I snort. “Look at us. She’s already dividing us.”
“You’re dividing us. You refuse to see.”
I grab his collar with both hands. I want to fight him. Hell, I just want to fight.
“Go on,” he says. “You want to punch me?”
“Yeah, maybe I do. Maybe I need to knock some sense into you.”
He grips one of my wrists but doesn’t quite pull it free. “Maybe it’s you who needs to see sense. Logic. Brother, we want the same thing.”
I snort.
“Fine,” he says, dropping his arm, keeping both at his sides. “Do it. Beat me with your fists if it will make you feel better. I won’t even fight back.”
The breath I draw in is tight, the air around us thin. It takes me a long minute, but I drop my arms too and walk away from him, running a hand through my hair.
“Do you ever wonder if I’d just shut my mouth if they’d have walked away?” I ask. It’s a question I’ve asked before. One that haunts me.
“What are you talking about?”
“That day in the kitchen. Do you think they’d have left if I hadn’t said what I said?”
“Bastian, you’re not at fault,” Amadeo starts.
I put a hand up to stop him. I’m not done. “I think about that all the time. Hannah was dead. It’s not like anything was going to bring her back. But if I’d just shut the fuck up like Dad told us both to do and kept my head down, do you think they’d have left us alone? Left Dad whole. Left Mom and us.”
Amadeo puts a hand on my shoulder. “No, brother, I don’t.” I meet his eyes, and I know he’s thought long and hard about this. Maybe as long and as hard as me. “I think Russo planned what he was going to do all along, thinking to force us to bend the knee. I think he was just fucking with us all that time. But he failed. That’s what I think about. And Vittoria? She’s not like them. Whatever happened to her, I blame her father and her brother. They damaged her as much as they did us.”
I look at him and tilt my head to see him from a different angle. Because am I really fucking hearing this? “Do you have fucking feelings for her? Is that what this is about? That fucking—”
He takes me by the collar and slams my back against the wall.
“Oh my fucking God!” I laugh a strange laugh. But before I can go on, the door opens, and Vittoria comes into view. Amadeo turns to see her, and from the look on her face, I know she’s been right outside all this time. Listening. Eavesdropping.
“Hear enough, Dandelion?” I ask, freeing myself of my brother. I adjust my shirt, taking her in. Her hair is damp, her face fresh and dewy, cheeks a little pink. She got some color today.
“I knocked—”
“It’s fine. Come in,” Amadeo says.
“Yeah, you come in,” I say as I walk toward the door. “You two discuss your plans, and let me get on with my life.”
I walk out of the study and straight out the front door. Across the long drive is a five-car garage built to house our not-so-small fascination with sports cars. The faster, the better. I open the door and see them all lined up in a shiny row. I push the button to send the garage door climbing and get into the shiny new Ferrari, my current favorite. The keys are in the ignition, and I start the engine, my head on my conversation with my brother. Vittoria’s face swimming in the background. The look on it. I set my foot on the pedal, the tires screeching as I pull out too fast and take the tight turn of the driveway. I don’t know where I’m going. That’s one thing about living so remotely. It’s good if you want to be alone, but when you want to get away, lose yourself in a bottle of whiskey or some anonymous person in some anonymous dive, it’s fucking impossible. And I know I should slow down around the curves, the sharp hairpin turns. But fuck it. What does it fucking matter anyway?