Complete Corruption (Corruption #1-3) (52 page)

“Antonio Spinelli,” he said.

“And you, ma’am?”

“Theresa Drazen.”

“Can I see some ID?”

We showed him. He checked our photos and took the license numbers down.

“Romance in America,” Antonio said, quietly joking.

“Movie stars and mobsters get the same treatment.”

“In Italy, they’d just shoot anyone who made trouble. To avoid the war, you play nice.”

“We’re about to ruin the whole party,” I said.

“We are mad, aren’t we?”

“We are.” I squeezed his hand. “Let’s do this. Before I go to the truck, let’s enjoy this. Let’s forget everything and dance for one hour. Let’s be who we could have been. Just Antonio and Theresa, with a real future and boring pasts. I’ll act like my biggest problem is whether or not you like my dress. And you’ll act like yours is how to get under it. We’ll be the most thrilling things in each other’s lives.”

He touched my lip, turning it down, then stroked my chin. “You already are the best thing I have.”

“Pretend I’m also the worst thing.”

“I haven’t earned the life you just invented for me.”

“Mr. Spinelli?” The guard leaned down, our licenses on a clipboard.

Antonio turned from me. “Yes?”

“Sorry about the wait.” He handed the licenses back to Antonio. “Can you get out of the car?”

“No problem.”

We were frisked. My bag was rooted through. They fingered the space behind my ears and looked inside them with the same little handheld lights doctors used, apologizing the whole time. Across the way, on the line of cars coming the other direction, another couple was getting the same treatment. Then the guards smiled and nodded, letting us through as if patting down guests was normal.

antonio

as it wrong to give her good memories of me when I knew I was leaving her? Yes, it was. I should have been making her hate me. But if I was going to keep two conflicting ideas in my mind at the same time, one was going to sweeten the bitterness of the other.

I was being selfish, but her suggestion that we enjoy the wedding appealed to me, and I couldn’t let it go. So after we gave the valet our keys and walked into the Heritage House, I guided her with my hand at the small of her back, which she relaxed into as if she belonged there. When the champagne went around, I took two glasses and gave her one, looking deeply into her eyes when we toasted.

“Am I getting dirty looks?” she whispered to me.

“Not today.”

If any part of our plan failed, by the next week, she’d be the
camorrista
whore. But I’d be long gone, and no shame would be brought to anyone. That day, to everyone but a few, she was just a woman I’d brought to a wedding.

“And Paulie’s not coming? You’re sure?”

“I’m sure,” I said.

Donna Maria sat at a small cocktail table with Irene and Carlo, shaking hands with subjects who passed. Irene wore a blue shift dress that went to the floor. There was no sign of the hypersexed little flirt I’d seen in the yard. She avoided looking at me.

By the dais, Bernardo Lei and Giacomo Bortolusi, the fathers of the Neapolitan bride and Sicilian groom, respectively, held court as if this coronation were the end of years of competition, when in fact it was only the beginning.

“We have to go pay our respects,” I whispered to Theresa.

“Can I get drunk first?”

I removed the empty champagne glass from her hand and led her to the line.

“I once met the Queen of England.” Theresa said quietly.

“Really?”

“Elizabeth. My whole class went. It was a trip to London, and you know, private school. Los Angeles. Rich people, blah blah. I wasn’t even nervous. And when it was my turn in line, and I said ‘How do you do?’ exactly like I was taught, I could tell she was just bored out of her mind.” She tilted her head to the right slightly to see the front of the line, the curve of her neck begging to be touched and bitten and licked to a bruising. But I couldn’t touch her. She turned back to me. “These guys don’t look bored.”

“This is the height of their lives. A business arrangement disguised as a marriage.”

She squeezed my hand. “Have you ever thought of just doing it? Maybe it won’t be so bad?”

“How could I go back to earth, having kissed heaven?”

I didn’t know if I was leading her on. I wondered if speaking the truth to her in those last hours would just make the separation worse. Would it make the sting of her hurt be lenghtier or go deeper? Would the venom course through her veins longer, or would she just have some honest piece of me to hold onto after I left?

“Master Racossi!” Bortolusi bellowed. He knew my father and was his main competition in the cigarette trade. He was ambitious, cruel, and ruthless.

“I go by my mother’s name,” I said as I shook his hand, looking him in the eye. I was famously unashamed of my bastard lineage, and I wouldn’t take any shit about it.

And he knew it. That disconcerted me.

“This is Theresa Drazen,” I said.

He took her hand and kissed it. She was perfectly gracious, neither too proud, nor coy, nor embarrassed.

“Pleasure to meet you,” she said.

“I recognize that name.”

“I have a big family. You might have met one of my sisters. I have six.”

He laughed and nodded then turned back to me. There was a line of people behind me, waiting to meet the father of the bride, but he took the time to put his hand on my shoulder. “A little bird told me I’ll be seeing you back home in a few weeks.”

“You shouldn’t listen to birds,” I said. “They chirp what they hear, not what they know.”

He laughed, but there was no humor in it. We shook hands with the gentle Bernardo Lei, who made no insinuations. Then we met the groom, who was boisterous, half drunk, half bald, and a bride who beamed with pride. Despite the reasons for the union, it looked like a good match.

“Shall we dance?” I asked. “I think we have time for one.”

“He said you were going back to Italy? I thought you couldn’t?”

