Inferno (Blood for Blood #2) (10 page)

‘Yes. Valentino and I were born early in the morning.’ Luca’s voice changed, losing the tinge of arrogance that made it haughty. His family was not a laughing matter. ‘My grandfather held me in his arms for an hour. He wasn’t so interested in Valentino. I don’t know if it was because of his defect or because I was the less screechy of the two of us, but my grandfather convinced my parents that he and I were kindred spirits. He said he
felt
it. I’m not so sure. How kindred can you feel with a scrunched-up baby who can’t even see properly? Anyway, after he gave me back to my mother, he walked right out of the hospital and dropped dead on the street.’

‘Oh,’ I gasped, feeling my face crumple.
That took a dark turn
. ‘Was it a heart attack?’

Luca’s smile was rueful. ‘Sophie Gracewell. Naïve as ever. They hit him twice; once in the head, once in the heart. Twin bullets, to represent Valentino and me.’

I clutched at my stomach. Despite my best efforts to remain composed, I was starting to feel a little sick. I focused
on the letters in front of me, following their elaborate curves. ‘Who shot him?’

I could feel Luca watching me. ‘The Marinos.’ In his mouth, the name
Marino
sounded like a curse word. Nic had spoken about them in that same tone when he had asked me about Jack in the garden. ‘We call them the Black Hand. You could say we have a … colourful history with them.’ He stopped, his head dipping like he was staring at something on the ground, and quietly, emotionlessly, he added, ‘It had been a long time coming.’

‘What exactly does
colourful
mean?’

Luca shrugged, still staring at that same spot. ‘That we’re always killing each other.’

‘Ah,’ I said, feeling horrified and doing my best to hide it. ‘Of course …’

‘We were in a truce at the time … or at least we were supposed to be, but they were still harbouring resentment for something that happened several years before that. And with the twin thing, I suppose the symbolism was too great to pass up.’

‘The twin thing?’

‘Yes,’ said Luca, looking up again, but not at me. His gaze roved around the room, tripping over his ancestors’ tombs. ‘In the eighties, during the second blood war between our families, my grandfather ordered the killing of Don Vincenzo Marino and his family. It was a drastic move, but he thought that would cripple the Marino dynasty and end the bloodshed once and for all. The Falcones got Vincenzo and his wife, but their sons weren’t there. They were twins. No one knows where they went – seems like they just disappeared into thin
air. After that, Vincenzo’s younger brother, Cesare, took over, but he was an incompetent boss. The family didn’t respect him the way they respected Vincenzo. Just like my grandfather had planned, the Marinos were weakened without strong leadership, and Cesare agreed to a truce.’ He heaved a sigh. It was heavy and filled with regret, as though he had been there to witness it all.

‘But the bloodshed didn’t end, did it?’ I asked quietly.

‘The Marinos endured the terms, at first, but they obviously didn’t swallow them – maybe the twins’ survival gave them courage, or maybe it was my mother’s sister, Donata, who changed things. She married Cesare Marino when she was barely twenty years old. He was almost twice her age, but she didn’t care. Donata was hungry for money, for the power she couldn’t find in her own family.’ His expression soured as his mind turned to his aunt. ‘The Genoveses were on the way out, and I guess you could say the Marinos had an opening.’

‘And she took it,’ I supplied. I considered the idea of marrying some random forty-year-old mob boss for money and power, and it made my skin crawl. What twisted brand of ambition would make someone want to do that? I remembered Luca’s mother’s words to me in my hospital room:
The Genovese women are survivors; we have the blood of Sicily in our veins, entire families who work beneath us
.

Luca nodded. ‘Donata became more of a boss than her husband. Within a couple of years, she was running the whole operation. The day Valentino and I were born, Donata sent her Marino
soldati
after my parents, out of some sick, delayed retribution.’ At my look of confusion, he clarified, ‘Soldiers.’

‘Soldiers?’ I repeated in a voice much higher than normal. In my head I pictured an army of mafiosi marching towards a hospital, and bringing death with them. I swallowed hard. ‘But why?’

‘Donata wanted to orphan Valentino and me, the same way the Falcones orphaned the Marino twins. She wanted to kill her own sister.’

‘That’s ruthless,’ I said. ‘I mean, they’re
sisters
.’

