Page 36 of Mafia Star

Chelle takes the bag of salads Beth carried, and Enzo grabs the bag of sodas and pizza I had. It’s cute to watch them in the kitchen together as they get our plates and glasses. I slide my gaze over to Beth, thinking how nice it would be if that was us one day. These daydreams are getting me nowhere but Blue Ballsville. When our eyes meet, I think she might be thinking the same thing.

We weren’t at Enzo’s long this morning since he had so little to move. It doesn’t take us long to finish up here. Chelle and Beth work in the master bedroom to get the closets and bathroom organized. I help Enzo set up his computers in the third bedroom. Now Chelle and Enzo each have their own office since it’s a three-bedroom apartment. The square footage is about three-quarters the size of Enzo’s four-bedroom penthouse, but I agree it’s a much nicer place for a couple.

“What’s going on between you and Liz?”

I’m unprepared for Enzo’s question, so it takes everything in me not to react.

“What do you mean?”

“I saw you two glancing at each other. Are you interested in her?”

“I—”

“Don’t lie, Marco. I already know the answer.”

I scowl at my baby brother who’s as tall as me and weighs about five pounds more.

“She’s attractive and intelligent.”

“She is. But that doesn’t answer the question.”

“She’s your sister.”

“But she isn’t yours. You are interested.”

I say nothing, instead pretending to pay attention as I plug a cord into his computer tower. What the fuck do I say?

“Dude, if you’re into her, ask her out.”

I nearly slam my head into the desk as I look up at him. We don’t just casually date. That’s why this shit is so complicated. If she and I go out, it’s because I’m truly ready to bring her all the way into this world and keep her here. I won’t string her along romantically. I won’t date her and remain emotionally closed off, only to hurt her. She might be fine with her sister marrying a Mafioso, but I don’t know if she’d even consider it for herself.

“I’m not ready to propose.”

“Don’t be an ass. A date isn’t a proposal. You might not be compatible, so it wouldn’t even be an issue.”

I know we’re compatible in one area.

“And if it doesn’t work? I don’t want to make anything uncomfortable for you or Chelle.”

“And if it does work?”

“You and I both know there is a far greater likelihood she won’t want any part of our life when she learns what it really means. Chelle will shelter her from it because you’ll shelter your wife.”

That’s what I really fear. I can tell myself every which way from Sunday that my hesitation comes from not wanting to rock the boat with Enzo and Chelle. But it’s really the possibility that Beth might reject me. That I’ll open myself up to her, and she’ll walk away. And I would let her. None of that fucking TV bullshit about sleeping with the fishes or now you know, I’ll have to kill you. There’s so much she would never know.

That’s another issue. The other men in my family might be fine telling half-truths and full-on lies to their wives, but I don’t want that. I don’t want to lie by omission, and I sure as shit don’t want to look Beth in the eye and know that what I tell her is full of crap. It would only be to protect her, but I hate the idea that I would spend the next five decades deceiving her. She deserves better than that. I don’t want to be that type of man. I’m not looking down on my dad or the others. I just don’t think I could live with it. I sure as fuck couldn’t live with telling her the truth. She’d never see me as anything but a monster.

And that boils down to another truth I don’t want to examine. I am a monster. I do fucked-up things in the name of family. I don’t regret any of it. I won’t stop, and I have no interest in changing. It means the people I love and the people who depend on me are alive. I have absolutely no limits to what I will do to protect them. And that makes me completely depraved and indifferent to human life. I don’t think I’m a psychopath who kills indiscriminately. I don’t get any kind of rush or thrill from it, though it is fulfilling at times.

That moral void in me isn’t something I want Beth sucked into. I don’t want to taint her with the underworld’s stench. I know the women in my family— by birth and by choice —navigate this shit. I know they love the men in my family and would do anything for them and for all of us. But the one thread or spark of conscience I have screams loudly enough that I can’t ignore it.

Keep Beth out of this!

“Earth to Marco.”

“Huh?”

Fuck.

---