“If this goes through, everything’s forgiven. Come on, let’s go dance. I’m not looking for absolution from anyone but you.”

theresa

 was glad I didn’t speak Italian. It meant I could smile through the half conversations and small talk Antonio endured on the way to the cocktail room. I didn’t have to attach meaning to any of the looks I got. I only had to pay attention when he was addressed in English.

“
Consigliere
,” an old woman said from a seat we passed. She wore a black dress and shoes, no makeup besides years of sun, and brown eyes sharp and clear.

“Donna, it’s been years since I was your consul,” he replied in English with a rote, joking tone, as if they’d been through this a hundred times.

“It still has a nice ring to it. I haven’t met the lady.”

I put my hand out. “Theresa Drazen. Lovely to meet you.”

“Maria Carloni. I’m sure you’ve heard of me.”

I swallowed. Smiled. Ran through my mental rolodex, cross referenced her with Daniel, in the subcategory ‘nice things felons do.’

“Yes. Of course. The Catholic Woman’s League.”

She laughed in the way an old woman does when she can, because she’s old and she doesn’t give a shit what anyone thinks anymore.

A young woman in a modest blue dress handed Maria Carloni a drink. She was lovely, with olive skin and brown eyes the size of teacups.

“You’ve met my granddaughter, Irene, Mr. Spinelli?”

“I have.” He took her hand and bowed a little. “Nice to see you again.”

She didn’t meet his gaze but curtseyed. Something in the gesture was formal, yet intimate, and I felt a surge of jealous rage I worked to cover with a noncommittal smile.

I wasn’t introduced.

Antonio took my hand and pulled me away. But as fast as he got me away, I heard Irene mumble, ‘
puttana
,’ under her breath. I was no scholar, but I knew what that meant.

Things had to be normal, right? I had to act like we were just walking out of here and going home and fucking. I had to act as if nothing had changed, and nothing ever would. I had to do things any typical woman would do on any particular day.

So I turned and smiled at her, then put my fingers to my lips and blew her a kiss.

“What are you doing?” Antonio asked.

“Being nice gets tiresome.”

“Contessa.”

“Yes, Capo?”

“You make a beautiful cat.” He pulled me two steps toward the piano player. “But you’re already dangerous when your claws don’t show.”

He turned me until I faced him. It was too early to dance, but he put his arms around my waist and pressed me against his body. I laid my fingers on the back of his neck.

“She’s cute.”

“I’m sure she fucks like a log in the woods.”

I smiled. He had a way of saying the exact right thing.

“The flowers are beautiful,” I said. “Did you see the truck? I saw it pull around to the Heritage House side.”

“They’re setting up the ballroom now. I made sure they were late.”

“Bad, bad capo.”

“It’s what I do.” The music stopped and people stood. “Ready?” he said. “We’re moving over.”

The party shifted to the Heritage Room, which I knew intimately. A big room that was part of a big building, with few doors and high ceilings gilded to the teeth. It was our last stop before we escaped this life. I reached for my phone.

“Who are you calling?”

“I didn’t talk to Jonathan. And I’m…”

Dying.

I clutched the phone, trying to find the words for what I’d forgotten to do.

Antonio laid his hand over mine. “No, Contessa. Just leave it. I’m sorry. Come on. You were the one who wanted one dance. Let’s have it.”

He pulled me into the center of the room, which had been fashioned into an ad hoc dance floor. The band struck some tune from the eighties, a happy kickoff. We were the first ones on the floor.

He pushed my hips away with one hand and pulled me back to him with the other. We turned, stopped, and kicked together. I must have been smiling because I squeaked with delight when he turned me and smiled back. The world blurred outside our movements. It was only us, stealing a dance, a moment, the space around our bodies an indefinite haze that had no bearing on our coupling.

I forgot everything except the places where his body pressed to mine, and his skin touched my skin.

When it was over, the band didn’t stop but went right into the next song. Antonio pulled me to him. “There are two more songs before they introduce the bride and groom. We’re sitting them out.”

“You’re a good dancer,” I said. “Wherever we go, let’s make sure we dance.”

He nodded. “We’re here.”

We sat at a round table with two other couples I didn’t know. He greeted them in Italian, introduced me, and put his hand on my back when we sat. He glanced at his phone and cursed under his breath.

“It’s early. The truck. They finished setting up the ballroom already.”

“Let’s go, then.” I grabbed my bag.

“The doors are open. No one will see us go. It’s pointless.”

“I’ll go then. I’ll keep them there.”

He put his hands between my knees, like a teenager who couldn’t keep his hormones in check. “Go do what you have to do in the bathroom. Now.”

“Why? I mean, who even cares if I do Daniel’s bidding?”

“Trust me.”

I squeezed his hand and stilled my heart long enough to look into his eyes. I was doing this for him and for us. I was doing it to be a different person and finally shed my skin of pretense.

I kissed his lips and stood.

“Okay, Capo. I’m going.”

I carried myself, more than walked, to the bathroom, slipping in with my head held high. I gave my hair a quick swipe in the sitting room then went to the area with the sinks and the attendant.

Her chair was empty.

Of course it was. I was a good fifteen minutes early. I put on lipstick, smiling at two women who came in and snapped the stall doors shut behind them. A third woman in a pale-blue dress came in, coyly swaying her hips. She puckered at me, as if she expected me to be there.

“Hello,
puttana,
” she said.

“Everyone in America knows that word, Irene. You’re not getting it past me.”