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—We need to talk. I am here. Meet me in the lobby, Giovanni texted me frantically at two in the morning.
With my shoes and hoodie in hand, I sneaked out the door and pulled them on in the hallway.
Giovanni rushed to me as soon as I stepped onto the ground floor.
“What’s wrong?”
“There was another phone call tonight,” he said. “I heard my ma whispering to the same man. He threatened to take me if she does not give him the money.” Giovanni swallowed and avoided my probing eyes. “She knows what kind of man my father is, and she is paying to keep it a secret?”
“We don’t know anything about your dad for sure,” I reminded him.
“What would they do to me if they cannot get the money?” He paced the length of the lobby. “I–I cannot go home again...Can I stay with you at Selena’s? I need to be close to you.” Giovanni peered down at me through bloodshot eyes. “Please. I can sleep on the sofa and leave before she or your mother wakes up.” The desperation in his voice tugged my heart.
“Let me check with Selena first.”
GIOVANNI LOUNGED ON the sofa-bed with his arms folded behind him. A soft orange glow from the street lights outside flooded the living room and illuminated half of his face, exaggerating the angles of his features. “Joy, do you think he is guilty?” he whispered before I reached the hallway.
I wandered over to him and settled onto the mattress. “I don’t know. I don’t really know him. We’ll find the answer, I promise.”
“I wish I could stop thinking...I wish I did not know about it.”
“But your dad is a free man for a reason. I mean, it wasn’t his company.” I pressed a kiss to Giovanni’s forehead and peered into his grief-stricken eyes as fresh tears spilled out of them. “Look, I know it’s hard not to worry, especially when it’s your family, but I bet once you get the answers, it won’t be anything like we thought.”
I crawled over him and cuddled his warm body. “I know it’s a different situation, but when I didn’t know if my mom would be okay after my dad hurt her, it was torture. Selena used to take me to the hospital to see her every day until she could come home.” I exhaled another shaky breath. “The scariest thing in the world, though, is to not know.” I grazed his scalp lightly with my nails. “She would be unconscious on the floor, all bloody and swollen, and I can’t tell you how many times I thought he’d killed her.” I swiped at my tears with my arm. “I couldn’t always protect her. But you...you’re bigger and stronger than I was. Everyone gets scared sometimes. Don’t wait for something scary to happen before you do something about it. You just gotta learn to trust yourself.”
Giovanni rolled over and cradled his chin on my chest. Tears tumbled down his cheeks and dampened my shirt. I pushed my fingers through his thick hair.
“How can you control it? I want to make it stop.” He dried his face on his palm.
I raised Giovanni’s chin to study his eyes in the low light. Their playful innocence had long gone. Now, fear and uncertainty lived there. But how could they not? Our discovery challenged everything he once knew of his father.
“You can’t stop it,” I told him truthfully. “You can’t control how you feel. You can only control how you react to it. My dad taught me to paint, to use color and brush strokes to express myself, no matter what emotion I felt. It used to help him a little. I know it helps me sometimes.”
“I thought you hated him.”
I swallowed away the tightness in my throat. “I’m afraid of him...of what he could do. Despite that, he was sick. I remember him a little when he was stable and sober, but the bad always takes over the good. I watched him change into someone I couldn’t love anymore.” I hardened my jaw. “I don’t want you to stop loving and trusting your dad until you know for a fact who and what he really is.” I stroked his cheek. “Once your perception of him changes, you can’t get it back. At least I can’t anyway.”
He nodded thoughtfully.
“My dad used art as his escape, before he got worse and turned to drugs. I’ve got some canvases if you wanna try it tomorrow.”
“I do not know how to paint,” he muttered.
“It doesn’t matter. We don’t have to paint. We can go for a walk, bake, even play soccer, anything to make you feel good.”
Giovanni hopped to his feet with a nervous smile and a scary, intense stare. I’d seen that look before...many times on Dad during his manic episodes. To see Dad’s expression on Giovanni made my heart shake with dread.
I rose halfway and wished away that feeling when Giovanni hauled me to my feet and into his arms. His lips on mine felt normal at first, but the sensation of raging bats spiraled chaotically in my stomach, replacing their gentle-winged predecessors. I moved away, unsure of its meaning.
“What is wrong?” he whispered, noticing my discomfort.
“That felt weird...I mean...different.”
His all-knowing grin spoke before he did. “I feel different.” His forehead wrinkled as he searched for the right words to express it. “There was a pain in my heart after we learned of my papá’s work. It did not go away until now. I am still worried about it, but I was not sure you could understand until I hear you speak about your parents.” The intensity of his stare made me feel alien again. “But you know this pain better than I do. You understand it. I need you now more than ever.” He squeezed my body against his. “I wish we could sleep together,” he said in my ear.
