So, no, I’m not like those women, I’m worse because I don’t want the designer gifts or the flashy dates, I just want the man. I want to be the woman who opens his eyes and makes him realize he’s more than his sins. Fuck Karen Hill, I want to be Rocco’s Grace.
Damn Victor for getting inside my head.
Damn him straight to Hell.
I tear my eyes away from my wrist and look at his handsome face. For the first time since I showed up in Miami, he looks relaxed, like he isn’t carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders.
Like the guy I always wanted.
I’m not sure if that’s because he’s sated or if it has something to do with me accepting his present. I mean he looked murderous when he thought I wasn’t wearing it and relief instantly filled his face when I showed him it was on my other wrist. Plus, he did mention that it wasn’t robbed, so there really is no reason not to keep it, right? It’s not like he held some poor jeweler at gunpoint.
Christ, I’m hopeless.
Seeming to read the hesitation in my eyes, he lifts his hand and brushes my cheek with the back of his hand.
“It was my mother’s bracelet, Violet,” he reveals.
Sure I heard him wrong, I stare at him in shock. He remains completely silent, and I force a swallow, trying to decide how to approach such a sensitive subject. Why would he give something so valuable to me? It’s not like he doesn’t have a sister and that’s the route I take.
“Rocco, I can’t accept this. Your sister—”
He cuts me off.
“My sister got enough. This bracelet is all I kept of my mother’s belongings and it would mean a lot to me if you accepted it.” He pauses. Rolling onto his side, he levels me with a look. “You knew my mother, Violet, and you know how much she meant to me—how much she still means to me after all these years. If anyone is going to take good care of the one thing I have left of her, it’s you.” He takes my hand and casts his eyes toward the bracelet. “I like reaching for your hand and seeing a piece of her on your wrist.”
I don’t know what it is about those words, but they make my heart feel so full. He may have lost his way, but every now and then a glimpse of the old Rocco shines through and I fall even harder than I imagined possible.
“I’d be honored to wear your mom’s bracelet,” I whisper. “And I promise to cherish it forever.”
He smiles.
“I know.”
Then he tugs my wrist and I fall against him. He wraps one arm around me, pressing me into his hard body and lowers his mouth to mine. It’s a kiss that seals my promise to him. A simple vow from me to him, that I will keep him mom’s memory alive.
He breaks our kiss and touches his forehead to mine.
“We better get out of this bed before your mother catches you climbing the fire escape and I miss my flight.”
As soon as the words leave his lips, I feel my stomach roll with dread, and it has nothing to do with my mother catching me—although, facing the wrath of her temper is probably not something I should sneeze at. I’m more concerned about where we go from here. I don’t think I can handle him pushing me aside again…not this time.
This wasn’t him and I flirting, toeing some invisible line. This was about both of us accepting the truth. Neither of us are perfect, and I’m sure there are many reasons why two people like us shouldn’t be together, but there’s no going back now.
Not for me.
I pull away from him, searching his eyes for the slightest trace of assurance, something that tells me he’s not about to stomp on my heart and make a fool out of me, but his eyes are expressionless.
“What?” he questions.
I’m not going to build some sort of bravado and hide my feelings. There is too much at stake.
“What happens when we get out of this bed? Do you drop me off and tell me this was a mistake again, because while I may have just promised to keep your mother’s bracelet safe, I didn’t say shit about keeping the Spinelli family jewels out of harm’s way.”
Biting the inside of his cheek, he holds back a smirk.
Hand to God, that is not the reaction I wanted.
“That’s my girl,” he teases before pausing. He drags his fingers through his hair and his face grows serious as he releases a sigh. “I’m not going to lie to you, my life is crazy right now and this week it’s going to get even crazier.”
Here we go…
“What does that even mean?”
“It means I need you to trust me. I know it’s a lot to ask of you, especially after this weekend, but it’s the only way this will work. You’re going to see things on the news, you’re gonna read shit in the papers, some of it will be true and some of it won’t, but it doesn’t matter because none of it changes what’s happening between us.”
Talk about vague and confusing.
“And what’s that?”
“Without getting into specifics, tonight my whole fucking world changed and all I could do was think about you.” He pulls his fingers from his hair and fixes me with a look. “All I wanted was you. I know that makes me a selfish prick, but I also know that behind every great man is a woman who makes him great. It’s a job that not just any old woman can hold either. She has to know him better than he knows himself. She has to know his past and be able to accept his future. There’s only one woman who knows the good, the bad, and the ugly and that’s you. If tonight was a mistake, it’s going to have to be you who declares it one, because I’m all in, Bug.”
My chest tightens at those words and the weight they hold.
“You’re all in,” I repeat.
“Yeah, and you should probably warn your mother too. If the woman thinks she hates me now, she’s gonna fucking despise me when I pick you up for dinner on Saturday.”
For some odd reason that makes me smile. It also makes things real because if he’s willing to go to war with my mother, he’s serious. I don’t know the reason behind his change of heart, if it has something to do with whatever went down tonight or what, I just know that I’m not going to let this chance slip by us.
