“Yes.”

  “I have them to give. But not until my business with the Orolios is finished.”

  “Ti ringrazio. How long do you think this business is going to take?” he asks.

  “Depends. You pay for the men with a certain favor, and it could be done before a single leaf turns red.”

  Dario puts his elbows on the desk, ready to hear my proposal. “I need to be in New York by the eleventh.”

  “The sooner I find Damiano Orolio, the sooner you get the men you need and get home.”

  He lifts his glass and I lift mine. We drink on it, and I tell him where to find Marco Polito, the closest thing to a father I ever had.

  The sun is hiding just behind the horizon when she groans in her sleep. Her brows knot and she curls into a tight fetal position.

  “I’m here,” I whisper too low to wake her, but she groans again and curls into herself. I can’t see her like this, chasing demons in her mind when I’m right here to slaughter them for her. “It’s just a dream.”

  I stroke her cheek. Her eyes open, then go wide. Wakefulness hasn’t chased away the bad dream.

  “I’m here,” I repeat.

  “No.”

  “You were having a nightmare.”

  “No,” she repeats, throwing the covers off her.

  There’s blood everywhere.

  Violetta turns on the light. The black shape under her becomes a violent red.

  I’ve seen a lot of blood in my life—and I’ve seen more than this come from a person’s body. She must be shot or stabbed, but I haven’t slept. No one came in. And she’s not acting wounded. So this shape soaked into the sheets—I’m shocked by it, and I’m not sure I should be. Women bleed. But how much blood? And shouldn’t they stop when they’re pregnant?

  “Is this—” I’m going to say normal, but a bark of pain comes from my wife.

  She buckles at the waist. She’s in pain and I have nothing, nothing to say or do about it.

  “What?” Loretta once said I only knew a woman’s body to the length of my dick. I knew she was right and didn’t think there was anything I needed to do about it. Now I wish I’d learned something, anything that would help Violetta now. I’m afraid to touch her and afraid not to. I’m like a runner on the first day of work for a new boss. “What do I do?”

  She takes one hand from her belly and points toward the bathroom. “Help me.”

  Given sudden purpose, I leap off the bed and pick her up in my arms, rushing to the bathroom in seven steps. Once there, though, my purpose is gone. I don’t know what to do. Still in my arms, she reaches over my shoulder, turns on the light, and motions to put her feet on the floor. She looks down at herself. Her panties and the bottom of her T-shirt are soaked with red.

  “Oh, God.” She’s distressed and overwhelmed, and all I’m doing is standing here like an idiot.

  I get on my knees in front of her and put my hands on her hips. “We get these off, okay?”

  She nods. I lower her blood-soaked underwear over thighs dripping with it. She steps out, flips up the toilet lid, and crouches on the seat, bent at the waist with her elbows on her knees.

  “You don’t have to stay,” she says, eyes closed. The bruised one looks swollen all over again. She’s been through so much, and I can’t do anything.

  “I want to.”

  “It’s bad. It’s going to be bad. You can…” Her face crunches like dough being kneaded, and she lets out a long mmmnnnn through clenched teeth. Beneath her, water splashes on and on. I put my hand on her knee, and she grabs it, tightens, and her deep groans turn to a series of squeaks. She’s in pain, and I can’t kill someone or cut it out of her.

  “This is the baby?”

  “Yes.”

  “It’s coming out?”

  She nods, sniffing as if she’s going to cry. Selfishly, I hope she doesn’t, because I won’t know what to do with my anger.

  “Is there something I can do?”

  She shakes her head. “Just stay.”

  I stay with her, making a mental list of who deserves to die for this. “I’m sorry, Violetta. I’m so sorry.”

  “Not your fault.”

  “I shouldn’t have made love to you. It was—”

  Her laugh dissolves into more groans, more splashing. She bends so deep her forehead touches the top of my hand as it rests on her knee. Her shoulders shake.

  She’s still laughing.

  “What’s so funny?”

