Bound in Love

by Alexis Abbott

  “I know, passerotta,” I say, stroking her hair gently with my thick fingers. “But we’ve gone through a trial of fire, both of us—and you’re not used to this. What you’ve accomplished, what you’ve survived in Italy is a greater feat of strength than I could ever come close to.”

  “I don’t know about that,” she says with a soft smile.

  “We’re coming back from the dead, you and me,” I say, looking down to that face I love so strongly. “You’re doing all this for your family, nothing else. It would be enough for your mother for you to keep yourself and your future child safe, but going back to look after family? If that doesn’t make you a good daughter, I don’t know what does.”

  After a moment, she looks up at me with a struggling smile on her face, and she gets closer to me. My arms, warm from exercise, wrap around her comfortingly, and we hug with nothing but the droning of the plane all around us for a few moments.

  “You are my strength, Serena,” I say, squeezing her gently. “I mean that. We have each other, and that makes us strong enough to move mountains for what we love.”

  Just then, I hear the pilot’s voice over the speaker.

  “Bruno, just to let you know, we just crossed into radius of American phone signals. If you have any calls to make, now’s the time.”

  “Thanks,” I call to the cockpit, and I nod to Serena, standing up and getting a phone from my bag.

  A few moments later, the phone is ringing, and I’m pacing the cabin with a hand on my hip.

  “...hello?” an uncertain voice answers from the other end.

  “Hello, Giovanni,” I say with a grin. “Nice to hear you again.”

  “Holy shit, Bruno,” Giovanni gushes, laughing at the other end of the line. “Don’t give me a heart attack like that! Fuck, it’s good to hear from you. You really didn’t waste any time stirring up the goddamn wasp’s nest coming back to life, huh? Rising on the third day too good for you?”

  “It’s a bad habit,” I say, winking at Serena.

  “Where are you?” he asks. “Can you even answer that? What’s going on?”

  “We’re heading back to America,” I say. “We’ll be in the Bronx before the end of the day. I need you to make sure pickup arrangements are settled at the air strip. You know the one. I’ve already got some guys on it, but I want someone I trust there with them. Talk to Nico.”

  “You got it,” Giovanni says, and I can still hear the disbelief through the phone. “I gotta say, Bruno, it’s fuckin’ weird hearing your voice again. I mean, I’d heard rumors, but…”

  “This is on a need-to-know basis,” I say. “Trust me, if I’d wanted to go public with this, you’d be one of the first men I contacted. But what’s this about rumors? What’s the situation in the Bronx?”

  “Shit, you don’t know anything, do you?” Giovanni says in wonder.

  “I’ve had a bad case of the ‘dead,’ Giovanni.”

  “Right, right. Well, things are uh, not good. We’re in an all-out mob war, Bruno.”

  I clench my jaw. “The Cleaners don’t know when to die, do they?”

  “They were backed into a corner for a while there, but anything backed into a corner fights hard. When everyone thought you’d been killed, they fought twice as hard to get back lost territory. Lot of good men are dead. It’s been a bloody winter and a bloodier spring. Nobody even knows what the turf borders are anymore, it feels like every week some block is ours, then it’s the Cleaners, you get the idea. Don Abruzzi dug his heels in hard, and he’s holding the vendetta for his son’s death against the whole Costa family. He circulated a bunch of news about your death, too, saying he had your body, photos, all kinds of shit.”

  I listen to all this with a still expression, taking it all in. When he’s finished, I take a breath.

  “Alright. Giovanni, I want you to get the boys back together. Only the men I’ve been on jobs with, you know the ones. Men we can trust. I’ll explain more when we land, but the Cleaners probably know by now that I’m going to be back in town soon. I’m going to lead us on a job.”

  “A job? Shouldn’t we touch base with Don Costa?”

  “Fuck the Don,” I grunt. “Has he given a shit when I’ve been busting my ass across the world on their account? No. You know who has stuck up for us? Us, Giovanni. If we want something done right, we do it ourselves. This is our neighborhood. Not the Cleaners’, and not the Don’s. I’ll deal with the blowback later, if anyone wants to cross that bridge. You with me or not?”