When you want something so bad, you find a way to make it work. Even if what you want comes with a side of organized crime. The only hiccup I foresee is my brother. Rocco’s loyalty to him runs deep and right now he’s not thinking about Joaquin and what he will ultimately think about us being together.
“What about my brother?”
“He’s dealing with his own shit right now. When the time is right, we’ll tell him.”
I bite my lip. I want to believe this is real, that he’s not feeding me lines and stringing me along.
“Any more questions?” he asks.
I decide to let the issue of my brother slide and live for the moment. I replay his words in my head and even though it’s a long shot, I ask, “What changed your world tonight?”
“You mean aside from you?”
“Nice try,” I retort, rolling my eyes. “I guess I’m just wondering why the sudden change of heart.” I pause, reading the blank expression on his face. “You’re not going to answer, are you?”
“No,” he confirms and sits up. Licking his lips, he looks away for a moment. Then he brings his eyes back to mine and says, “There are going to be a lot of times where I won’t be able to answer your questions, Violet, and you need to get used to that. You need to understand that I’ve taken a vow of silence and if I betray that promise the consequences are grave—for me, but more importantly, for you. The less you know, the safer you are.”
Someone else might’ve heard those words and thought about the girl who died in front of her eyes. She would’ve taken it as a warning and fled, but I didn’t even bat an eye.
Behind every great man, is a woman who makes him great.
She knows the good.
The bad.
The ugly.
She reminds him of who he used to be.
Well, beneath the fancy suits Rocco has a heart of tarnished gold and I’m the girl wh
o is signing up to polish it and make it shine again.
Chapter 18
Violet Cabrera
“Heel forward, shoulders down. It’s very simple Violet,” my instructor, Ms. Beechers, chastises.
If it was up to her, she’d have me exiled from the academy. My scholarship would be revoked and instead of training for a one of the most prestigious productions to hit Lincoln Center's stage, I’d be dancing on a corner.
I swear some days I think she’s right, that I don’t belong here. It’s usually after a long day of classes, when I stay late to practice. I slip my ballet shoes off and stare at my bruised and bloody feet with tears in my eyes. The dream of one day holding the honor of prima ballerina feels so out of reach.
“That’s enough,” Ms. Beechers announces.
I square my shoulders and slowly bring my arms down to my sides, ending my routine fluidly and gracefully. However, judging by the look of disdain radiating from Ms. Beecher’s eyes, it safe to say she doesn’t agree. Feeling discouraged, I cross the room and grab my bag.
Today normally would be one of those days where I stay behind to work on all the things Ms. Beecher’s critiqued, but I don’t have it in me.
To be fair I’ve been off my game since Tuesday and it has little do with Ms. Beecher and everything to do with Rocco. Our relationship was off to a rocky start and that was putting it mildly.
He dropped me off a little while after we forced ourselves out of bed and promised to be in touch. I climbed up the fire escape wearing a shit-eating grin, one that was quickly smacked off my face when I crawled through my window and found my mother sitting on the foot of my bed.
Literally, she smacked me across the face. I don’t know how she knew I had spent the night with Rocco, but she did, and she called me every filthy disgusting name imaginable. The tears I held in my eyes were not a result of the slap, but rather a product of the words she spewed at me.
“He’s no good, mija,” she shouted. “How could you sell yourself so short?”
I wanted to believe that she had my best interest in heart, that she was playing the role of a concerned mother, but there was so much hatred in her eyes.
“His father was killed, and he will be too,” she continued to rant. Her English turned to Spanish and she started going on about my brother and how he was already dead to her.
When she was done with her tirade, she lifted her hand. I thought she was going to hit me again, so I braced for it, holding my hands in front of my face. That’s when she grabbed my wrist. Her eyes nearly popped out of their sockets as she inspected the bracelet and in an instant, I felt bile rise to my throat. I let her get her jabs in and swallowed her slurs, but if she so much as a laid a finger on that bracelet, I was going to hurt my own mother and that sickened me.
I pulled my hand out of her reach.
“Where did you get that?” she sneered.
“It’s none of your business.”
“Did he give that to you? What did you have to do for it, Violet?”
I knew what she was insinuating, and the funny thing is, the only time I ever sold myself short was when I tried to save her ass. If she knew I took my clothes off night after night to pay her debt would she be so insulting? What would she think if she knew Rocco saved me from that situation? That the man she hates is the one responsible for her keeping her restaurant.
Would I still be a slut?
Would he still be the Devil?
I looked her in the eye, and I told her the truth.
“It was his mother’s bracelet and now it’s mine.”
Her mouth hung open at that and I left her standing in the middle of the room. When I came out of the shower she was gone, and I vowed that I was done pleasing her. I also told myself I needed to get the fuck out of her house once and for all.
The next morning things went from bad to worse. I was just getting ready to leave the house when I heard Victor’s name be called on the television. I followed the sound and found my mother in the kitchen, a cup of coffee in her hand and her eyes glued to the thirteen-inch T.V. she kept on the counter.
Alleged mob boss, Victor Pastore, has surrendered himself to authorities. Sources say he has confessed to murdering a twenty-four-year-old disc jockey.
