Page 59 of Soulmate of the Mafia King
I shook my head.
“At least I had the decency to buy my girlfriend,” Tommaso continued.
Adrian and Patrick snickered.
“What do you think of this for my toast: I’ve known a lot of men who would beg, borrow, and steal to find the love of their life, but no one who took the last option there as literally as Killian.”
I turned to see my old friend with a fake glass raised in the air and couldn’t hold back a smile. “Stealing worked for me.”
He burst into laughter, and Adrian and Patrick joined in. A moment later, one of the million waitstaff Sera had hired for the event pushed inside with a carafe of coffee. Tommaso thanked the girl then poured cups for each of us and raised his.
“To get a little serious,” he said. “Let’s drink to the good men we lost on the way. None of us would be here without their sacrifice.”
I raised my cup, then sipped the burning black brew. He was right. I’d lost so many men on this road. The trail of blood behind me stretched for years, good and bad men alike. At this moment, the last hurrah of my mafia career, I even missed Francesco in his own way. Every drop spilled brought me to this moment. I’d expected to die like my father, with my hands still painted red. But Sera gave me a chance to, if not wash themclean, keep them from growing redder. I didn’t know that I could ever repay her for that.
Someone knocked on the door, and I turned, expecting to see another member of the waitstaff. Instead, my mother’s newest nurse poked her head inside. I stood. For a moment, I thought this might also by my mother’s death day. A fitting fate for the Hand of Death.
“She wants to talk to you,” the nurse said.
The moment dissipated. I nodded and let her lead me up to the room my mother moved into a few days ago, so the stress of coming downstairs wouldn’t exhaust her too much to attend the wedding. The blinds were drawn, and the room was dark, but my mother sat in a wheelchair in the middle of the room, blinking blearily. The nurse nodded at one of the pill bottles on the bedside table. She’d been heavily drugged, likely to reduce her pain.
“Who is that?” she croaked.
“Killian.” I stepped into the room. “You wanted to see me?”
She reached vaguely for my hand, and I offered it to her. Her thin skin wrinkled easily in my grasp. Like this, it was so easy to forget she’d tried to kill Sera so many times.
“Today is the wedding, hm?” she said.
“Yes,” I replied. “I’m marrying Sera.”
She scoffed. “I’ve never liked her.”
I clenched my jaw. “I know that.’
“But you’re the man of the house now.” She squeezed my hand weakly. “You do what you must. Just like your father always did.”
I squeezed her back just as gently. “Thank you.”
“You know I got married in your grandmother’s garden as well?” she said.
“No, I didn’t.” I sat in a chair next to hers. “What did she have to say about that?”
My mother cackled. “Hated it. But I guess that’s as fine a tradition as any to carry down the Ricci line, eh?”
The Ricci line. When Sera asked me about children, I honestly hadn’t known how I’d answer. I was the fucking Hand of Death. I couldn’t exactly picture myself fitting in at T-ball practice. But as soon as I opened my mouth, I knew I couldn’t live in a world without a little baby that had her eyes.
“It’s almost time for the wedding,” I said. “I have to go.”
“I love you. Your father loved you,” she said.
I swallowed. “I know.”
CHAPTER 45
SERA
In the upstairs dressing room I had constructed as part of the wedding planning process, I sat in front of a professional makeup artist like I had for the last hour. My neck ached, the cute, poofy chair had grown uncomfortable, and I really wished I’d eaten another croissant before I let her put on my lipstick.