  There’s a long sigh from the other end of the line before Giovanni says, “Shit, yeah, you know I’m with you, Bruno. Alright, let’s do this. I’ll see you in a few.”

  I end the call, and I look down to Serena, who looks shocked at me.

  “Did I just hear all that right?”

  “I didn’t survive a car bomb to go back to following orders like a grunt,” I say.

  “Well, yeah,” she says with a smile, but it fades as she goes on, “I mean, what did you mean, ‘job’? What are you planning?”

  A cocky smile crosses my face. “We’re going to find your mother by drawing the bastards out of hiding first. And we’re going to do that by finishing this where it started.”

  16

  Serena

  The car rolls to a stop just down the block, and it hits me how strange it is to be surrounded by these familiar sights again. Italy feels like a world away, like a dream I wish I could get back to. Those sweet, happy memories are fading away, almost like it never happened at all. It’s heartbreaking, but at the same time, I know there’s a lot I need to get done here. I can’t just live in denial forever while the world keeps burning down everything I’ve built around me.

  Maybe someday things will be soft and easy again, but now is not that time.

  Now, it’s time for action.

  I hop out of the car before Bruno can even turn off the engine, and I start marching my pregnant self down the street, my stomach churning and my heart racing. As I approach the building where Bathing Beauty is located, I nearly double over to throw up at the sight of it.

  My beautiful store, the shop I have worked so hard for, is in shambles.

  There are streamers of yellow caution tape all over the entrance, the windows busted up and cracked, tiny splinters of glass littering the sidewalk. I cover my mouth with my hands in shock, stepping gingerly through the broken glass to the front door. With a shaking hand, I take the key out of my pocket and fit it in the door. I have to jostle it to try and get it open, since the door is hanging slightly crooked on its hinges, like it’s been knocked off-angle. Like somebody kicked the door in to break inside the shop. To my surprise and panic, the key doesn’t quite fit like it used to. I thought it was opening up, but apparently the door is just so messed up that it can’t open anymore like it used to. Bruno comes up behind me and takes my hand.

  “Come on, mia passerotta. I’ll get us in somehow,” he tells me gently. He leads me around the back of the building, to the rear employees’ entrance. As expected, my key doesn’t fit here either, but luckily Bruno has enough brute strength to break through the door, shattering the lock in the process. I rush inside and start turning on the lights—half of which don’t turn on, and the other half only flicker pathetically, like they’ve been smashed to bits.

  As I walk through the kitchen and storage rooms, I can feel a lump rising in my throat.

  The shelves are all knocked over, chemicals and equipment scattered all over the floor. Bruno grabs me by the arm and says, “Be careful, Serena. I don’t think you should be here, breathing in these chemicals. It’s not safe for you or the baby.”

  “Just… just let me look around a little bit. I-I need to take stock of things,” I say, my voice already shaky. Leaning on Bruno for support, I walk through to the main shop front, my breath catching in my lungs as I take in the horrific scene. The state of things is even worse in here. All the cabinets and shelves have been ripped out of the walls. All the products are smashed
and poured on the floor. The files are spread out everywhere, some of them ripped to pieces. All my hard work is lying here in bits on the ground, unceremoniously dumped out and trampled on.

  I immediately start to cry, unable to hold back the waterworks. The waves of devastated emotion crash over me and I crumple to the floor, burying my face in my hands. I sob openly, feeling my heart shatter into a million pieces. First, I learned that my mother is missing and most certainly in danger, and now my beloved shop, the business I’ve worked so hard to keep going, is destroyed. My family’s last asset, our last hope, dashed to pieces by the enemy.

  Bruno rushes over to comfort me, tugging me into his arms and kissing my forehead.

  “I’m so sorry, Serena,” he murmurs. “Those bastards are going to pay for this. I promise.”

  “Everything I had here is ruined. My old life—I’m so stupid. I abandoned it all. I was having such a wonderful time in Italy with you, and I was so selfish to think I could just leave it all behind and it would be okay. I’m an idiot. I shouldn’t have just let it all go so easily. I should have been here to make things right,” I sob angrily, shaking my head. “I’m so mad at myself. I can’t believe I let this happen.”

