mine would be. But I’d also always known it would be to anItalianman, a member of the Family, someone that my father knew and held in good stead. Someone that I could trust that, if he wouldn’t love me, he’d respect me and never harm me.
My first marriage didn’t turn out like that. He wasn’t even more than half-Italian, and that was on his mother’s side. And now it looks as if my second won’t, either.
I know, deep down, that I don’t have much choice. I might have said to Luca that I do, but I know better. I understand a little more now how Sofia felt, and I feel a pang of guilt for how I dismissed her fears about Luca, how I told her so casually that, of course, she had a choice.
But she hadn’t, really, not any more than I do right now. Her choice had been to marry Luca, risk my father’s wrath, or else allow herself to be caught in the hands of the Bratva. And now—
I don’t even entirely know how to picture Viktor. I’ve never seen him up close, only from a distance on the afternoon of my father’s funeral. I know that he’s older, but I’m not sure by how much. I don’t really know what he looks like, other than newspaper articles with quick photos where it’s clear that he’s handsome enough and not overweight. But none of that would matter, ordinarily. I would always prefer a handsome husband, of course. Still, I’d come to terms long ago with the idea that if the husband who benefited my father most was ugly and fat, that’s who I’d have to marry. And there would be no argument.