  “You,” she says into her thighs. “You backward paisà. They don’t teach you anything.” She looks up. I can’t tell if the white part of her black eye is more bloodshot than yesterday. “It was the drugs they gave me. Or the stress. Or it just wasn’t a good egg. But it wasn’t your dick. That’s not how it works.”

  I can’t pretend to know how any of it works. All I know about a woman’s body is where to put my dick, my fingers, and my mouth. I know I’m stupid enough about the rest to ask if I’m hurting her. I’ve never had to deal with pain I didn’t cause and couldn’t stop.

  “I’m sorry anyway. Mi dispiace.”

  Her face crunches, and she nods, bending again. “It just hurts.”

  “Is there something I can get for you?” I squeeze her hands. It’s all I have. I’m out of my depth. “Anything? I’ll kill an animal for you to eat. I’ll bring a river if you’re thirsty. If you’re cold, I’ll set the world on fire to keep you warm.”

  “You’re sweet.” She sobs into her knees, and I want to put the world into a shredder to make her stop.

  “You want normal? I’ll give it to you. Barbecues and a house. Like they show on television. We’ll get in the car and drive anyplace you want. The ends of the earth. The middle of nowhere. The moon. California.”

  “Calif—?” She cuts herself off, and I think it’s to cry until she lifts her head. “Don’t try to be funny.”

  “I’m not trying to be funny. I don’t like winter.”

  Her face twists like dough. “Ow. Sorry. Me neither.” She bends again, putting her lips on our clasped hands. “Ow.”

  “Whatever you want,” I whisper, repeating the promise over and over, wishing for some way to fix this disaster.

  “I want my mother,” she says into our hands. “And two Advil.”

  She doesn’t let me get up for the pills for a few minutes.

  As far as her mother goes, even the king can’t raise Camilla Cavallo from the dead. But I can bring her the comfort of women.

  Celia brought Advil when I texted for it. She stood in the doorway, saw my wife on the toilet with blood everywhere, and knew what to do. She stripped the bed, brought us a stack of clean towels, and readied a hot water bottle.

  Women must be taught these things while men are killing animals and moving rivers, and since Violetta isn’t hungry or thirsty, I’m useless once I carry her to a fresh bed.

  “I’m fine,” she says. Her eyelids droop, then she cringes and groans again.

  “Is the Advil not working?” I ask Celia, realizing my cook is not enough. She has a job. This is not going to work.

  “Go,” Violetta says. “Move a mountain or whatever. I’m fine.”

  I let Celia hustle me out, but once I’m in the hallway, all of the threads of the coming war tighten around me into a trap. If I don’t do something for her, I’ll go crazy.

  This insanity isn’t new. When Rosetta died, I couldn’t figure out why it happened or who to blame. Outside my territory, I couldn’t threaten my way to an answer. I couldn’t break the doctor or midwife without exposing myself and thus Violetta, who was a sitting duck on the other side. I didn’t know the right questions to ask, and I didn’t believe the answers anyway. Rosetta was a good girl. I didn’t want her, but she’d been given to me, and when it turned out I had another, more noble reason to marry her, I saw it as a gift. I would raise the ill-conceived child as my own and make the best from the worst.

  Then she died. A hole opened in the earth, and I fell into the gaps in my knowledge. An ectopic pregnancy is still a baby… Or is it not? And does it matter? Was it preventable? On purpose? Who did it? I was a wild man, trying to close the gap with assumptions and old wives’ tales.

  Here I am again. I recognize this helplessness. This ignorance.

  Out the window, I see Secondo Vasto, but also the houses built into the mountain below, and I know what to do.

  I hustle downstairs. This time, I will do something. I will not leave Violetta with no one to talk to.

  Loretta doesn’t know I’m coming. If she’s home, I’ll talk to her. If she’s not, I’ll wait. If Damiano’s there again, all the better. This will be over sooner than I thought.

  “So,” Tavie says as he drives. “We getting her for leverage? ‘Cos of her and Damiano?”