  “Serena, stop. This isn’t your fault. You didn’t choose to leave, dolcezza. Remember? You had to go. It was the only way to save you and the baby. You did what you had to do to survive.”

  “Yeah? And now what? My mother is in trouble, the shop is ruined, and I can’t do anything to fix it. I’ve made such a mess of everything, Bruno, and I don’t know what to do!”

  He helps me stand up and leads me over to sit down on a stool miraculously left standing behind the beaten-up cashier counter. He kisses me on the cheek. “Just sit here for a minute. Breathe slowly. It’s going to be okay. I’m going to make this okay. Just trust me.”

  I sit there, breathing deeply, doing what I’m told, because… well, what the hell else can I do anyway? The tears slowly begin to subside and I calm down a little bit, coming out of the darkness to notice that Bruno is going around the room with a garbage bag, cleaning up as he goes.

  “What are you doing?” I ask, frowning.

  “Cleaning up. Just like old times,” he says, giving me a reassuring smile.

  Despite how awful everything is, I can’t help but smile back weakly. “What’s the point, Bruno? This place is a mess. It’s shut down. There’s no hope for Bathing Beauty. This shop has been beaten down and vandalized and destroyed so many times by now, what’s the use?”

  “Well, I’m not giving up. Not yet. We’ve rebuilt this place before, and we can sure as hell do it again, Serena,” he says. He walks over to me and takes my hands, kneeling in front of me. “Listen to me, okay? This is important. You can’t stay here. It’s not safe. All these crazy chemicals in the air have got to be dangerous for you and the baby. I have a plan, but you have to trust me and do what I say. Alright?”

  I look at him suspiciously.

  “What exactly am I agreeing to?”

  He sighs.

  “Serena. I have a lot to get done here.”

  “What is your plan? You have to tell me, Bruno.”

  He hesitates for a moment and I add, “I’m the mother of your child. I’m your fiancée. You and me? We’re a team. That means you have to keep me in the loop.”

  Bruno smiles again, shaking his head.

  “God, you’re stubborn. But you’re right. Okay.” He takes a deep breath and continues, “Here’s what’s going to happen. I’m going to clean this place up, get the lights back on, make it look like it’s up and running again.”

  “But why? Won’t that just make the Cleaners suspicious?” I ask.

  He nods.

  “Exactly. But it won’t just make them suspicious, it will make them angry. It will draw them out, get them to come here and try and put us back in our place.”

  “Bruno…” I breathe, my eyes going wide. “Are you really setting a trap? That isn’t a good idea. It isn’t safe.”

  He kisses my hand.

  “Yes. But the time for playing it safe has passed. And besides, I won’t be alone here. The Cleaners think we’re alone, you and me. They think we’re free agents. I made sure to spread word around town, get the rumor mill started on telling everybody that I quit. Broke away from the Costa family for good. The Cleaners will think I’m severely outmanned here. But what they won’t know is that there will be Costa members hiding in wait all around here. The Cleaners won’t send the big guns in to get me—they won’t see any reason to. So when they show up, they’ll be the ones outnumbered, outgunned.”

  “That’s crazy, Bruno. You can’t do this,” I tell him firmly, shaking my head. “It’s too risky. You know that. I-I can’t let you do this.”

  “Serena, it’s the only way. If you’ve got a better plan, let’s hear it.”

  I sit silently, my mouth closing as I realize he’s right. I don’t have any other ideas.

  He cups my face in his hands.

  “Dolcezza, I can do this. I’ve faced worse enemies than these before. Do you trust me?”

  I nod.

  “You know trust isn’t the problem. I trust you with my life.”

  “You’re just going to have to let me do this, even if it scares you. I promise it will work. It will all be just fine in the end,” he assures me. “But you can’t stay here. I won’t let you become a casualty of this war. It’s my fight, Serena, not yours.”

  “What do you mean? I’m not leaving you here. Bathing Beauty is my responsibility. And you—you’re my fiancé. I can’t just abandon you when you need me!” I exclaim.

