Amore (83 page)

The car steered into the cemetery. The burial grounds were hundreds of years old. The ceremony would be done at the graveside. Mirabella was helped from the van. She glanced back for her children and found them all accounted for. The boys chirped happily as the men they considered uncles carried them. Eve held to her Zia a bit more, confused. It was Mirabella’s duty to be at Giovanni’s side to pay respects. But she wished they could have spared the kids this.

Catalina approached. She held Dominic’s hand. “I think they are waiting on us,” she said. Giovanni slipped his arm around Mirabella’s waist. Together they made the walk to the gravesite. The first person Mirabella saw was Kyra. Her braids blew out behind her shoulders. Large black oval sunglasses concealed her eyes. She stared at the grave, lost in thought. And then she looked up. Their eyes met. Kyra gave Mirabella a faint smile. She’d only spoken to her on the phone. She never had a chance to really tell her how sorry she was that Renaldo was shot. She would that evening. And when Kyra turned to Renaldo and said something to him, he glanced in their direction as well. He nodded his head at Giovanni and Mirabella. They nodded in return. He was able to stand with the help of crutches similar to Mirabella’s. He looked stronger.

“How is he?” Mirabella asked her husband.

“It’ll take some time. He has recovery to do. I gave them a place in Napoli so they could be closer to the physical therapy.”

“Sweet of you, Gio,” Mirabella said.

“Come, Bella. They’re waiting,” Giovanni whispered.

The Battaglias were not the last to arrive. When Mirabella was helped to her seat she saw a long limousine drive in.

Giovanni glanced out across the tombstones to the arriving family. Carlo helped Ciro’s mother from the vehicle. The woman looked broken with grief. It was hard to hear her wails and see her pain.

The Italian government only released Ciro’s body a week ago. They kept the kid on ice for weeks while they built their case for murder. Giovanni made sure to cover all expenses to return the young man to Sicilia. His gaze turned to Armando Mancini. The Don stood with his men, observing. He considered Armando’s request to not be named as the one to help free Carlo. But Giovanni didn’t like sharing a secret, or favor, with him. Even now, after everything they’ve done together, their newfound friendliness made him uneasy.

The courts wanted to crucify Carlo. And then out of the blue a young man stepped forward and confessed to being the one to choke the life out of Chao Lee. At first the hotshot inspector scoffed. But when the tapes were rolled back it clearly showed the man jump into the mob fight in the boxing ring. Carlo went down with Chao Lee, so did several other men. Including the one who offered up his confession. The guy wasn’t part of
la Camorra
or any other criminal enterprise. He was an ordinary spectator who had too much to drink and loved to fight. The prosecutor bought the story. The media bought the story. The Chief Inspector did not. And neither did Giovanni.

Armando Mancini had visited the man and his family. He made him an offer he could not refuse. Carlo was free and clear. And Carlo’s freedom felt like justice.

When Carlo brought Ciro’s mother to the grave the priest began to lead them in prayer.

Catalina listened. She prayed. And though she tried to focus on the sadness weighing down on her family, she could not. Often during the service she found it hard to keep from looking at Armando. Twice he met her stare, and dared her through his sly smile to hold the exchange inappropriately longer. She refused to return the gesture. She closed her eyes and tried to block any thoughts of his smile from her head.

“You okay?” Dominic asked.

“Huh?”

“Are you okay, sweetheart?” Dominic asked.

“No. Not really,” she admitted. “This is hard.”

Dominic put his arm around her and pulled her in closer. She trained her gaze straight ahead and kept it that way. Carlo stepped over to the open grave. He removed his father’s pocket watch and tossed it inside. Ciro’s mother wailed with tears. They had chosen to bury the young man next to Carmine. And when it was over, several grown men were concealing their teary eyes behind dark sunglasses. The day would be a long one of mourning.

