Page 79

It's torture, being in a room with someone, breathing the same air, but feeling miles away. The isolation you feel, sharing a bed with someone you can't connect with, is insurmountable. Some people get off on casual sex, they relish in the physical pleasure, but that's never been enough for me. I've slept with a few women since my wife died, casual flings that ended as quickly as they started.

I got nothing out of it.

Afterward, I'd lie in bed beside some woman as she bathed in a post coital glow, coated in sweat and body fluids, and feel nothing but desolation. Disgust. It reeked of desperation.

It was always the loneliest moment of my life.

Until now.

Karissa's lying in bed beside me, both of us wide-awake. I could reach over and touch her if I wanted, run my rough fingertips along the curves of her soft frame, but succumbing to the temptation feels a lot like surrendering. Sex, with her, always had passion, toeing the thin line between love and hate. Touching her tonight would be dangerous. I could just as easy condemn her as I could forgive her, wrapping my hand around her throat and forgetting to let go.

Sighing exasperatedly, I sit up, my feet hitting the floor beside the bed. I run my hands down my face. I'm exhausted, physically and mentally, but I'm not going to get any sleep.

The moment I stand, her voice calls out to me. "Ignazio?"

Not Naz. Ignazio.

I think she knows that gets to me.

"Not right now," I say as I head for my closet. "I can't do this with you right now, Karissa."

She says something else, but I don't stick around to hear it. I grab a suit and walk out, putting it on and pulling myself together as I head downstairs. It only takes me a few minutes, and I slip on my shoes in the den, grabbing my keys before heading outside.

I lock the door behind me.

I need some space.

I need some answers.

I need to fucking think.

It's five in the morning, and there's not too much traffic on the streets as I drive around the outer boroughs before heading to Manhattan. I'm not sure where I'm going or what I'm even doing, ending up in Hell's Kitchen before dawn. I drive through the old neighborhood, the streets I ran growing up. The streets where Johnny Rita was my best friend, where Carmela was like a sister to me, where I fell in love with Maria.

They're all dead now.

All three of them.

Depends on who you ask, I might have all of their blood on my hands.

I pull the car in a spot along the street and get out but don't bother to feed the meter. I have no change on me. I stroll down the sidewalk, toward the old brick townhouse, oddly a shade lighter than the rest of the places on the block.

It's dark, no lights on, but it doesn't matter.

I have no intention of going inside.

I hesitate in front of it, staring at the chipped paint of the black front door, before I take a seat on the grungy steps leading to it. I sit in silence under the dim outside light, gazing around the neighborhood.

After a few minutes, the door behind me unexpectedly opens. I don't turn around, don't bother to look. I can feel eyes boring into the back of my head. Footsteps descend the steps and pause on the sidewalk in front of me.

My eyes slowly move up, meeting my father's steely gaze.

"I've seen you more this summer," he says, "than I saw you the past few years."

"I didn't come to see you," I say. "I figured you'd be at work already."

"So, what, you came for your mother?"

I can hear his anger in that question.

"No, I'm not going to bother her."

"So why are you here?"

I hesitate before deciding to go with honesty. "I don't know."

He nods, his harsh expression softening, like me not knowing makes perfect sense to him. He shoves his hands in the pockets of his khakis, stained from years of working in them. I gaze at him curiously, surprised he's lingering. I know it isn't because he enjoys my company. He's probably afraid I'll try to break in.

"Funny, seeing you out here, sneaking around in the dark, given you've always been scared of it."

The blunt way he says that makes me bristle. "I'm not afraid of the dark anymore."

"Of course not," he says. "It's not the darkness that's terrifying, it's what you might find in it. And it doesn't scare you anymore, Ignazio, because it is you. You're what's terrifying in the darkness."

He says it matter of fact, but he doesn't sound scared.

I don't terrify him.

To him, I'm just what's left of that little boy, the one who used a nightlight because he couldn't sleep in the dark. I'm a desecrated corpse.

"Can I ask you something?" I ask my father. He doesn't say anything, but his unchanged expression is as good as permission. "You ever talk to the police about me?"

"Yes."

No bullshit.

No denial.

I laugh bitterly to myself, shaking my head as I look away from him.

"They come around sometimes, asking questions," he says. "I tell them we don't know nothing. I know your reputation, Ignazio, but it's not my business to repeat what I hear. That's between you and your maker."

"You are my maker."

He scoffs. "You know what I mean."

"I know," I mutter, leaning back on my elbows. "So you never considered actually turning me in? You've threatened to a few times."

"I never threatened to turn you in," he counters. "I just protect what's mine. I'm not a coward, Ignazio. You won't harm what I love. But the rest is on you. Has nothing to do with me. I don't seek out trouble. I don't want it. That's why I ask you to stay away."

Nodding, I push off from the steps and get to my feet. "I probably shouldn't be here."

I step down, stopping in front of him.

"Is there a reason you're asking me that?"

I consider just walking away, but what the hell? I need to get it off my chest, and his opinion of me certainly can't get worse. My father won't hold back and maybe, I think, the brutal honesty is what I need.

"Karissa, the woman I was with that day..."

"Johnny and Carmela's kid?"

"Yes," I say. "She went to the police."

"She rat on you?"

"She swears she didn't."

"And you don't believe her?"

"I don't know."

He stands there for a moment before taking a seat exactly where I'd just vacated. "Now answer me something, Ignazio... you say this girl knows the kind of person you are? That she knows the history between you and her parents?"

"Yes."

"And she swears she didn't rat on you?"