Page 12 of The Viper's Wife

The Family doctor has been by a few times to change his bandages, otherwise, I don’t think Dad would bother. That night he came back home, I listened to Mom sob in the downstairs living room. Then, a few hours later, she slammed the front door shut and hasn’t been back since.

“Listen, Val.” Stefano parks the car. A brick wall looms over us. We’re sandwiched between two other SUVs. Stefano turns. His gaze touches Dad and skitters away to me. He used to look up to Dad, to try to be like him. “You need to get this right,capisce?” Stefano and I don’t speak Italian, but he likes to pretend anyway.

Get this right? Our family was supposed to be cast aside after whatever Dad did.

No one in their right mind would want to marry me, least of all Nico Matassa.

It doesn’t make any sense. Nico is Don Salvatore’s half-brother, and their dad is an important don in New York. Their family’s wealth and power is practically infinite, while my family’s barely staying alive. My stomach churns on nothing.

The scrap of paper burns in my pocket like a bad luck charm.Watch yourself.

Stefano’s anger from the other night when I got home late clicks into place.

“When was this engagement brought up?” I ask.

“Don’t ask questions,” Stefano snaps.

I wince.

He forces a smile onto his face. It looks painful. “We’ve been given a second chance, alright? It doesn’t fucking matter why Nico wants you, just be fucking happy he does.”

Stefano has always wanted to be a made man, ever since he understood what that meant. But the consequences of failure mar Dad’s body in the car with us. How could he still want to be a part of the Family now? I don’t know if he even realizes there are other paths to choose.

We walk to the restaurant together, slowly, because Dad can’t seem to drum up the energy to move any faster these days. I don’t know if he’s been eating. I leave cups of plain yogurt in the fridge for him, and sometimes one or two are gone by the time I get home from work.

I don’t do it out of love—I don’t love Dad. I figured that out a long time ago. But that doesn’t mean I want to see him die. For now, I’ll help him, and once I move out, taking careof Dad will be Stefano’s duty. Dad always preferred his son anyway.

A hostess with long, silky hair and bright baby blues ushers us through the restaurant the moment we step inside. She doesn’t look at Dad’s missing ear or eye patch—Stefano must’ve called ahead to prepare her. Everyone else in the restaurant, men and women in fancy evening clothes, gawk openly at Dad as we pass by.

The old Dad would’ve quietly seethed at all the negative attention. His image was always an expression of his power. Now, he drags his feet, staring at the ground a few steps ahead.

I itch to lend him my arm or walk on his bad side for him, but instead, I set my jaw and follow Stefano. I won’t let him die, but I’m not going out of my way to offer sympathy to the man who let Stefano hit me for years.

The hostess leads us up a set of creaky narrow stairs to the second floor.

The room is empty save for a long table with a red linen on top and a stack of wooden crates along one wall. A lone flickering candle in the center of the table struggles to set the mood.

The hostess assures us this is VIP seating. It looks like the restaurant’s infectious disease unit.

I make a beeline for a center chair—far away from the men who will claim the end chairs, but Stefano snaps his fingers and points to another seat, right next to the head of the table. The hostess clears her throat as I stiffly obey.

She swaps places with a gangly server who appears at the top of the stairs. He can’t be much older than eighteen and has tight, blonde curls like a lamb’s, but swaggers to our table with the confidence of a veteran server. His megawattsmile dims only when he asks for our drink orders and sees that Dad needs to write his down.

Once we have our drinks, we wait.

By the third time the server jogs up the steps to ask us if we’re ready for food, Stefano tells him to get lost until our guest arrives.

My stomach grumbles, but I don’t complain. I stare forward at the terracotta plaster wall and trace the fading patterns with my eye.

Even before we were ostracized, I was never a part of the Family grapevine. I usually worked while my cousins went to weddings, baby showers, and graduations. Most of the time, I was only invited to events as an afterthought.

But even I’ve heard about Nico. Annetta Lombardi told me his dad sent him to Chicago to look for a wife. She said it with a twist of pity in her voice, like marrying Nico would be a tragedy.

I wished I’d thought to ask her more, but even before Dad messed up, there was no world where Nico would pickmeas a bride. Our family has always been low on the food chain.

I’m not even entirely convinced that this isn’t a cruel prank—some further humiliation for Dad and Stefano to dress me up for an engagement so we can all be laughed at when no one shows.

I hope that’s all it is.