Page 157 of Dirty Mafia Torment

Camilla and I shake our heads.

Aunt Teresa wipes her hands on her apron, then disappears from the kitchen. Leaving us to finish with the cleanup.

Bianca hip-bumps me, and I almost drop a soapy dish into the sink. “It’s too quiet. How did you manage here all by yourself?”

I swallow hard. I never told my friends exactly how I came to arrive in Sardinia or the events that led up to it. The bruises from the attack are long gone and the threat buried. The burn mark on mywrist the only reminder. As for being alone … the feeling’s more intense now than ever before. Bittersweet.

My aunt returns and gestures us to the kitchen table. In her hands, she’s shuffling cards. “Scopa,” she announces. “Best two out of three.”

Bianca and Camilla slide into their chairs across from me, Bianca giggling at the quirky suits on the cards and Camilla asking if the game is “like Go Fish.”

Aunt Teresa’s smile doesn’t reach her eyes. “Something like that, tesoro.”

The first few rounds are harmless enough; Bianca laughing when she accidentally helped Aunt Teresa win; Camilla making a show of overthinking her plays. Until the stakes started to appear, a folded note slipped toward the winner of each hand. Innocent little slips of paper.

The twinkle in my aunt’s eye says otherwise.

“We can’t have you girls bored,” Aunt Teresa clucks.

They stare at her, wide-eyed.

For the first time in two weeks, I laugh.

“Redeemable for a favor,” Aunt Teresa says when Bianca opens hers. “Any favor.”

“What is this?” Bianca asks, staring at her in wonder.

“This is how we draw guests back to the restaurant.”

“By my singing ‘Mambo Italiano’ while I’m on the floor?”

I laugh so hard my stomach aches.

“It’s not even an authentic Italian song,” she continues to protest.

Aunt Teresa gives Camilla a smile. “You’re next, tesoro.”

The game goes on, every note wilder than the last, every laugh convincing me that I’ll be okay. That I’m not alone. That I have an aunt and friends who love me.

Still, the sweetness is tainted.

God, I hate you, Renzo.

Because what cuts the deepest, aside from knowing I wasn’t the only woman he asked, is that the last time he promised me marriage,he was completely sober. He lied, fully aware. No addiction. No chaos. Just Renzo, his true self, serving me another broken promise.

RENZO

“How are you?”the shrink with the Harvard degree asks. I’m in the same chair I occupied months ago, sucking on a stale lollipop I swiped from the container by the door. Same reluctance, same disdain for psychobabble.

What I’m not is the same man.

“Been better.”

She smiles. “We’re already off to a better start than last time.”

I sink back, letting the sugar rush settle in.

“I was surprised when you called.”