After the service –

Carlo sat at his brother’s graveside in a chair he pulled out from under the tent. He’d helped the gravediggers cover Ciro until his arms burned with exhaustion. Now it was done. His gaze volleyed between Ciro’s and Carmine’s graves. He put a hand to his face and wiped away the sweat. The sun was ruthless. It blazed and burned hotter than flames straight from hell. And he endured. Because hell is where he belonged. There were many regrets in his life, but this one, the death of his brothers; he knew their blood was on his hands. This was his curse. No matter his sin, he never suffered worse consequences than the people he loved.

A hand touched his shoulder. His sister had warned she would come after him if he stayed at the grave too long. He wasn’t ready to let go. Not yet. “Go on, leave me,” he said in Sicilian.

“Carlo?” a woman spoke. He turned his gaze and looked back over his shoulder. The sun temporarily blinded him. But her pink hair blew out in the wind, and she stepped between him and the harsh glare. Carlo stood. It was Shae.

“What are you doing here?” he asked.

She took another step toward him. He stared down at her in confused disbelief. She looked to Ciro’s grave. She walked past him and put a white lily on the dirt mound. Carlo observed her, unable to speak. Her presence had not only surprised him, it rattled him. Shae leaving him the way she did hurt him more than he thought possible, considering their short time knowing each other.

“Marietta called me last week when you made the funeral arrangements. I had to come,” she said softly.

“Why?” he asked.

“For you, Carlo.” She looked at him again. She reached up and touched his face. “I’m so sorry about Ciro. He was a sweet kid. I liked him a lot. I’m so sorry for your pain.”

“You said you didn’t care.” He turned his face away not wanting her touch.

Shae lowered her hand. “I lied. I care. Don’t be angry. I didn’t come all this way to upset you. Let me be here with you.”

“Until you decide you don’t want to be?” he asked.

“When will that be, Carlo? Before or after you finally see me, and not a replacement for Marietta?” she removed her sunglasses. “If you want to be loved, you’ve got to stop thinking you don’t deserve to be.” She stepped closer to him. “Be angry if you need to be. Go ahead. I can handle it.”

“Leave, Shae,” he turned away from her. She hurried and stepped around him. “I was wrong to up and leave you like that. I was a coward. But today isn’t about me or us. Is it, Carlo? Ciro’s dead. You barely escaped prison for murder. Let me be here, right now, and we’ll worry about tomorrow, tomorrow.”

Carlo put his hands to his head. He squeezed his eyes tightly shut. “I can’t!” he groaned. “I can’t do it anymore.”

“I know,” she said sadly.

Carlo felt weak in the gut and legs. He dropped to his knees in an instant. He grabbed Shae by the waist and pulled her to him. He put his face against her abdomen and held tight to her. “I can’t go through this anymore!”

“Shhh… I know. I know, baby, I’m so sorry.”

He couldn’t cry. He didn’t know how in that moment. He’d spent too many nights feeling his anger, to understand how to release it. But when he held Shae and she allowed him to, he began to understand why he needed her. Why he needed his brothers. And then the tears came. He brought her down before him. He held on to her. She wrapped her arms around his neck and held him. He cried.

“It’s okay, Carlo. It’ll be okay,” she said. She kissed the side of his face and embraced him. “I’m here. I’m not leaving you. I swear it.”

Two Weeks Later –

Mirabella walked up to the doors of Villa Rosso. The work crews were at it today. Finally Giovanni okayed the reconstruction of the villa. She wasn’t told all that happened in there while she was gone. Something had. Giovanni switched his meetings to his office inside Melanzana. The carpet had to be pulled up. The floors scrubbed, and walls repainted. Which meant she could do some remodeling of her own.

The closer she came to the doors of the villa the weaker she felt. She wiped at her brow and shuddered. The medication they gave her often helped. But some days she felt nauseous, fatigued, and on other days she had a fever. The doctors said it was something in her blood. But even they couldn’t quite explain what. For Mirabella it was a constant burn beneath her skin that made her worry as much as her husband.

“Donna, you shouldn’t be here,” Dreco said when she tried to enter the door.

She smiled and stepped back. “Oh hello, Dreco. I only wanted to make sure the painters do as I told them.”

