Page 12 of Pregnant By the Mafia Boss

You’re about to learn a valuable lesson.I will hunt you down….

Chapter Seven - Fiona

The wobbly Formica covered table I sit at is round and small, and not adequately designed for many people to sit at, only making it worse for me. My legs are cramped, and I feel the onset of pins and needles spiking through them, but I don’t dare change position. It’s a miracle I’m even here in the first place, and it’s too close for comfort to be facing the man I am. The one industrial light that hangs above my head is dim, keeps flickering in my eyes, and it’s annoying.

Why is he even calling me here now after a year of not talking? Even with these barren circumstances, the power of my father’s name makes it compelling enough for me to show up. Frustrated, I cradle the black box in front of me, looking at it and not knowing what to expect. I stare at it, immediately wanting to hand it back to my infamous father—Luca Marino, the Italian don. It’s a tortuous secret I’ve harbored my entire life, and having borne the cross for so long is taking its toll. I gulp down the hard acorn in my throat, looking over at the aged man whose face is now thin, sunken in, his eyes lackluster of light. Frowning, I divert my eyes to the small back room, which is packed tight full of boxes, not wanting to hold eye contact with him.

Luca takes a sip of water, and I do too, pushing down the hard lump lodged at the base of my throat. He readjusts himself in his chair, his hands clasping and unclasping together while I wait for him to explain exactly why I’m here and what’s contained in the box.

Wanting the meeting to go as fast as possible, I start speaking first. “Why did you call me here?” I ask in an accusatory tone.

“Fiona, my cara figlia,” Luca croaks out, the sentiment ofdarling daughtercausing me to cringe. I don’t know where he gets off saying it, because there’s nothing “darling” about how he’s treated me.

“That’s a stretch calling me that,” I quip with heavy sarcasm. Luca’s tired eyes stare back at me, his breathing labored as he lifts his cap, shakily placing it beside him on the table. He looks paler than I’ve ever seen him, even with his olive-tanned skin.

Shocked at his ghastly appearance, I gasp in horror. “You’ve got no hair!” As soon as I saw him when I walked in, I knew something was wrong with him, but I couldn’t pinpoint what it was exactly.

`“No,” he proclaims sadly with a weighted sigh. “I don’t. I’ve been fighting cancer, and it hasn’t gone well. I’m at stage five,” he rasps, wincing as if it’s hard for him to speak.

I want so badly to hate the man, but when I look at him, I see the pain and suffering he’s enduring.Thisis why he called me. He’s on his deathbed andnowhe wants my forgiveness. It’s a bitter and hard pill to swallow.

Solemnly, I shift the box aside, wanting to know more about his life, and what happened to him. “What type of cancer do you have, and how long have they told you have to live?”

Luca strains,wheezing between every sentence.“Any day now I could leave here.” He marks the sign of the Catholic cross over his chest, and instantly my heart sinks for a man I’ve never really known. Hot tears prickle in my eyes asI stare over at the dire straits Luca is in, bricks of guilt from resenting him all these years, stacking up inside of me.

“Isn’t there anything that can be done?”

“No. I’ve done everything I possibly can. I’ve been to the best doctors in the country, and nothing has worked. It’s a rare aggressive form of pancreatic cancer and now it’s spreading. It’s reached into my lungs, and part of it has stained my heart, so it’s too late for me, cara figlia.”

“You have to try,” I tell him, choking up, even knowing he’s done so many bad things. He’s killed many a man. I’ve heard the stories through my mother, back when I lived with her in Ohio, and it wasn’t that long ago, I moved away to Chicago for a better life and opportunities for advancement.

“Your father is a bad, bad man. He kills people for a living, but he loves you. He doesn’t want you to be part of such a life,”she told me, and I couldn’t believe the man was my father, because to be associated with such evil makes me sick to my stomach.

Luca reaches out hissweaty hand,his crepe-thin hands eclipsing mine.“No. Fiona, I choose to go now. I’m in too much pain, and I no longer want to live this life in the same way,” he rasps. “I’m sixty-eight and I’ve conquered and soared to being the Don. From a young boy it’s all I ever wanted to be. I trained up through the ranks from soldier to consigliere to Don,” he explains, but I could care less.

Shattered from the inside out, I shake my head, tears falling. “You weren’t there. You abandoned me!” I express, the repressed emotions leaking out even as I scramble to stuff them back down.

“Bella, I’m sorry. I had to. Don’t you see—” He coughs sporadically, drawing back his hand as he reaches for the water, and for a moment I think he’s going to keel over. I stop, not wanting to say anything else that might throw him off.

“What’s to see?” I retort glumly, wiping my eyes with a napkin from the napkin holder.

“To see I—I did this for you, Bella. I didn’t want you to grow up surrounded by violence and the mob. It was my destiny to be a mob boss. Once you take the blood oath of the Omerta, there’s no change of life path.”

Solemnly, I nod, knowing it’s true. “Okay, I understand.” I hold his hand, not wanting to let go.

“It’s not good. I did what I thought best as a father,” he rasps, slowly letting my hand go, drinking more water, but some misses his mouth, overflowing in a dribble down the sides. It’s sickening to watch.

“Okay, sure you did,” I tell him, doing my best not to choke up inside. My father and I might have experienced our differences over the years, but I’ve remained torn about his mob involvement for years, especially since I’ve benefited from them for many years, being given a healthy allowance. At times it’s been hard to hide from my close friends, but I’ve managed to get away with it by telling them it’s to do with my job, but really, it’s been Luca keeping my pockets flush with cash all these years. I can’t say it hasn’t helped. He was one of the main reasons I was able to move to Chicago, and it’s the main hub where my father runs his operation out of. In hindsight, I can see that him helping me with a Chicago apartment might have been to draw me closer to him and to keep an eye on me, but now I don’t care.

“I love you, and I wanted what was best, and look at you now. I have to go….” My father trails off, his face full of fear. “I’ve made peace with death, and I will be opting for euthanasia.”

The blows just keep coming, and it’s almost unbearable to listen to him talking this way. “No, no, no, Papa.No!” Crumbling, I wish I was closer to him now and I wish Iunderstood his mob operations, so I knew the truth of his life, but I sense there’s no time to repair the brokenness of our relationship.

“Yes, I have to go, but before I do, I have a favor to ask.”

“What’s the favor?” I ask, wiping the last of my tears and turning to the box.

“The favor I have to ask involves the box.” I raise an eyebrow at him. “The box contains some very important files. Very, very important, Fiona. Do you understand?” my father confirms in a grave voice.

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