Like Father, Like Son

Chapter 23

They dress my father's corpse in the suit he pawned three times but always bought back—some desperate loyalty to the man he used to be before the cards and dice ate him alive.

The funeral parlor reeks of lilies and formaldehyde, that particular cologne of grief that makes my stomach turn. Franco Santoro lies in his casket looking more peaceful than he ever did breathing, two bullet holes hidden beneath expensive tailoring, courtesy of some back-alley execution dressed up as a robbery gone wrong.

Robbery. As if anyone would rob a man leaving Big Eddie's gambling den at three in the morning with nothing in his pockets but IOUs and regret.

"He looks good," Marco murmurs beside me, his hand warm on my lower back, playing the devoted husband with Oscar-worthy commitment. "Peaceful. Like he finally found what he was looking for."

"A bullet in the skull?" The words scrape out raw, fury barely contained. "Yeah, that's exactly what he was chasing all those years."

Marco's fingers tighten imperceptibly—not in warning but in that new gesture of his, the one that mimics sympathy so perfectly you'd swear it was real if you didn't know better.

"Grief makes us say things we don't mean." His voice carries just the right amount of understanding. "Your father had his demons, but he loved you in his broken way."

My mother sits in the front row, a study in catatonic devastation. She hasn't spoken since they identified the body, hasn't moved except to occasionally touch her wedding ring like it might summon him back from whatever hell gamblers go to. The woman who warned me about monsters yesterday can't even recognize the one standing next to her daughter today.

"Mrs. Santoro." Salvatore approaches with measured steps, dressed in black that makes him look like an expensive shadow. "My deepest condolences. Franco's loss diminishes us all."

The lie slides smooth as aged whiskey, and I watch my mother nod mechanically while Salvatore's eyes find mine for just a heartbeat—concern mixed with questions he can't ask here.

"Your son has been invaluable during this difficult time," Mom finally speaks, her voice threadbare. "So supportive of Lucia. You raised him well, Don Caruso."

If I wasn't afraid of shattering completely, I'd laugh at the cosmic irony of my mother praising Marco to the man whose bed I've shared. Instead, I stare at my father's waxy face and calculate probabilities.

The timing is too perfect. Franco's gambling debts mysteriously cleared, then bullets find him the same week Marco starts dismantling forty years of Caruso infrastructure. Someone's cleaning house, and my father was just lint in the corners.

"You should sit, darling." Marco guides me to a pew with that careful concern he's perfected. "You're shaking."

He's right—my whole body vibrates with rage so pure it feels holy. But I let him play the supportive husband because the alternative is screaming the truth in this room full of people who'd bury me next to my father if I named their precious Marco as the architect of this tragedy.

The service blurs past in Latin and lies. The priest speaks about redemption and eternal rest while I count the ways a man can die in this city. Gun, knife, poison, accident, suicide that isn't suicide—all the currencies of power that Marco's been studying like scripture.

At the reception, held in the Caruso mansion because of course it is, I watch Marco work the room with newfound grace. He brings my mother tea, offers tissues, says all the right words at exactly the right moments. Even Salvatore watches with something approaching pride as his son demonstrates this miraculous transformation from violent drunk to perfect gentleman.

"Your husband's really stepped up," Aunt Teresa observes, materializing beside me with her bloodhound nose for family drama. "Such a change from even a few months ago. You're a good influence on him, cara."

My father's portrait stares down from the mantle—a photo from before the fall, when he still had hope in his eyes instead of hunger. I'm looking at it, trying to remember that version of him, when Marco appears in my peripheral vision. He's talking to Tommy, the nervous one who announced Dad's death, and their heads are bent together in the kind of conversation that changes trajectories.

The connection hits like a physical blow—Tommy works the neighborhood where Dad was shot. Tommy who looked ready to vomit when he delivered the news. Tommy who's now nodding at whatever Marco's saying with the resignation of someone taking orders they can't refuse.

The room tilts. My chest constricts like someone's sitting on it, crushing my ribs into my lungs. The air turns thick, viscous, impossible to pull into my body. My vision tunnels, the edges going dark as my heart hammers so hard I'm sure everyone can hear it.

Two years of nursing school kick in with clinical precision—rapid heartbeat, shortness of breath, chest pain, derealization. Panic attack. My first one, arriving at my father's funeral like an uninvited guest who plans to stay.

I stumble toward the bathroom, one hand on the wall for support while my body wages war against itself. The marble tiles feel cold against my palms as I lock the door and slide down against it, knees to chest, making myself small.

"Five things you can see," I whisper, voice shaking as I follow the grounding protocol from textbooks. "Mirror, gold faucet, marble counter, orchid, towel."

My breathing still comes in gasps, but I force myself through the exercise. "Four things you can touch. Floor—cold. Wall—smooth. Dress—silk. Hair—tangled."

The tunnel vision starts to recede. "Three things you can hear. Music from the reception. Pipes in the walls. My own breathing—getting slower."

By the time I reach scents and taste, my heart rate has dropped from hummingbird to merely terrified. The attack leaves me wrung out, exhausted in that particular way that comes from your body convincing itself it's dying. Tears come then—not pretty, delicate tears but the ugly kind that leave your face blotchy and your nose running.

I sit there crying for my father who gambled away everything including his life, for my mother who loved a ghost of a man, for myself trapped in this marble prison with a husband who might have orchestrated the whole tragedy.

When the tears finally stop, leaving me hollow and spent, the nausea arrives like an afterthought. This time it's not violent but insistent, and I crawl to the toilet just as my body decides to reject the nothing I've eaten today.

After, I rinse my mouth at the sink, and that's when I see it—a used tampon wrapped in tissue, sitting in the small waste basket. One of the catering staff, probably, taking advantage of the upstairs bathroom during the reception.

The sight of it hits like cold water. When was my last period? I count backwards, but the days blur together in this haze of violence and stolen moments. Twenty-eight days? Thirty? More?

The blood evidence in the trash mocks me with someone else's regularity while my own body keeps secrets I'm terrified to decode. If I'm pregnant, whose is it? The timeline could argue either way—Marco's dutiful attempts at husbandry, or those three desperate nights with Salvatore when careful became a foreign language neither of us spoke.

The knock interrupts my spiral. "Lucia? Are you alright?"

Salvatore's voice, concerned and too close. If I open this door, he'll see it written on my face—the possibility that's either salvation or damnation depending on whose blood runs through theoretical veins.

"I'm fine." The lie comes out steady enough. "Just needed a moment."

"You don't sound fine. Let me help—"

"Please. I just need to be alone."

I hear him hesitate, then footsteps retreating. When I finally emerge, the hallway's empty except for voices drifting from somewhere deeper in the house. Male voices, low and urgent, carrying that particular weight of conversations that reshape worlds.

"—next week. Everything's in place—"

"—won't see it coming—"

"—Marco's timing is—"

The fragments float through the air like smoke signals warning of fires I can't locate. I strain to hear more, but footsteps approach and I have to move, leaving me with puzzle pieces that form a picture I'm terrified to complete.

I back away, my father's death suddenly looking like the first domino rather than the last.