Sempre: Redemption (52 page)

“Does this count?” he asked, motioning toward the puddles.

“No.”

“Then, uh . . .” He paused, calculating. “. . . Eleven years ago when my mother lived here.”

She just stared at him, blinking. He dropped the chicken, letting it hit the floor with a splat, and reached into his pocket for his phone. He dialed Celia’s number and waited as it rang. “Yeah, uh, can we reschedule dinner for tomorrow night? Great. Thanks.”

He hung up with a sigh and looked over at Haven. “How do you feel about Chinese?”

“Chinese is great,” she said, sliding her eyes to the chicken on the floor. “Salmonella? Not so much.”

The church pew felt like steel beneath Carmine, his entire bottom half numb and tingling. Restless, he tapped his foot, trying to pay attention to the service, but it all sounded like
blah, blah, blah
to him.

“Why’s he fidgeting?” Gia asked, her voice a mock whisper that seemed to echo through the church. Worshipers in the surrounding rows turned to look, scowling. “He looks like he’s possessed! There’s a demon in that boy!”

Celia quietly scolded her mother while Corrado let out a low, bitter laugh. “It’s called addiction. He hasn’t had a drink today.”

Gia sneered. “Don’t let him take communion then. He’ll steal all the wine.”

Carmine rolled his eyes, relaxing back into the seat, but his leg steadily bounced as Haven grabbed his hand. What made him decide to tag along for Sunday Mass, he wasn’t sure, but he certainly regretted it now. Sweat formed along his brow as anxiety crept through his veins, bubbling up under the surface of his flushed skin.

The rest of the service dragged by slowly. He sat in the pew during communion, ignoring the snide comments that slipped from his grandmother’s lips as she moved past to join the procession to the altar. Haven remained right beside him, silently absorbing everything, her eyes wide with innocent fascination.

She had never been inside a church before.

After Mass ended, Carmine pulled Haven into the main aisle. He made it only a few steps before stopping, hesitating as he glanced at her. “Can you ride home with Celia and Corrado?”

Her brow furrowed with confusion, but she nodded, not questioning him. He gave her a quick kiss, making sure they would get her home safely, before he headed toward the front of the church. Father Alberto stood at the altar, talking to a few parishioners. He noticed Carmine’s presence and excused himself, making his way over to him. “Ah, Mr. DeMarco, do you need to use my telephone again?”

Carmine chuckled, pulling out his cell phone. “No, I’m covered today.”

“A ride?”

He pulled out his keys. “All set there, too.”

“So what can I do for you?”

“I was hoping we could talk.”

Father Alberto smiled. “Absolutely.”

The priest led Carmine into the back office, the same one the two of them had sat in before, and motioned for him to take a seat. Carmine nervously ran his hand through his hair as he sat down, remaining quiet as the priest settled into his chair.

“It’s good to see you,” Father Alberto said. “I wanted to catch you at the cemetery after Vincenzo’s funeral, but you were preoccupied with the young woman. I didn’t want to interrupt.”

“Yeah, that’s Haven. She, uh . . . she’s . . .”

“I know who she is,” Father Alberto said. “I’ve heard quite a bit about her.”

“From my father?”

“Oh, that I cannot say.” The priest smirked, a twinkle in his eye. Definitely his father. “Confessions are confidential.”

“Even after the person’s dead?”

“Definitely. Your relationship with God doesn’t end with death, son.”

“I’m not surprised,” Carmine muttered, gazing across the desk at the priest. “That’s sorta why I wanted to talk to you. When they read my father’s will, he asked me to do him a favor. He wanted me to come here . . . said he left something.”

The priest nodded, not an ounce of surprise registering in his expression. He had been expecting him. “That he did. But before I give it to you, tell me something.”

“What?”

“How do you feel?”

Sighing, Carmine shook his head. “How does it
look
like I feel?”

“You seem to be holding it together pretty well.”

“Yeah, well, looks are deceiving.”

“Nonsense. Maybe you’re the one who can’t see.”

Carmine paused, hesitating for a fraction of a second, but the weight of his grief became too heavy to hold back. The dam broke, the words gushing out in a furious unyielding wave of emotion. It flooded the office, nearly drowning Carmine as he choked on the confession of his sins.