Shaking my head, I chuckled to myself. “Yeah. You really want my mom to kill you.”
THE DOOR SLAMMING INTO the wall of my room woke me with a start. I sat upright, ready to fight. My hands unclenched when the intruder turned out to be Mom. She had the audacity to accuse me of startling her.
“What? What do you want?” I closed my eyes and relaxed my body.
“Giovanni’s on the couch. Why is he on the couch?”
“He had a rough night. Selena said it was okay.”
“And did you stay separate the whole night?”
“Yes, Mom.”
“What time did you get in bed?”
I plunged into my pillow, willing her to leave me alone. “I don’t know. I’m tired. Please. Go away.”
I could almost hear her frown. “And you stayed here, and he stayed there the whole night?” she repeated in dreaded expectation of my answer.
“Yes, Mom. I left him alone, and he left me alone. I’m tired. Please. Go away and let me sleep!” I glared at her.
She nodded, letting me know she believed me. “Okay. I’ll start breakfast whenever you’re ready to get up. Giovanni’s still conked out too. We gotta finish packing up our old place today. You feel up to it?”
“Yes, but later.”
I turned over and pulled the blanket over my head to block out the daylight that poured into my room. As soon as she exited and shut the door behind her, sweet unconsciousness swaddled me like a baby.
I SLIPPED THE BRALETTE over my head when the door burst open.
Fear coursed through me as I bolted to the safety of my closet, desperate to conceal my scars with a pair of jeans and a shirt. “I locked my door for a reason!” I stumbled out of the shadows, trying to calm my heart. Freeing the hair trapped inside of my shirt, I turned away from Mom’s smirking face.
“You forget. I used to change your diapers, remember?” Mom said.
“Fifteen years ago.” As if that had anything to do with her invading my privacy. It was clear she wanted to irritate me for Giovanni spending the night without her knowledge.
“What was Giovanni doing here last night?”
“He’s been having a hard time with his parents.”
“Did they give him permission?”
I shrugged and fastened the clasp on my necklace. “I don’t think he asked them. It didn’t even occur to me to find out.”
Nearing me with her waving finger, she said, “Don’t ever forget to check with his parents again. The last thing I need is for them to bring the cops here in the middle of the night looking for him. That’s every parent’s nightmare. You hear me?”
As far as I could see, it was his parents’ fault he was in any danger.
WHILE WE FILLED UP on pancakes and coffee, Mom pitched her plans for the day to Giovanni with an invitation for him to join us, much to my dismay. Of course, I would’ve loved to spend the day with him, but he had no idea what he was signing up for.
I did my best to educate him about The Glen so he could make an informed decision about whether he wanted to go or not. His eyes glazed over, finding my mouth more worthy of his attention than the words I was saying.
Annoyed, I retreated in a huff and changed into the baggiest clothes I owned, hoping my warnings would miraculously sink into his brain.
“Leave your money here,” I ordered after joining him in the living room again.
His face drooped and his shoulders sagged in protest. “Why?”
“‘Cause you’re gonna get robbed.” When he rolled his eyes at me, I stomped my foot at him. “Why won’t you listen to me? You know what? Maybe you should stay here.”
“No. I want to go with you.”
“It’s not where you need to be.”
“I need to be with you.” Giovanni tried to keep me from flattening his hair. “Why you are doing this?”
I unbuttoned his white and gray-striped, pulled it off of him—leaving his white T-shirt on—and tossed it onto the couch. “Because no one goes around the projects looking rich. And if you do, you’ll be a target. Have you ever been robbed before?”
He nodded. “After we moved here.”
“Did you enjoy it? ‘Cause the way you keep fighting me, you act like you want it to happen again.”
When he reached for his shirt, I stopped his hand.
“Leave it. I’m serious. The last time we went, we almost got shot on our way out. I don’t wanna see you get hurt ‘cause you look like money. Please.”
He finally listened. I rewarded his obedience with a kiss, but being Giovanni, he had to take it to the next level. Pressing firmly against me, he dipped me back, literally sweeping me off my feet. The butterflies in my tummy didn’t know what hit them.
“Boy, I told you ‘bout kissing my daughter!” Mom yelled at him, storming into the room. “It ain’t too late to send you home.”
