Total pages in book: 157
Estimated words: 154525 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 773(@200wpm)___ 618(@250wpm)___ 515(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 154525 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 773(@200wpm)___ 618(@250wpm)___ 515(@300wpm)
SUSPECTED RUSSO MAFIA CAPO—
Frankie stopped reading. “Is that the Los Angeles Times?”
Her dad had been in California for the last several weeks. Now she knew why.
“He does have things going on,” Sissy said softly. “It’s better that you don’t know all the details, but perhaps you could occasionally look at the bigger picture.”
And he didn’t have a choice.
She knew that too well because her father told her so. He didn’t go into details. The one time she gained enough courage to outright ask about his connection to the mob left her with more questions than answers. His response still made her heart ache whenever she replayed the conversation to herself.
Don’t ever ask me things that’ll make me have to lie to you, Sunshine.
So, she didn’t ask and her father never told. Frankie remained as lonely as ever all the time in between.
“He loves you,” Sissy added as the ice cream took the brunt of Frankie’s pain. “More than anything in the whole world.”
“Yeah, I know.”
More than the moon, and stars, and galaxy. More than God. More than myself, he told her once.
Sissy offered nothing else while Frankie demolished the cookies and cream treat. It was only when her spoon scraped the bottom of the container that Sissy sighed.
“I should also let you know...”
“Oh, God. What?”
Sissy tried to smile, but it came off tight and untrue. Only one person could gain that sort of fake pleasantry from her. Even in the face of the seventeen-year-old she had practically raised.
“When?” Frankie demanded.
“Mrs. Gallo—”
“No.”
“Carina,” Sissy corrected with a roll of her eyes.
Between them, they didn’t have to bother with what Carina wanted to be called. Frankie refused to play that game.
“When?” she asked Sissy again.
“Tomorrow, I guess. Sometime. No one really knows. I wasn’t able to get a definitive time to expect her. She’ll pick her car up from storage and drive herself home. I do know that much.”
Which meant that Sissy had taken the time to talk to the head of the estate’s security, Larkin. He kept a general schedule and tab of everyone’s business and needs. The man of the house didn’t like surprises. The woman of it, on the other hand, didn’t listen well.
“Why?” Frankie asked, the question making Sissy glance away. “Why is she coming back from Milan this early? Wasn’t it supposed to be another month?”
Without a word, Sissy nodded toward the newspaper again. It connected the two things, in some way, which meant Carina’s early return had likely been a demand of her husband’s.
“I really didn’t want to deal with her until my birthday, at least.”
Carina would have to be there for her graduation.
All the rest, though?
“Fuck,” Frankie spat.
“Francesca Dove Gallo, language!”
Sissy had every right to reprimand her, but she barely heard the warning. A little too much had been piled onto the plate of total crap that was her day.
Carina tipped the scales. Complicated didn’t begin to explain the toxic mess between she and her stepmother. There had been times in her life when Carina stepped up for Frankie in ways no one else could. Yet, she had also been the same woman who traumatized a motherless child.
No one knew the mess of hatred and gratitude inside Frankie festered and warred each time she exchanged air with the woman her father had chosen to make his wife. A model known globally, but the farthest thing from a mother to exist. They never loved each other, and a kind word hadn’t passed between Carina and her husband in years.
Yet, the word divorce hadn’t been spoken, ever. The word entered Frankie’s vocabulary at twelve, sitting in a pew while a man at the pulpit deemed it a sin.
Then, she got a little older and realized how her stepmother had come from the same place that now controlled her father’s every move.
That’s how she figured it out. Her father’s marriage...an arrangement. Some deal struck that she probably couldn’t ask about. Like everything else.
“Are you okay?” she heard Sissy ask.
“No.”
“Can I help?”
Sometimes. Not this time.
“No,” Frankie whispered, pushing back the stool to stand.
Life often became too much for Frankie. People, places, and things became background noise to the blood that rushed in her ears and the sound of her own heartbeat thrumming through her screaming bones. What had started for her as a child that felt like too many butterfly wings beating in her stomach every time a voice raised around her had turned into full blown panic attacks for her as a teenager.
Before she turned to leave, Frankie said, “I’m sorry for swearing.”
“It wasn’t at me, I suppose.”
That didn’t make it better. Neither did her apology. Before she said or did something worse because she couldn’t manage her own feelings, she decided to go deal with it alone in a way that soothed the angry, anxious parts of her like nothing else could.