Page 105 of The Killer Cupcake
Having parents who loved that hard meant knowing exactly what you'd lost when life took pieces away. She crossed to her dresser, muscle memory guiding her to the drawer with the false bottom. The hiding spot stood empty—those letters to Carmelo had made the journey to Butts with her—but the gesture alone summoned fresh pain.
"Kathy?"
"Yes, Ma?" She quickly wiped her face, turning with practiced brightness. "Hey!"
"Hey, yourself. Danny-boy said you wanted to talk?" Brenda closed the door softly.
The moment it clicked shut, Kathy flew into her mother's arms. They stood there, holding each other up, tears mingling on shoulders that had carried too much. Brenda pulled back first, studying her daughter with fierce pride.
"My baby girl. All grown up and married. So beautiful. I know I fought letting you go, didn't understand your father's decisions. But seeing you with Ely..." She touched Kathy's cheek. "Maybe it was all part of God's plan."
Kathy stepped back. "Is it God's plan, Ma? Or just the consequences of my choices?"
"Kathy—?”
"You heard Junior. You heard him call Matteo 'Papa.’”
"Children that age get confused?—"
"He's not confused, Ma. That's his father."
Brenda aged ten years in an instant. "Even if—we never say it. You understand? Never. This family can't take another blow."
"Ma, I have to tell you something." The dam broke. "Everything that's happened—Debbie and Matteo, this war, Uncle Pete—it all started with me and Carmelo. I'm the match that lit this fire."
"Baby, that's not?—"
"Please. Sit. Let me tell you all of it." Kathy retreated from reaching hands. "You're all I have left who might understand."
"I'm your mother. I'd die for you. Nothing you say changes that."
The story poured out—Janey, the arrangement, the baby, the brutal end with Carmelo. Brenda listened like a priest taking confession, wincing but never judging.
When it ended, Kathy felt emptied and clean. Silence settled after the last word. Her mother stared at the wall, reorganizing everything she thought she knew. At first, she couldn’t look at Kathy. She kept shaking her head. Kathy felt the worst. Brenda closed her eyes at last and squeezed them tightly shut. She mouthed a prayer Kathy could not hear. When it was over, she stood slowly, as if it were painful to do. Kathy trembled with shame and grief. Her mother’s rejection would be the nail in her coffin. She needed her mother above all else.
"Come here, baby. Mama's got you." Brenda said with open arms. Kathy collapsed against her, feeling twelve again. “All I know, all I focus on is my baby is having a baby. Another Elliot girl. Cause we are Elliot girls. Made from pain and strength. We take care of each other. Always.”
“Yes, Mama,” Kathy wept.
“We’ll protect this child like we protect each other. With everything in us.”
The Triangle Social Clubblew at 3:47 AM. Windows blasted outward in a violent symphony of shattered glass, cascading everywhere. The blast turned night into day on Mulberry Street. Ely was already running, legs pumping hard against the pavement, when the concussive blast wave slammed into his back. He stumbled, his boots skidding, but sheer momentum and terror kept him upright.Let the boys have hit their marks, he prayed silently, the thought sharp and desperate amidst the chaos. If the plan held, Don Cosimo Ricci’s jewel – the hallowed ground where the Don conducted his most crucial meetings with his mob ties – would be lit up like a Christmas tree and reduced to a smoldering skeleton by dawn.
But plans, especially bloody ones, have a way of turning into shit. The Riccis had been tipped off about Harlem’s retaliation. While Slim’s warning arrived too late to stop Ely’s dynamite from tearing through the club, it gave the Riccis just enough time to arrive and spring their trap on Bumpy Johnson’s men, who now answered to Henry Freeman.
Gunfire erupted, sudden and brutal, from three directions at once. The Harlem crew scattered like startled cats into the labyrinth of Little Italy. Through the acrid haze of smoke and the leaping orange glare of the burning building, Ely caught a glimpse of Carmelo Ricci unfolding himself from the black bulk of a Cadillac. The flames illuminated his face, etching it with pure, cold fury. Across the chaos – the staccato gunfire, the shouts, the groan of collapsing timbers – their eyes locked.
"That's him! The tall one!" Carmelo's voice sliced through the din. “Nail him!”
Ely hit Hester Street at a dead sprint, lungs already raw and burning. Ricci's foot soldiers faltered behind him, swallowed by the chaos, but Carmelo came on, relentless and fast. Ely risked two frantic glances over his shoulder. Bullets whined past his ears, stitching the air where he’d just been – the chilling realization hit him like a physical blow: Carmelo wasn’t just chasing; he was hunting to kill.
Ely ran into the mouth of a narrow alley off Hester, the sudden stench of decay thick in his throat as he slammed trash cans aside with his shoulder. He scrambled over a splintered wooden fence, the sharpcrackof a bullet tearing through the space his head had been barely a heartbeat before.How the hell could he shoot and run at the same time with such accuracy?He dropped hard onto the cobbles of the next alley and was moving again before his knees fully registered the impact. Terror surged within. He could die. He could actually die after all theseyears of waiting and dreaming of Kathy as his wife; he’d die and lose the chance to love her before their life began.
He was a fucking idiot.
He should have listened to her.
He made a vow to God that if he got back to her, he’d never take such risks again.