Father Alberto gazed at him, silently taking in his rant, and didn’t speak until Carmine finished. There was nothing formal about it, no asking for forgiveness from God or man. It was just Carmine and his truth, and the one person who could hear it without looking at him differently.

The one person who could hear it and never tell a living soul.

“How do you feel now?” the priest asked when the office grew silent again.

“I feel like I need a drink,” he muttered.

The priest laughed lightly. “I’ll tell you what you can do instead.”

“I don’t need Catholic penitence,” Carmine said. “I’m not fasting or repeating Hail Mary a dozen times. That’s bullshit.”

“Ah, I wasn’t going to tell you to,” he said. “I was merely going to suggest you make a list. Write down the names of everyone you feel you’ve wronged and find a way to make it right again someday.”

“That would take the rest of my life.”

Father Alberto shrugged. “You have something better to do? I once knew a man who tried to drink his pain away. He drank to forget his family, he drank to dull the loss of a life, and when he finally sobered up, he had to make up for it somehow. He was righting his wrongs until the day he died.”

Carmine gaped at him.
His father?

“Speaking of which, this was left here.” Father Alberto reached into his desk, pulling out a long gold chain and holding it up. A simple gold band swung from it, Carmine’s chest aching at the sight. He recognized it, had seen it thousands of times, on the finger of the first woman he ever loved and later around the neck of the first man he revered.

His mother’s wedding band.

“I’m sure you know what to do with it,” the priest said, handing it to him.

Carmine carefully put the chain around his neck and concealed it in his shirt. The metal felt cold against his bare chest. “Thanks.”

“You’re welcome. I also noticed you didn’t take communion. Would you like to do it now?”

Carmine shook his head as he stood. “Maybe next time.”

“Next time,” the priest mused as Carmine headed for the door. “I’ll take that. It means you might be back some day.”

Twenty-four hours later, the six of them met at the Moretti home—Haven and Carmine, Celia and Corrado, Tess and Dominic—for a family dinner to honor Vincent’s life. It had been moved from Carmine’s house, since he didn’t even have a dining room table, and Haven and Celia went in together on cooking the meal.

They gathered around, plates piled high with food, and shared laughs as they ate to their hearts content. Dia was the only one missing, having returned to her life in Charlotte. That weighed heavily on Haven’s mind during dinner as she thought about the life waiting for her back in New York. Kelsey had called her dozens of times, but Haven had been too conflicted to return any of those calls.

“This is nice, having us all here,” Celia said. “I tried to get Mom to join us, but she wouldn’t.”

“Meno male,”
Corrado muttered.

“Hey, she’s not that horrible.” Celia paused as everyone cast her skeptical looks. “Okay, so she’s a handful. But she’s relied on Vincent a lot the past few years, so the rest of us are going to have to step up now that he’s gone.”

“I hardly know her,” Dominic said.

“Same here,” Carmine replied. “And what little I do know says she doesn’t want shit to do with any of us.”

“Not true,” Celia interjected. “She’s just stubborn.”

Corrado scoffed. “I mean no disrespect,
bellissima,
but your mother’s issues reach far beyond sheer tenacity. We both know she has a deliberate cruel streak.”

“Maybe so, but she’s family.”

“True, which is why I’ll do what’s expected of me,” Corrado replied. “Doesn’t mean I’ll like it, though. I have no idea how Antonio dealt with her all those years. The man was a saint.”

“My father?” Celia asked. “Did we even know the same man?”

“Every man sins, Celia. Even the saints.”

Dinner wore on, as did the conversation. It was well past nightfall when they separated, Tess and Dominic heading back to Indiana, while Carmine and Haven made their way down the block. All was silent between them, their fingers loosely entwined as they strolled along. Carmine seemed content, his shoulders relaxed, but something brewed in his expression. He stopped abruptly a few feet from the blue door, his hand slipping from Haven’s as she continued on.

She turned to him at the loss of connection, seeing the furrow of his brow and the hard line of his lips. “What’s wrong?”

“Tell me about New York.”

She raised her eyebrows. “Now?”

“Yes.”

“But I already told you.”