Mom frightened him so badly, he lost his hold and grappled to catch me at the last second. I rolled out of his arms onto the floor, fighting to contain my laughter and scramble to my feet. But the longer Mom’s glare lingered on his dejected puppy face, the more I strained every muscle in my body to suppress my laugh.
SEEING HOW GIOVANNI stuck out like a sore thumb all fresh and innocent against the backdrop of that gritty part of town, kept me on high alert. The contrast didn’t bother me as much as the attention he drew—precisely what I wanted to avoid.
The instant we stepped onto the sidewalk from the moving van, the welcoming committee sized him up. Giovanni let his sights fall to everywhere else but the gawking gangsta’s standing guard.
“Hey, Ronnie.”
Ronnie’s friends clustered themselves a little closer to one another, making an exhibition of their hostility toward Giovanni.
Ronnie broke formation from them. “Joy. What’s good wit’ ya?” He beamed brightly on his way over to us.
“Nothin’ much.”
The whites of his eyes made it difficult to know if he was in dire need of sleep or his high was fading. My eyes watered to peer into them too long.
“Where ya been? We ain’t seen you and your moms for a while now.” He joined us on the long stretch of sidewalk and self-consciously smoothed his outgrown twists with his hands.
“We’ve been stayin’ across town. Did you hear what happened to my baby?”
“Yeah, I did. You know who did it?”
“The cops said it was my dad.”
Strolling alongside me, he said, “That’s messed up.”
“I know. I still can’t believe she’s gone.”
A tear fell from one of his sorrow-filled eyes, unseen by anyone except me. I was glad for his sake. We both knew his sudden sadness had nothing to do with my dog and everything to do with his own grief.
I rubbed his arm and observed the changes in him within the four weeks since I’d seen him last. His oval face looked sunken-in, and he smiled with a broken smile. I wished my mom and Giovanni away so Ronnie and I could catch up, but we hadn’t come to The Glen to socialize. We had work to do. Plus, Mom forbade me from hanging out with him. Her fear stemmed from the company he kept and the street hustle that paid his bills.
“Joy, we gotta get movin’ before it starts getting late,” she reminded me.
“We can talk later,” I offered quietly.
Ronnie cleared his throat and stared at me pensively. “Okay...Wait. Can I help you guys?”
I looked at Mom to answer.
“Thanks, but we don’t have much to do,” she said.
Ronnie’s face fell with disappointment.
“We’re just moving boxes,” I said. “But it would be faster if he helped,” I directed at Mom.
Her hazel eyes pierced me. She gave him a stiff nod. “You can help, if you’re not busy.” Mom kept her words short and bitter to the taste.
Ronnie read between the lines with ease. “Actually,” he said. “I remembered I gotta take my mom to an appointment today. Sorry. Let me know if you forget anythin’. I can drop it off to you...if you want.”
Mom’s nostrils flared with her hostile thanks. She’d never give him our new address or accept his kind offer. With her hand on my shoulder, she moved me along faster. Glancing back at him, I said my awkward goodbyes. I wished he wouldn’t have let Mom intimidate him.
Passing through the squeaky doors to enter the building, my mind shifted from Ronnie to this horrendous complex’s many repugnant charms. The scent of alcohol-soaked urine and stale weed hit us in the face, although the pee really stole the show. It always did.
Giovanni buried his nose in his shirt as we moved through the dank corridor and up three flights of stairs to our old apartment.
There was no stifling my embarrassment over the shame of ever calling The Glen home. Living in a place like that was a desperate necessity, a last resort before the streets—something Giovanni knew nothing about and probably would never have had to face. Still, I couldn’t shake the guilt of not preparing him enough for what to expect as if him refusing to take me seriously was somehow my fault.
Walking through the door of our apartment shifted that shame in an instant. Glaring at Storm’s former resting place rushed that day back to my heart and mind as if it had happened today. Luckily, Giovanni’s presence was a welcome relief, a distraction from the negative energy forever infused in the place.
Our apartment reeked of disinfectant instead of Storm’s blood or the funk that strangled us when we first entered the building. Giovanni breathed in deeply as if the smell of cleaning products was the purest form of oxygen he had ever known. I couldn’t blame him. I only hoped he’d stored enough of it in his lungs for whenever we had to venture downstairs into the fumes.
He lifted a box of kitchen wares and watched me with suspicion. “How do you know that guy?”
“We used to go to school together. He dropped out before the end of his eighth-grade year, around the time his sister...uh, passed away. He was a couple of years ahead of me. I guess he’s like twenty now.” He looked more like a haggard thirty-year-old, and it worried me.
“I thought they were going to make problems when we arrived.”