Something unreadable flitted across Luca’s face. ‘They’re Genovese,’ he resolved, as though that would explain everything. It didn’t, but I stayed silent and after a moment, he picked up the thread of conversation again. ‘My grandfather got a tip-off that the Marinos were going to move against us, so he met them on the streets outside the hospital that day and they took him instead.’

‘God,’ I said.

‘Yeah,’ said Luca. ‘He paid the ultimate price in the end.’

‘For killing the Marino boss and his wife?’ I thought about the wife. Had she been someone like me, ushered into the family by her feelings and naïvety, or was she raised the way Nic’s mother and her sister were? Did she marry Vincenzo Marino willingly, knowing what might one day happen to them?

‘For ordering it,’ Luca clarified. ‘The hit on Vincenzo Marino and his wife was Felice’s. His first. Well, first and second.’ A bitter smile twisted on his lips. ‘If you ever want to piss Felice off, mention the missing Marino twins and he’ll go so red you won’t recognize him. The ones that got away,’ Luca said with mock wistfulness. ‘Only Felice would lament the failure to kill a couple of kids.’

‘He ruined their lives,’ I said, bitterness overtaking me at
the thought of Felice’s stupid face. His leering grin. His murderous eyes. ‘Wasn’t that enough?’

Luca shook his head. ‘There’s a long history between our families, Sophie. It doesn’t come down to a couple of murders, not of their boss, not of my grandfather. We’ve been warring with the Marinos since Sicily. It started with land, and land became profit and drugs and arms, and territories, and revenge. There have been losses on both sides.’

‘I don’t see how that excuses anything.’

Luca’s voice hardened. ‘I never said it did.’

‘Nic told me once that you never go after members of the Mafia culture, no matter what they’ve done.’

Luca’s laugh was mirthless. ‘Nicoli says a lot of things. That doesn’t make them true.’

‘So he lied.’ I tried to keep the surprise from my voice. I know Nic was more than capable of being dishonest, but when he had sat beside me in his sitting room, pouring out the secrets of his lineage, he had seemed so sincere.

Luca’s forehead creased. ‘I think it’s less about him lying to you and more about him lying to himself. The Marinos have always been different from the other families. We’ve never shared a history of respect with them.’

‘Are you still at war … in a “blood war”?’ I amended, wondering at the sick turn in my stomach, at the way my panic flared at the thought. How strong were the Marinos now? How close were they to the Falcones? Just how bloody was a blood war?

‘No. Not for a while now.’ Luca’s face was pale and drawn; he looked tired of standing, tired of talking. He sat down, tucking his boots under the bench and leaning forward. He
steepled his fingers in front of his lips, thinking. I was struck by the memory of Valentino – how alike they were in that moment, one in my memory, the other beside me. I stayed standing, curious now that I was steeped in their history. I circled the room, scanning names I couldn’t pronounce and Roman numerals that made no sense.

‘That’s good, I suppose, that there’s peace,’ I said.

I couldn’t see Luca’s face, but the back of his head jerked, and he snorted. ‘A truce is only as good as its sincerity. Once my mother’s sister has rebuilt her wealth and the Marino membership, she’ll come out of the woodwork.’

‘Maybe she won’t. Maybe she wants peace too. That’s what most people want.’ Well, most sane people.

‘Peace or not, there’s an old Falcone saying: “Never turn your back on a Marino”.’

‘Ah, a family saying,’ I said. ‘Kind of like “A Lannister always pays his debts”.’

He swivelled around, re-planting his feet on the ground closest to me. He cocked his head. ‘What?’

I raised my hand to him. ‘Don’t act like you’ve never seen
Game of Thrones
, Luca. Nobody likes a liar.’

He rolled his eyes. ‘Trust you to lower the seriousness of the conversation.’

‘I was
contributing
,’ I countered. ‘It’s not like
I
have a family motto to offer.’

‘What a shame,’ he said drily.

‘If I did, it would probably be something like “When all else fails, play dead”.’

‘That’s idiotic.’

‘Tell that to possums. They know what they’re at.’

‘Well, it’s nice to know I don’t have to worry about you when you’re out there on your own.’ I could almost taste the sarcasm in the air.

My laughter surprised me. It hung in echoes around us, making the room seem bigger and colder.

Luca’s eyes grew in surprise, two sapphires sparkling in the dimness. ‘What’s so funny?’

‘Just the thought of you worrying about me. Or, well, anything, really.’