I covered my mouth, silencing a gasp and without my mother seeing me, I snuck out the front door. It wasn’t until I got to the corner of our block that I stopped and let myself process what I had overheard. My first instinct was to call Rocco and so that’s what I did. I wanted to know if it was true and if he had known anything about it, but he didn’t answer. In fact, the phone didn’t even ring, all I got was his voicemail.
Any questions I had would have to wait. I pocketed my phone and I started for the train, but the neighborhood was buzzing. It was seven o’clock in the morning and instead of getting their kids off to school with a kiss and a ‘have a nice day’, the housewives of Bensonhurst congregated at the school bus stop, running their mouths.
Did you hear?
Oh my God, his poor wife.
I knew he had something to do with that shooting.
His daughters must be devastated.
The men in the neighborhood were no better. I walked into the corner store to grab a coffee and guy behind the counter was talking to the man who owned the butcher shop three doors own.
Watch and you’ll see the neighborhood is going to go to shit now.
There’s going to be a war for his territory.
The longshoremen are fucked.
Who do you think is gonna takeover? My money is on Bianci now that Jimmy Gold is gone.
I took a newspaper, paid for that and my coffee and got the hell out of there as fast as I could. But there was no escaping the news. Victor’s face was plastered on the front page. I didn’t read the article until I was on the train.
It turns out Victor was being extradited back to New York, that he had turned himself into the Miami police. As soon as I read that, I knew Rocco was involved somehow. I skimmed the entire newspaper looking for any mention of his name, but I got nothing.
I went on with my day and by the time I got home there was still no word from Rocco. The whole fucking week passed, and he never called. Saturday came and went and guess what? He never showed to take me to dinner. It’s the start of a new week and all I know is what I read in the papers and see on the news and today it wasn’t Victor who made the front page of the papers, it was Rocco.
The newly minted don of the Pastore Crime Family.
“Violet, may I have a word?”
Ms. Beecher’s voice quickly forces me out of my head, and I turn to face her, hiking my bag on my shoulder. Meeting her gaze, I try to prepare myself for the verbal berating I’m sure she’s about to deliver to me.
“Yes?”
“I don’t need to remind you that the company production try outs are in two weeks. If you want to be on the stage at Lincoln Center, you are going to need to perfect your form and lose at least ten pounds.”
It isn’t the first time she’s commented on my weight. The sad thing is, I’m a hundred and twenty pounds and at five three that’s hardly reason to sound the alarms. But unlike every other ballerina in the academy, I have hips and an ass.
“No, you don’t need to remind me,” I reply, trying my hardest not to sound like a bitch. “I’ve been working overtime to make sure I’m ready for the performance.”
Lies.
I’ve been working overtime catching up on the mob.
“And your diet?”
I scarfed down a bag of Flaming Hot Cheetos last night for dinner, but I washed it down with a Mango flavored White Claw, so I saved some calories there.
“I’ll make an appointment to meet with the nutritionist.”
I think she knows I’m full of shit, that I’m going to walk out the door and grab an empanada from the food truck on the corner as soon as I get out of here, but she doesn’t comment. Instead she frowns and dismisses me with a jerk of her head.
Stepping out of the studio, I make my way toward the locker room. It’s mostly empty, which I prefer because changing in front of a bunch of girls who gawk at your curves is never a pleasant experience. It’s also a test of my restraint because I would love nothing more than to slap a little Vaseline on my face and go to war with these shallow bitches.
Especially in the mood I’m in.
Setting my duffel bag on the bench, I begin the transformation from ballerina to Violet Cabrera. The first thing I do is remove all the pins holding my hair in a bun. I shake out my long blond locks and almost instantly, the pressure in my head eases. Next, I take a seat on the bench and untie the ribbons of my Bloch pointe ballet slippers. Grimacing, I slowly remove one slipper. I peel away the tape and examine the bruises, noting they don’t look any worse than yesterday.
My first week at the academy, my toes bled right through the satin, ruining them. That’s when I began to tape my toes. I proceed to remove my other slipper. Wiggling my stiff toes, I shove the slippers in my bag and grab my street clothes.
Aside from the pink Bloch ballet slippers, the academy’s strict dress code consists of a black leotard and salmon Bloch tights which must be worn in place of underwear. Since I’m in Pointe, I’m also allowed to wear a wrap skirt. Shimmying out of the skirt, I kick it to the side before lowering the straps of my leotard. I push it down to my hips and remove it, along with my tights. Grabbing my thong, I step into it and pull it on, letting the thin elastic snap against my hips. Next, I slip my legs into a pair of baggy black sweatpants. I unravel the support wrap that keeps my boobs in place and opt out of wearing a bra. My breasts are perky enough to allow them a chance to breathe.
Lastly, I grab a cropped t-shirt out of the duffel bag and pull it over my head. Fully dressed, I slide my feet into a pair of slip-on Converse sneakers and fasten my hoop earrings into my ears.
Feeling more like me and less like a specimen under a microscope, I exit the locker room and make my way through the building, out the front doors of the academy. I freeze in my tracks, though, because parked at the curb is a sleek black Maserati and leaning against it is the newly minted don of New York.
Straightened Out (The Pastore Crime Family Book 1) Page 13