“Ronnie would never. His friends would have if he wasn’t there. Actually, he saved me from trouble a few times.”
I shook the terrifying memory of my run-in with the buffalo-faced, boulder-sized gangster. I could still see his sneering face in my head the day he cornered me on the stairs after school. Ronnie fought that fight for me, despite being half the man’s size and sixteen at the time. He shoved Lug down the stairs with all of his might.
The sickening sound churned my stomach whenever I thought about his heavy body smacking one step after another. The fall left him quadriplegic, unable to speak or point Ronnie out to his former comrades.
I owed Ronnie my life, and there was no telling how many others had been saved from falling prey to Lug because of Ronnie’s actions that day.
I retrieved the pocketknife from my pocket, opened it, and carefully slipped it into my pocket again. “Ronnie’s always been sweet to me. He’s a good person. He’s just...stuck.”
I followed Giovanni out the door with my own load. There was strength in numbers, and the last thing I wanted was to have my boyfriend disappear, get hurt, or worse. My list of bad memories associated with this place was already beyond full. I could’ve done without another.
THE SMELL OF FRESH paint still lingered in the air as we filled our new apartment with boxes. Giovanni laughed at me for testing the light switches in each room.
I grinned. “Look, ma. No shocks!”
He’d missed out on experiencing the shocking light switch at our old apartment for himself.
I loved the extra space and safety this place had to offer compared to the shoebox we used to live in. Our new furniture was due to arrive within the next few days. And I could not wait to get settled. Too bad Storm couldn’t have been there to make this apartment feel like home with us. She would’ve loved the living room corner by the radiator.
I WALKED GIOVANNI TO his house before nightfall. It wasn’t until he entwined our fingers that I noticed the slight tremor in his hand. He was genuinely terrified to return home.
“Joy, there is something I need to tell you.” Giovanni released his clammy hand from mine. “My papá wants to move. He applied for a job in New Jersey, and he has an interview on Wednesday.”
I was speechless. Jersey wasn’t a world away, but we were so close to the end of the school year with one more year left until graduation. If his dad was unable to acquire that job, it would only be a matter of time before he would search for and obtain another even farther away. But what about his mom’s bakery?
“He is already looking for a new place for us to live.”
I clung to his arm and started on the path to his house again. “This guy that’s blackmailing them is making him desperate. We’ve gotta find answers faster. That’s what we should’ve been doing today.”
Mrs. Vitali greeted Giovanni with anger. I had an idea why when she shook her phone and shouted at him in Italian. He hadn’t told his parents about his whereabouts. Mrs. Vitali embraced him and cried into his shoulder. She said a few more words and stormed into the kitchen with the phone to her ear.
Riddled with guilt, Giovanni took my hand and led me up the narrow staircase to his room.
“What did she say?” I bounced anxiously on his bed while he enclosed us inside.
“My papá is looking for me.” Giovanni removed his sneakers and lined them on the closet floor with the others.
“That’s what my mom was afraid of. She said that the cops might show up at our place looking for you and to make sure that your parents knew where you were the next time. I’m sorry you got in trouble. But don’t you think you should talk to them about what’s goin’ on?”
Giovanni dropped onto his computer chair and scrubbed his face.
“These people are threatening to kidnap you. We need information, and the way we’ve been tryna get it ain’t fast enough.” He averted his gaze to the parquet floor. I reached over and stroked his scruffy cheek. “I know you’re scared, but the only way to get the answers we need is for you to talk to your mom about it. It’s the quickest way I can think of.”
Giovanni covered my hand with his and sighed.
I looked through the window at the darkening sky outside. “I’ve gotta go.” Gripping the armrests of the chair, I rolled him closer and kissed his lips. “I’m here for you, no matter what. Okay? Call me if you need me.”
I’d made it to the edge of the darkened hallway when someone knocked on the door. Mrs. Vitali greeted the unexpected visitor as he forced his way inside. My position on the stair’s landing prevented me from seeing anything other than a third of his lower half. But a glimpse of the man’s massive flexing fists and huge gray Timberland boots told me he was a giant. Mrs. Vitali moved away from him as he encroached on her space out of my view. I dug through my purse for a wooden skewer I’d keep for protection and listened carefully for the cue to help if the need arose.
“W–Why you are here?” she asked.
“I gotta make sure you do what you’re told,” said the man.
Giovanni sneaked up behind me before I could hear more. I jumped, nearly falling face-first down the stairs until he gripped the back of my shirt and pulled me to him.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered. “What are you doing?”
I held my hand to my heart, trying to recover from my near-death tumble. “Something’s wrong. Your mom sounds scared.”