  “No.” I don’t explain further. My cousin doesn’t have to know my reasons even if he knows Loretta’s history. Dami would let her die to get ten centimeters closer to the crown.

  The road down to her place can be as treacherous as the conversation I am forced to have with Tavie. He drives the Mercedes around the curves with confidence. If we all get past this, I decide this will be his job.

  We’re halfway to Loretta’s when I have enough signal to call the Politos.

  “Pronto?” Guglielmo answers the phone.

  “It’s Santino,” I say. “I need Madeline to come to her niece. Have her pack a bag.”

  He grunts, and there’s a muffle over the receiver. Words spoken in whispers. Then her Zia Madeline comes on the phone.

  “Where is she?” Her voice is stiff. Something isn’t right, and I decide not to answer the question.

  “Just be ready.”

  “Is she up the mountain?”

  “You’ll know when you know.”

  “I can’t come, I’m sorry,” she says quickly and hangs up.

  I’m left looking at my phone. Something is wrong.

  “What happened?” Tavie asks.

  “We’ll pick up another car and go there next,” I say more to myself than him, counting how many men I think I’ll need. “Someone’s there.”

  “Gia?” he asks.

  Maybe. Maybe not. But now I know I have to deal with the problem in front of me. Tavie.

  When someone is sent into exile, I personally tell the family why. When men are killed, I tell the family how. I promise vengeance if it’s appropriate and let them know when it was delivered. I have to do this every time, in person, or the whole city would erupt into amateur killing hour. It’s a terrible thing, to tell young parents their son was murdered. It’s worse when they’re older. They think it’s time to rest and let their children move forward, then I come to let them know there will be no more forward motion. Everything they took for granted now stops.

  Now I owe this boy the same respect.

  “Your sister,” I say.

  “If I knew where she was, I’d go to her and tell her she’s doing the wrong thing.”

  “Don’t bullshit me, Octavio.” I grab a handful of his hair and give his head a playful shake. “You’d tell her to run.”

  “I would not.” He pushes my hand away.

  “Don’t lie to me. You’d give her your car keys and a full tank of gas so she could get out.”

  In a low Italian falsetto of my voice, he replays an incident from our childhood. “‘Run, Tavie, before they get shoved up your ass! Run!’”

  “How stupid do you have to be to steal strawberries from Emilio Moretti? Eh? Who does this?” I push his shoulder. “Men get killed for less.”

  “I was seven.”

  “You were eight. And that only means Camilla’s the one to beat you. Or worse, I have to do it to prove I won’t go easy on my little brother.”

  We drop into silence. He’s not my brother, but he is as close as anyone will ever be.

  “You would have gone easy,” he murmurs.

  “I did. I let you run.”

  “Yeah. You were a good brother to me and Gia.”

  “Tavie,” I say, trying to tell him the thing I don’t want to.

  “I know, Santi.”

  “What do you know?”

  “Gia. She… You’re going to… You’re really mad at her, and I don’t blame you. She shot you.”

  “She did more than that.”

  “Don’t say it. Whatever she did, don’t tell me. It’s not my business. But you should let her run away. Send her with nothing in her pockets if that’s what you have to do.”

  He’s pleading for Gia when what I wanted to talk about was his father. Give him the option to be far away when we drag the man onto the compound. But we arrive at Loretta’s. I’ll have to do it when we get back.

  The white BMW I bought her two years ago is parked at the bottom of the driveway, same as the last time I came, and she wasn’t the only one here then. That tank Damiano drives must have been in the garage. I have to assume he’s in the house, maybe not hiding in the bushes this time, or maybe hiding someplace else.

  “I’m leaving this in front of the garage doors,” I tell Tavie. He looks back at me, too green to hide the fact that he wants to know why. “If someone’s parked there, we block it.”

  “Yes. Okay. Smart.”

  I put a hand on his shoulder and give him a little shake. “It’s going to be all right.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “I am always sure.”

  “Okay.” He gives a sharp nod, convincing himself. “I believe you.”