  Bruno pulls me into a tight hug. “I can only do this if I know you’re somewhere else—somewhere safe. I will not let them anywhere near you. I’m the prize in this honeypot, not you.”

  “Where will I go?” I ask, shaking my head as my eyes fill with tears again.

  “Rafaela’s. She’s coming to get you any minute now.”

  Just as the words leave his mouth, there’s the honk of a car horn outside. I look back over my shoulder and see Rafaela in Nico’s car, looking very solemn and pale.

  “Bruno, don’t do this,” I beg, clinging to him desperately.

  “It will all be okay,” he says, nearly dragging me out the door. I continue to cry and protest as he pulls me around to the front of the building, taking out his phone to make a quick call. “Giovanni. Si. Tonight. Go ahead and send them. It’ll all be in place by then.”

  He gently pushes me into the passenger seat, then looks up at Rafaela and says, “Take care of her. Make sure she eats. And drinks water. And make sure she relaxes—”

  “Got it,” Rafaela says curtly, nodding. “You do what you have to do.”

  “Bruno!” I cry out tearfully. “Don’t you dare.”

  “Mia passerotta, I will see you when the smoke clears. I love you,” he says, leaning through the window to kiss me even as the tears streak down my cheeks.

  Rafaela throws the car into gear and we take off down the street. I glance back, seeing Bruno’s shape getting smaller and smaller until he disappears. I turn to Rafaela, who is staring stony-faced at the road.

  “Take me back!” I shout at her. She shakes her head. I can tell this is incredibly hard for her. She doesn’t like having to drag me away against my will. “Rafaela, turn this car around.”

  “No!” she barks back. “No. I can’t do that, Serena. You’re my best friend and I love you and I’d do anything for you, but this? This is out of our hands.”

  “Please, Raf. I can’t just leave him back there. Not—not again,” I whisper, thinking back to riding in this car as it sped away from the explosion, leaving the love of my life behind.

  There are tears in her big brown eyes. “Hermana, no. This is my part in the fight, okay? There isn’t much I can do. Nico and all the others—they can fight. But I’m no fighter, Serena. This—taking care of you—this is the only way I can contribute. I have to do what I’m told.”


  “You don’t understand,” I whimper.

  She stops the car suddenly, turning to me with flashing, angry eyes.

  “I don’t understand? Amiga, I know exactly what you feel! Do you think I don’t break down and cry every time Nico goes out to do god-knows-what for the mafia? Do you think I haven’t been worried sick with panic the whole time you’ve been off in Italy? I had no idea whether you were alive or dead all that time! Do you really think I don’t know what you’re going through? I was there, too! I saw that explosion! And the whole time I just kept thinking, ‘That could have been Nico. That could have been Serena. Hell, that could have been me.’ Don’t you understand that I’ve been terrified, too? Serena, you know me better than that. You’re like a sister to me, and this is the one way I can do my part. Just let me do my part,” she says, her lip trembling as she bursts into tears, too.

  “Oh god, I’m so sorry, Raf,” I mutter, reaching over to hug her.

  “I’ve been so scared, Serena. I thought my best friend was gone forever,” she cries.

  “If I had been able to reach out to you, I would have. You know that, right?” I assure her.

  “I know, I know.”

  “I can’t imagine how scary it was for you, being stuck here, not knowing what was going on,” I tell her, and I mean it. Guilt floods into my heart. I hadn’t even thought about it. Poor Rafaela, worried half to death all this time.

  “All along, I’ve just been quiet, doing what they tell me to do. I used to think I was pretty tough, you know? I thought I was strong. But this stuff? It’s way over my head,” she sniffles.

  “Rafaela, you are strong. You always have been. It’s scary, but you’re still here. Right? You’re surviving! And thank god, too, because I don’t know what I’d do if anything happened to you,” I confess. She wipes her eyes.

  “I’m sorry for blowing up at you like that, but I’ve just been so wound up, so tense all the time waiting for the next shoe to drop,” she says, trying to calm herself down.

  “I know the feeling. It’s okay. You have every right to feel that way.”