“Yes, but the boss doesn’t want anyone inside. Even you. It’s strict orders,” Dreco said. He pleaded with her with his eyes. She relented. She turned to leave when a man came out carrying a bin of trash. He miscalculated a step and dropped it. The contents scattered.

The men started arguing over whose fault it was. Mirabella glanced down at the rubbish. One thing in particular drew her eyes. She knelt and picked up a smashed VHS tape. The label that said, ‘Play Me’ was caved inward. Mirabella remembered the video recorder next to the bed. She remembered Kei saying he recorded something for her husband. She and Giovanni never spoke of it. Not ever. And somehow she managed to suppress a lot of her memories. It was funny how the human mind found ways to recover from trauma. And even more frightening was how something as simple as a VHS tape dragged it all up to the surface of a person’s memory.

And then there was something else. Since her return from the hospital and all through her recovery, Giovanni hadn’t once tried to make love to her. At first they were both concerned about her health, and the doctors’ inability to explain what Kei had used on her. The next major worry was for Carlo, and getting the family to Sicilia after his release for Ciro’s funeral. Excuse after excuse came for why they were not behaving as husband and wife. Mirabella stared at the tape and began to tremble with cold dread. Her eyes welled with tears.

“Donna? Are you okay?” Dreco asked.

“I-I’m fine.” She wiped her tears. She walked off with the tape. She went inside. She heard the kids’ laughter nearby. Lorenzo and Marietta had stayed behind in Sicilia. Dominic and Giovanni were in a closed-door meeting in his office. She climbed the stairs with no problem now that her ankle was healed. She went in her room and closed the door. Giovanni constantly checked on her, and would return upstairs to check in on her soon. She set the broken VHS tape down next to her and waited for her husband.

**

“That’s not good enough!” Giovanni shouted.

“There is no trace of her, Giovanni. We’ve looked everywhere. She’s vanished,” Dominic said. “I don’t know how, but she has.”

“She hasn’t fucking vanished. She’s retreated. She had this planned all along. And she used the
Ndrangheta
to help. That’s where we need to strike. Flush her out.”

“You said we had to lay low,” Dominic reminded him.

“That time has passed. I’m not going to wait for her to come after this family again. We’ll take it back to the triangle.”

“Giovanni, after the Calderone war we have been advised to not spill any more blood there. Let me keep working my contacts.”

With a burdened sigh he closed his eyes. His business was suffering, and so was his family. All he could think of now was finding Isabella and making her pay.

“What are the doctors saying, Gio?” Dominic asked.

“That’s she’s fine, physically. They have her on this anti-viral medication for the next ninety days. She’s nauseous sometimes and runs a fever. But I don’t see anything else wrong with her.”

“He mixed heroine in that shit he gave her for what purpose, Gio? Why was he trying to make her sick?”

“I don’t know. I need to find Isabella. I need to know what was done to my wife!” he said.

“No. Gio, look at me,” Dominic said.

Giovanni lifted his gaze. Dominic stepped forward. “That’s not how we get back on track. What we do is what you’ve always done. Remember when the Russians shot Patri? Remember the chaos, the uncertainty? We have an enemy. She is no different than all of the other enemies we have. We need to get strong. We need to rebuild our defenses. You have us spread thin with the clan bosses. Trafficking. Taking business deals from the
Mafiosi
. We need to focus on what makes us strongest—family.”

The advice was solid. Part of him knew Isabella wanted him to chase her shadow. He had to find a way to build his family again, and then draw her back out. And this time he would be ready.

“When Lorenzo returns from Sicilia we refocus.”

“I have some ideas, Gio. You’ve tried it Lorenzo’s way. You’ve tried it your way. Now it’s time you let me help. Try it my way.”

Giovanni smiled at his little brother. “Okay, Domi. We’ll try it your way. But there is some unfinished business. I’ve had time to think on it. I want you to be the one to finish it.”

Dominic nodded. “Ask and I’ll do it.”