  “Bene. I’m leaving the keys. Get out with me, but stay by the car. Keep your eyes open.”

  “I will.”

  We get out. Tavie stands in the driveway to watch, and I approach the patio. Before I get there, Loretta swings open the door.

  “Santino,” she says, arms crossed.

  In those three syllables I hear an unusual guardedness. As though my name is banging up against a metal shield, making it rattle just a little. Once it was clear I was going to marry Violetta, she and I had to stop fucking, and even then, she didn’t put armor around herself with me. She didn’t volunteer information either.

  “Loretta.”

  “What are you doing here?”

  “Pack a bag.”

  “It’s not a good time.”

  She tries to shut me out, but I stop her, staring through the space between the wall and the edge of the door. Something is wrong, and she can’t say what.

  I take out my gun and walk past her, into the house, scanning the familiar living room for danger. I check the corners and closets, exiting to the back patio from the sliding kitchen door, listening for a man in the bushes, the scent of his cologne, or the adrenaline from his pores. All I smell is morning dew.

  “You should go,” Loretta says from behind me.

  I turn to her. She leans against the jamb with her arms still crossed. I wonder if they’re locked that way to hide something besides her heart.

  “I haven’t seen Damiano in days,” she says. “If that’s who you’re looking for.”

  “He knows I’m coming for him.”

  “When you’re like this, no one gets ahead of you,” she scoffs. Her arms drop to her sides, and she backs into the kitchen. “Come inside, it’s buggy out.”

  Is she saving me from a trap or drawing me into one?

  Outside is better for me. More options. If men are out here and I go inside, I’m stuck there.

  “Sit.” I pull out a patio chair for her. “And close the door behind you.”

  She’s so efficient at doing what she’s told that I can’t read whether this was her plan or not. There’s neither satisfaction nor disappointment in her manner.

  I do not sit. I stand where I can see everything, with my back to a small, enclosed area with a barbecue and no way to surprise me from behind.

  “I’m alone,” she barks loudly. “I told you.”

  She didn’t tell me she was alone, so she’s not.

  “Have I ever lied to you?” When I stay silent, she looks at her lap, and the shield slips. “The way you lied to me for years?”

  “I was always honest about what I could be to you.” I look over the garden terraces built into the mountain below, sniff deeply for cologne, check for movement in the garage windows.

  “Not with your words but with your mouth.” The last word comes from the bottom of her lungs. It’s not loud, but it’s still a shout of the heart.

  “You lied with your body.”

  I feel no pity, no guilt, nothing. She may be telling the truth, but she’s also stalling. Giving me room to locate whoever is here.

  “And this is why you sold your body to Damiano? To get back at me?”

  She sighs, shaking her head. “Do you have a cigarette?”

  I take out the pack and offer her one. She wedges it between her lips, and I use my dented Zippo to light it.

  “I heard how your lighter got like that,” she says. “You’re going on a murder spree, then you’re going to have a baby and a happy little family like it never happened.”

  “There is no baby anymore.”

  She pulls on the cigarette again, looking at me as if I’ve done something unexpected.

  But the baby is gone, and I can’t let her talk about it as if it’s going to be born. It’s a curse in her mouth.

  “Condoglianze,” she says, then turns over her shoulder to blow out smoke, making a pointed look upward, then at me.

  I’m a split second from death. I know it without looking.

  With all the energy I have, I straighten my legs and launch myself backward, toward the house and under the balcony, just as a bullet bursts into the tiles an inch from where I was standing. Her eyes widen, but she’s too terrified to move.

  Without thinking it through, I jump away from a secure position to grab her and pull her into the house, saving her from a second shot.

  She doesn’t waste a moment.

  “Upstairs and in the front and—!”

  I yank her behind me and shoot the man coming down the stairs. She growls, and I turn to see what’s happening. A thudding sound is followed by a second man falling backward into a table. She’s holding a ceramic vase.

  I shoot the falling man twice before he has the chance to come back at us. Loretta drops the vase and holds up three fingers, then points toward the front door.