“You told me what was wrong about it, what you were missing, but I wanna hear the good. You know, the dream.
Your
dream.”

He didn’t say it, but she saw it in his eyes: He wanted to know if leaving her had really been a mistake.

“Well, New York was busy, just like you said the city would be,” she started. “There was always something going on. People everywhere.”

It all spilled out of her, every detail of her life there, as the two of them stood along the street in the darkness. She held nothing back, wanting him to know she had had a good life. It may not have been perfect, but things rarely were.

Carmine listened intently, drinking in every word, and didn’t speak until she was done. “You love it there,” he said quietly.

“I do.” She smiled. “I really love it.”

They stared at each other again as that truth hung in the air between them. Haven watched his expression slowly shift, another question forming in his eyes. She didn’t address it, not acknowledging its existence, instead waiting for him to be the one. She waited for him to ask, for him to gather up the courage to say the words.

Love me more,
his eyes said.

“Do you, uh . . . ?” He ran his hands down his face as he let out a deep sigh. “Would you stay?”

“Stay?”

He nodded. “Stay here.”

“I would.”

The corner of his mouth twitched as he restrained a smile. “Will you?”

“Stay?”

“With me.” He cleared his throat nervously. “You know, stay with me?”

She opened her mouth to respond, but the words didn’t have time to escape her lips. Something in Carmine snapped, his anxiety getting the best of him.

“Christ, I can’t believe I just asked you that. What the fuck is wrong with me? It’s not right! I can’t ask you to choose me!”

She grabbed his arm, stopping him as he started pacing. “You’re not asking me to choose you. There’s no choice about it. It’s always been you. Your father once told me that we always have a choice, but I think he was wrong. I think sometimes things choose us. It’s like with breathing. It’s natural. It’s a part of us. It just happens. We can hold our breath and try not to breathe anymore, and it’ll work for a few minutes, but we’ll eventually pass out and nature takes over. We can’t just
not
breathe, just like I can’t just
not
love you.”

“But New York,” he said. “Your life.”

“The best parts of life have nothing to do with a place. Love, friendship, happiness . . . I don’t need to be in New York to have those things. I have it all here.”

“But school? Painting? What about that?”

“I can do those things anywhere, Carmine. But you . . . you’re in Chicago.”

The hopeful smile twisted his lips, held back no more. “Clean slate?”

“As clean as our slate can get.”

“Which is still pretty fucking dirty.”

She laughed, watching him for a moment before extending her hand. A nervous blush warmed her cheeks.
Clean slate
. “I’m Haven.”

“Carmine.” He took her hand. “You have an interesting name, Haven.”

“It means a safe place,” she said.

“I know,” he replied, entwining their fingers again. “And something tells me it fits you perfectly.”

T
he heads of the five families gathered around a long table in the back room of a swanky Italian restaurant just outside of New York City. Their unrestrained chatter overshadowed the music from the violinist in the main dining room, their laughter and exuberance palpable from the parking lot.

The hostess pointed Corrado in their direction the moment he stepped inside, no words necessary. They had been expecting him. He approached the men, personally greeting each one before slipping into the only empty chair.

“Moretti,” the Don of the Calabrese family said. “We’re glad you could join us.”

Corrado tipped his head. “The pleasure’s all mine.”

Drinks flowed as the men discussed everything from politics to music, side skirting business issues for most of the night. The conversation was fluid, almost friendly, but Corrado wasn’t fooled—he was being tested. They watched his every move and weighed his every word, gauging whether or not they wanted to do business with him. He had met them all before while on the job, but this was different.

This was the interview of his life.

“What brings you to New York?” Sergio Geneva, head of the Geneva faction, asked. “How long are you here for?”

“Just for the night,” Corrado said. “Brought my nephew and his girlfriend.”

“So personal reasons?”

“Mostly.”

The Calabrese Don looked at Corrado across the table. “I’m glad you’re here. There’s something I wanted to talk to you about. This friend of mine, Sammy Graves . . . he opened up this new casino. You know which one I’m talking about?”

“Of course.”

“He’s a good guy, on the straight and narrow. Got a family and kids. I tried to help him out, get his place off the ground upstate, give him a line of credit, but he declined. Wanted to do it himself, every bit of it legal.”