Page 5 of Princess of the Mafia

He chuckled softly, and it warmed my heart. I hadn’t heard it for some time now. “Go now before she catches you in those shoes.”

Hesitation stalled me. I wanted to tell him it was all going to be okay. He would be a better Don than Papà ever was. Except I was a girl, and it wasn’t the time now. So I turned and left. I was almost up the stairs when his voice floated up to me. “Daria.” I turned to see him framing the doorway, amusement but a distant memory. “You stay out of the way later. Sì?”

Well, I wasn’t going to ride my carretto to meet the Don, if that’s what he meant. I frowned, nodded, and ran up the stairs. Just when I thought he was lightening up.

My room was what it would look like if a burglar had barged in and searched each cupboard, each drawer and had some junk food while doing it. Mamma sent the servants in every Thursday. Come Thursday night, it would look like they’d slept in my room rather than cleaned it up. Mamma said I had selective blindness. One that skimmed over dirty clothes and empty candy wrappers. I preferred to think of it as a talent.

I took off my dirty sneakers and hid them under a bunch of clothes puddled in my wardrobe. Once in a while, Mamma joined the servants to clean up. With my luck, she’d find it, and I’d get a bashing even if it was months after. I made a mental note not to forget to clean it.

I showered like the Don was coming for me, not my beautiful sister with her glittering black hair and ruby-red lips. None of us in my nuclear family was a fan of this contract wedding. Not even Mamma, I think, even though she pretended otherwise. Papà would have been, but he was dead, and his opinion didn’t count. But Orietta had agreed for some reason, and I wasn’t letting an occasion go by where I could dress up. So I got dressed in the prettiest, pink, frilly dress I could find, put on my favorite perfume, and sauntered out of the room like Cleopatra, till I passed Orietta sitting in front of her vanity in her room.

Medda! She looked like she’d do a Juliet and poison herself. I didn’t get why she had agreed, but hadn’t bothered to ask her either. I’d learned to avoid asking Orietta questions. Most often, I didn’t understand her cryptic answers and didn’t like her mean words. There was something between us that sparked wrong. But still, she was my sister, and I loved her very much.

“What?” she snapped, tracing her eyes with a steady hand. When she stopped, they were lined in black, just like her eyes.

“Molta bella, Etta!” I wasn’t lying. Orietta was the kind of gorgeous that got grown men dropping to their knees. She was a woman, seductive to her core, and she knew how to use it. As if that wasn’t enough, she had straight black glossy hair. The type that looked great any time, any place. There wasn’t a single lock that was out of place. Her features were sharp. Her nose was the straightest I’d ever seen. Not flat at the bottom, like mine. Her pale skin was the envy of many of my cousins. She was lighter than our darker olive skin.

I stepped into her room and sat down on the bed next to the vanity. Her bed was made up and there wasn’t a spark of dust to be found on the floor. Fascination overtook me as she traced her lips with cherry red lipstick. “The Don is a very lucky man.”

She scoffed. “Like I care.”

Orietta confused me. I knew my brother. If she didn’t want to do this, Vitale would never allow it. His edges were tainted rough, and he was a made man to the core, but he wasn’t unkind. Not to his sisters. “Why did you agree to it then?” I grabbed her hand in mine. “If you don’t want to go through with this, tell Ale! He won’t allow it.”

“Oh, Daria, you are so naïve.” She yanked her hand away. “You live in your own world with your silly shortened names. The princess in the tower. Don’t you realize…” she looked me in the eye and pointed her lipstick at me, “that I don’t have a choice.”

“I don’t get—”

“Of course, you don’t get it,” she snapped. “You know what the difference is between us? You’re still a child, and I am a woman. I have responsibilities. What do you think will happen if I say no?”

“I don’t know—”

“Exactly. You don’t. If I say no, there is no alliance and we will be alone when our enemies are waiting for us to fail.”

“Ale will find another way. It doesn’t have to be through marriage,” I pleaded with her.

“There’s no other way.” She took her blush and flipped it open. “No need to worry your pretty head off now. At least he won’t get my virginity.”

What? I blinked.

She smiled at me, brush in hand. “You didn’t think I was a virgin, did you?” She laughed at my surprise. “God, you’re so naïve. Daria, haven’t you learned anything from Papà? If a man like Martello took my virginity, he’d own me! You think I’m going to give a man a power like that over me?”

Medda! Papà really did a number on all his girls. The worst part was that I understood Orietta for once.

“Daria!” Mamma’s yell hit from downstairs.

I released her eyeliner that I was clutching in my hand and made for the door. My heart edged with a heaviness again.

“Daria.” I halted at the door with my hand wrapped around the doorframe. I knew what was coming. “If you tell Mamma, I’ll have to kill you.”

I nodded. When I was younger, I thought she was joking. The first time she’d told me that, I had been five. Still, even if my family were the Cosa Nostra, I didn’t really believe my sister would kill me. But sometimes I wasn’t so sure.

“Daria!”

“Coming!” I ran down the stairs where Mamma waited.

A frown wrinkled her beautiful forehead. “Why are you all dressed up?”

“Same reason you are, I guess,” I quipped.

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