Page 32 of Blood and Penance
I squeeze his throat tighter, just to get my point across. I wasn’t always a priest, and I’ll do whatever I can not to go back to the person I was before I took my vows. However, my red line is my son and Phoenix. I’ll do what I need to do to protect them, then ask for God’s forgiveness afterwards.
Once I think I’ve gotten my point across, I let him go then push him away. “This is your final warning. I gave you too much control over my life before, and it cost me my family. I will not do that again. Stay away from Phoenix and my son.”
My father rubs his neck, and the glare his throws my way would cause many men to cower to him. But I’m not that man. He’s cost me the chance to have a life with the woman I love, and my son for six years. I will not bend to what he wants anymore. I will kill him before I let him anywhere near them.
He straightens his suit, and calmness replaces the anger on his face. I know not only is Lio D’Amico a problem, but Giovanni Puglisi is too.
“You need to leave, now before I do something I can't come back from.”
“This isn’t over, Gianni. You can be a part of his life, or not. That’s your choice, but my grandson will be raised a Puglisi.”
“Over my dead body.”
The silence in the room is deafening. But I meant what I said. He will have to kill me for my son to be raised anywhere near him. He’s toxic, and I refuse for Giancarlo to have the life I had growing up. He deserves more, and as his father I will make sure he has it.
With no more words, my father walks out the rectory, slamming the door behind him. I let out a breath of relief that he’s no longer here. I need to figure this out. My father isn’t one to back down, and I know he’s already planning how to get Giancarlo in his clutches.
Chapter Twenty
Phoenix
What did he mean he’s the reason I’m not in Gianni’s life now?
As soon as the door slams and I know Giovanni is gone for sure, I let out a relieved breath. I heard everything. If Giovanni knows I’m here, it would do more harm than good. I have no doubt he would use force to make me take him to see Giancarlo. So, I waited until he left. Now that I know for sure he’s coming after my son, I can’t waste any more time. I’m not staying here another night.
“You can come out now,” Gianni says, sighing.
He sounds so stressed, his voice cracking under the weight of everything, and though I hate that I’ve unloaded my problemsonto him, I have no other choice. No matter the connection we still share with one another, this is to save our son.
“What did he do?”
He sat down on the couch. “Come sit.” He motions for me to sit next to him. “We have some things to discuss.”
A heavy silence hangs in the air as I move toward him that’s punctuated only by the worried frown etched onto his face. This is going to be a hard conversation. I can’t say I’m not curious to know what his father meant. But I also can’t say I’m not scared to hear his confession. For better or worse, whatever happened changed the course of both our lives. He became a priest, and I became a single mother until Lio. Then my life became ten times worse than I could have ever imagined.
Giovanni has always tried to control Gianni’s life just like he’s trying to control it now through our son. I don’t know what Giovanni has done, but whatever it is, he accomplished what he wanted. I’m no longer in Gianni’s life.
“How much did you hear?” he asks when I take a seat next to him.
He takes my hand, his fingers intertwining with mine, and a familiar warmth spreads through me. It reminds me of the old days, his hand warm in mine, a comforting presence whenever we were together. With Gianni, it was always the small, thoughtful gestures—a hand squeeze, a knowing glance, all of those things made me love him even more.
“I heard everything. What was he talking about?”
He let out a deep sigh. “You know how much I wanted to propose to you that night in Belize, right?”
I know that week had been magical, and I hoped he was going to ask me to be his wife. But when he placed that ring on the coffee table, and walked out on me, all I thought I knew about him and our relationship shattered.
“I believed you then, but then you walked out. What happened? And tell me the truth, Gianni.”
“I had it all planned out,” he says his eyes full of anger. “Somehow, he got wind of my plan.”
“Sergio,” I mumble. “He’s always been a kiss ass when it comes to your father.”
If there’s anyone in this world I hate more than Lio and Giovanni, it’s Sergio Puglisi. He’s just as heartless as his father, and because of that he believes he deserves to head the Puglisi family. When we were together, Gianni never cared about leading the family, but Sergio hated him anyway. He did anything Giovanni wanted him to do without question.
“More than likely,” he says. “But I’m not sure because my father always had his spies. Anyway, Lorenzo got in touch with me that day to let me know that Giovanni made it clear that if I didn’t break things off for good, he would have your mother and Seraphina killed.”
The air rushes out of my lungs. All this time, I thought he just gave up on us because it had always been a struggle for us to be together. We fought to be in each other’s lives. And when we split, for a time, I hated him for what he had done to us. Cursed him for walking away from what we worked so hard to have and leaving me to raise our son alone.
