Total pages in book: 71
Estimated words: 71179 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 356(@200wpm)___ 285(@250wpm)___ 237(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 71179 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 356(@200wpm)___ 285(@250wpm)___ 237(@300wpm)
This is my father. A man who has never laid a hand on me my entire life.
“I’m sorry I had to do that,” he says, “but you gave me no choice, Savannah.”
“There’s always a choice, Daddy,” I say. “There’s always a choice.”
I’ve heard those words from somewhere, but at the moment I can’t remember where. Perhaps I read them in a book, heard them on a TV show or movie. Maybe in a class.
But they ring in my mind now.
There’s always a choice.
So I make a choice now.
I choose not to get entangled in this mess. Not to bring children into this family.
My father doesn’t reply to my words. Just gives me his icy stare.
My father, Vincent Gallo Senior.
My father, who was forced into marriage to my mother. Not to join a family. The Gallo family, as I understand it, is nothing compared to the Bianchi family.
But Caroline Bianchi, my mother, needed a husband who would be loyal to the Bianchis. They found that in my father.
My father does whatever my grandfather tells him. He’s a good lackey, and a strong man in his own right.
No weakness there.
But I see him now as my grandfather must see him.
He just struck his only daughter. For the crime of asking to see her dead brother.
I see my father in a different light now.
I’m still his little girl, and in a way, I still have him wrapped around my little finger.
But here, it’s family first. And by family I mean the business of family, not individual family members.
I will be watching my back.
Every step of the way.
When my father finally goes into his office to deal with the fallout, I go to my mother, sit in her lap like I did when I was a little girl, nuzzle her shoulder.
And we cry together.
I wake up, tears in my eyes.
I was dreaming, but I can’t remember what about, until it hits me like a brick.
My brother’s death. The change I saw in my father that day.
What I fear I may see in my father now.
He’ll do more than slap my face this time.
In his way, I believe my father loves me. Loves all his children for that matter.
But when you’re born into this kind of family—and this kind of business—you learn that it’s all business. Family is business. Nothing is personal anymore.
Vinnie is gone, and Michael is dead. I’m all that’s left to bind these two families.
But I’m not sure why it’s so important.
Does it have something to do with Michael’s death?
I wasn’t told any of the details—if any of the details are even known.
That’s how it is in these kinds of families. Women are treated as second-class citizens. As chattel to barter with, to use as pawns when necessary. But they’re never told why. They’re never told anything.
Even in the twenty-first century, it still happens.
I think of that day when I was locked in a room by my own father. Unable to escape as he and the McAllisters negotiated for me.
Somehow, that time, I got through to him. He got me out of it then and set me up to help the family as a parole officer in Austin. Five years later, I thought they had finally let me out.
But no.
It was a temporary reprieve at most.
And my father fucking knew it the entire time.
I reach toward the nightstand to find a tissue to wipe my eyes and sniffling nose, but there’s nothing there.
Seriously? No tissues? They must be here somewhere.
In the meantime, I scramble out of bed, head to the bathroom, and use toilet paper to wipe my face, blow my nose.
“Vannah?” Falcon’s voice.
I leave the bathroom. “I’m here.”
“You okay?”
I rub my eyes, hoping he won’t know I was crying. “Yeah. Just a bad dream.”
“About what?”
“My brother’s death. The day I started to see my father for who he truly is.”
“Come here.”
I crawl into his arms. “I’m all right.”
“You’ve been through so much. Almost being raped by that piece of shit.”
“Thank God for puke.” I force out a chuckle.
He takes my face in his hands. “I don’t want you to worry about him anymore, Vannah. You’re my responsibility now.”
I pull away from him then. “I don’t want to be your responsibility.”
He furrows his brow. “What the hell do you mean by that?”
“I don’t mean anything bad. I just don’t want to be anyone’s responsibility.” I look away from him. “I’m tired of being treated like a thing.”
“I would never treat you that way.”
“I know that. I know you wouldn’t on purpose, anyway. But for God’s sake, I can’t be your responsibility or anyone else’s. I have to be responsible for myself.”
He chuckles then.
“I don’t see what’s so funny about that.”
“You don’t want to be my responsibility,” he says, “but what did you do? You made a deal with the devil himself to keep me out of prison. You made me your responsibility, Savannah. And I don’t want to be your responsibility either.”