He narrowed his eyes. ‘How low your opinion of me is.’

I circled the bench, zeroing in on his grandfather’s inscription. I could sense him turning with me, following my movements. How long had we been in here by now? And why was I so eager to traverse the walls of history in his company?

‘They were hoping I would be just like him,’ he offered into the silence. I pressed my lips together, surprised at his willingness to surrender information to me, to want to talk to me about something real, something important. ‘Gianluca Falcone was the
capo di tutti i capi
, the boss of all bosses. My grandfather had marked me that day in the hospital, before he died.’

‘Do you
want
to be like him?’ I asked, turning to study him.

A subtle tilt of the chin, and then, quietly, he said, ‘Isn’t the answer obvious?’

‘He sacrificed himself so that you would have parents to raise you.’

‘One right doesn’t remedy a thousand wrongs.’

‘You should write a book of quotes.’

He wasn’t smiling. I supposed it was obvious then. Glaringly obvious, if you knew where to look – Luca had abstained from
the role handed down to him by his father, the role they all wanted him to undertake. He had given it away, but not entirely. He was still the underboss. Conflicted, dreaming, but ultimately trapped. What was there to smile about?

‘What do all the numbers mean?’ I read his grandfather’s Roman numeral aloud. ‘One hundred and thirteen? Is it some kind of ranking system?’

Luca stood up, the earlier exhaustion fading from his face. ‘You can read Roman numerals?’

‘I’m pretty smart, I’ll have you know,’ I said. ‘Not a nerd, like you. But smart, in the ways that matter.’

He traced the number with his forefinger. ‘This is my grandfather’s kill count.’

The room seemed to darken all of a sudden. I stepped backwards and stumbled against the bench.
One hundred and thirteen people. One hundred and thirteen funerals. One hundred and thirteen grieving families
. So that was what it meant to be the boss of all bosses. Suddenly Luca’s words took on a whole new weight. He was Gianluca II, his grandfather’s prodigy; the butcher’s legacy. ‘And your family
want
you to be just like him?’

‘Yes, they do.’ An emotionless answer.

‘And, just
how
like him are you already?’

Luca glanced sidelong at me, his lips twisting. ‘You really think I’m going to answer that?’

I moved away from him, to another, sparser wall, where there were just two plaques and I didn’t have to think about Luca’s Roman numeral. Or Nic’s. The sign on the right was Felice’s, his death-date yet to be marked. The sign on the left simply read:

EVELINA FALCONE

‘Who’s this?’ I asked.

Luca came to stand beside me. His arm brushed against mine. I could feel the static on my skin. ‘This is Felice’s wall.’

Between the plaques, a ruby encased in silver had been inset into the stone. Protruding from the silver in swirling calligraphy were the letters F on one side, and E on the other. Beneath the ruby it said
Sempre
.

Luca brushed his fingers along the words, translating. ‘
Always.’
And then in a quiet voice, he added, ‘Felice wanted to be interred next to his wife.’ He traced the ruby, reverentially, softly. ‘He engraved her tomb the day he engraved her ring. Every dime he ever earned went into those two rubies and then one of them went with her and it broke his heart.’

‘Where?’ I asked, looking for dates and failing to find them. She wasn’t dead. Yet.

‘She disappeared. She was eight months pregnant with their daughter, and one day she went out and never came back.’

‘Why?’ I asked, though in truth it was not hard to imagine. Felice was, after all, a terrible human being.

‘He’s never said.’ Luca shrugged. ‘He still believes she’ll come back to him some day.’

‘Do you?’

His mouth hardened into a thin line. It sharpened his cheekbones and the clean cut of his jaw. ‘He’s a fool.’

‘A romantic, maybe,’ I tempered, wondering at how bad things must have gotten for an eight-month-pregnant woman to walk out on her husband. Still, being married to a
sociopath is no easy feat.

‘No,’ said Luca. ‘A fool.’

I got the sense the topic was closed. I let it be, thinking on Felice with fractionally more empathy than before. Emphasis on fractionally. I guess no one can be painted with just one brush. There is light and shade in all of us, pain and hardship, and some of us rise from it while others are darkened by it.
Evelina
, I thought,
wherever you are, you are probably better off
.

Luca sat down on the bench again, his legs stretched out and crossing at the ankles. He was watching me. ‘You’re pale.’

‘I’m always pale.’