I step toward the windows, and look out over the rolling, vibrant-green golf course. Hands stuffed in my slacks because I can’t watch Tony comfort his wife, and not love Reese outwardly.
A quick glance over my shoulder and the entire scene is engrained in my mind. The loving couple intertwine arms on an antique settee, hands entwined. Reese is across from them. Instead of the matching settee, she’s chosen a chair, which leaves no room for me to comfort her. As she watches the love radiate off of our parents as the quietly speak, her eyes close for a fraction of a second, she desires it too. But she has denied us.
“I think I’ll start with why things went wrong with you and Grayson,” Lolita’s feminine voice is soothing, but she doesn’t get a compliant reaction from Reese.
“Why?” her daughter simply says.
I turn around for a second, just to seem engaged. And shit, I really fucking am. Yeah, I need to know why the two never worked out. Reese had told their story one night. She was wrapped in my arms, while offering a romantic scene in a movie that had been her life.
She’d said before there was me, there was Grayson. She hadn’t verbalized the words ‘love,’ but it rung out in her voice as she spoke. My jaw clenches, the green grass fuzzes before my eyes in anger as I reminisce on her words. Reese had said, there were no interests in the male species before Grayson. She’d been focused on becoming a baker. And there was only Grayson because his assistant was sick one day, forcing him to buy his own breakfast. The douchebag called it serendipity. Then he proceeded to purchase every baked good in Flour just to escort her to lunch. Then at the fancy, well-to-do lunch, he made fun of himself in front of his peers while loudly requesting her hand for dinner. People applauded them, believing the amusement was her engagement. Over my fucking dead body.
As I glance back again, Lolita smiles at me. “Reese and Grayson used to finish each other’s sentences,” she gives this tidbit in order for me to imagine their love too.
“Oh,” I respond, since she’s so kind as to pull me into the conversation.
“Well, we went from bouncing off ideas to each other,” Reese chimes in, “to him writing a few sentences devoid of emotion in email format. Mom, that’s ancient history.”
Those chocolate-brown orbs choose not to cast my direction. And Lolita says, “I scared the crap out of him,” so all eyes are on her now anyway. “I had to see if he honestly loved you. Reese, you’re my baby girl, you’re all I have.”
“Oh sheesh, Mom,” Reese shifts in her seat. Her body language is geared toward the door, further away from me.
At Tony’s nudge, Lolita continues, “I told him just who Milo was. And no, I don’t mean crooked cop. I do believe that mentioning your father was one of Giovanni Giugliano’s children weighed more than love.”
Tony rubs a hand over her shoulder, I sink down onto the brocade chair positioned perfectly for reading while sitting near the window. Milo Gianni Benincassa… Giovanni motherfucking Giugliano. Milo Gianni Giugliano.
A fistful of air evaporates from my lungs, seated wide-legged I take a deep breath. There were rumors. Of course the LAPD had Milo’s body for a short time, but no DNA for Giugliano. And the subsequent days following Milo’s demise, there were more deaths. Deaths of natural causes, deaths pointing the fingers to ‘wives’ who had to be angry, deaths of the four officers who orchestrated the entire event. While that occurred, Milo’s corpse disappeared from the county coroner. Dead bodies have walked away before, but the ‘miracle’ probability is slim.
“So my fiancé ran for his life.” Reese chuckles, “Only to bid farewell via an email probably written in haste while in his corporate office with a skyscraper view of downtown. This is bullshit, Ma.”
Giovanni Giugliano. The name has made grown men piss their pants. The incredulous look on Reese’s face reads that she knows exactly who the man is. She doesn’t keep up on current events, and tells me that she has always hated watching the news and how it has ruined her name. The Giugliano family is the head of a syndicate that governed the entire East Coast territory. Giovanni Giugliano doesn’t get past those who rather not watch the news or those who are too naive to want to know of such atrocities. The nightmares people gossip about don’t even do him justice. But the Giuglianos are legendary.
“It’s true, honey.” Lolita continues, sniffling back tears. “Your father had once been a very bright young man. Loyal to a fault and that's saying much about the version we knew who ping-ponged the police department’s operation to his own father.”
I bite my bottom lip, rubbing the stubble on my chin. Again, Lolita includes me into the conversation, with the nod of her head.
“He'd graduated top of his class. Moved up into the LAPD and was just about to shift over to the FBI, per Giovanni’s orders. Somewhere during that time, Milo went batshit crazy. A power trip took ahold of him so bad, he just had to be king. Those honey eyes which captivated me to no end went cold with greed.”
She spares no expense to Reese’s feelings. Lolita tells Reese how during funeral proceedings she found out that Milo had a family. Another wife and set of kids. Full-blooded Italians who he lived with when they missed him the most.
Then Lolita adds, “Giovanni will be back once you bare your first son.”
Reese cuts in, “Wow, this sounds like a B-list movie, Ma. You’re saying, my child will be blood, and Giovanni will demand to know him. I suppose if I