Giovanni frowned and descended the steps to investigate, ignoring my pleas for him to listen out for more clues from their exchange.
“Hello. May I help you?” Giovanni disappeared from my line of sight.
“No, but your mom can.” Lowering his voice, the Brooklyn native said, “He wants you to get it done soon.” The man strutted across the living room and closed the door after himself.
Giovanni interrogated his mother. Mrs. Vitali fled into the kitchen to escape her son, shouting hysterically at him in Italian. I sneaked downstairs and outside in search of the man. He ducked into the driver’s side of the sleek SUV parked across the street, offering me a glimpse of the tip of his head. The tinted windows were too dark to see through.
“Wait!” I unfastened the chain-linked fence and ran to catch up.
Slamming the door shut, he cranked the car. The headlights blinked to life. The giant peeled out of the parking spot and sped away.
Giovanni joined me outside, his anchored shoulders making his every step drag. “What are you doing?” he hollered at me from behind the fence.
“I wanted to talk to that guy, but I missed him.” I crossed the street again.
Giovanni pulled me into his arms. “Did you see him?”
“I didn’t get the chance.”
Swallowing hard, he sighed into my hair. “I am glad you did not. He scared my ma. She will not tell me anything!”
“Let me talk to her.” His shoulder muffled my voice.
Giovanni crooked his arm around my neck and kicked a stick out of our path. The gate squeaked when he latched it behind us.
I ENTERED THE PEACH-colored kitchen with caution. Mrs. Vitali guzzled one shot after another of hard liquor at the counter. Torrential tears streamed down her face. Taking the bottle of vodka and glass from her hands, I set them aside and rubbed her shoulder. She covered her face in shame and sobbed some more.
“It’s okay. He’s gone,” I whispered. “What did he want?” I took the hair tie from around my wrist and swept the hair off her neck into a loose ponytail.
Mrs. Vitali fell into me and wept uncontrollably, making my heart cramp.
“Here. Take a seat,” I said, guiding her to a stool at the counter. “He’s gone. I won’t let him hurt you. Ya hear me?”
She nodded.
“Do you want me to get Mr. Vitali for you?”
“No. H–He is not here.”
Giovanni blotted her tears with a paper towel. “We want to help you, Ma. Let us help.”
Mrs. Vitali’s chin quivered as she peered into her son’s eyes and blinked away new tears.
“Please. Who was that man?” he asked.
Drawing in a shaky breath, she finally spoke. “He works for a friend of your papá.”
Giovanni frowned. “The man that is blackmailing you?”
Her mouth came unhinged. “H–How do you know?”
“I heard him on the phone the other day.”
Mrs. Vitali clutched the gold medallion on her necklace and lowered her eyes to the granite countertop. A second round of tears rained down her cheeks when she nodded. Giovanni dabbed them away and settled onto the stool beside her, listening intently while his mom made a long-winded confession in their secret tongue.
After rinsing the glass, I filled it with water and passed it to her. I didn’t know who that man was or from under which bridge he crawled out from, but I’d search every rat hole in all five boroughs to bring even a dollop of peace to Mrs. Vitali if I could.
Resting my elbows on top of the island, I watched Giovanni’s surprised reactions to everything she said and made up my own interpretations. Visions of the man who’d upset Giovanni’s precious mother popped into my head. Then, violent fantasies took over as I began plotting ways to take that giant down.
Mrs. Vitali’s sudden silence snapped me out of it. She closed her tired eyes and leaned into her son. Helping her onto unsteady legs, Giovanni guided her through the dining room and upstairs with a firm arm around her shoulders.
Mom’s ringtone sounded from the depths of my bag. I dug it out with a groan and answered. “I’m on my way.”
“You’d better run,” she said sourly and hung up.
I traipsed up the staircase and stopped at the landing just as Giovanni shut his parents’ bedroom door. He pressed his lips into a thin line.
“I have to go,” I said. “My mom’s already annoyed that I’m late.”
Giovanni’s eyes glazed over with tears. Giving me a thoughtful nod, he stroked my cheek and folded his arms around me. “She told me everything.”
Torn between staying there to hear the mystery revealed and avoiding my mother’s wrath, I chose the latter with a heavy heart.
Giovanni called me on my hurried way home.
“She says my papá worked for a bad man, Pietro Ferraro. My papá betrayed him. He and many people who worked for him got arrested.”
“I bet it was because of the agency.”
“Yes. And now our family will be in danger if anyone finds out my papá was responsible. The name of the man who is blackmailing her is Cesaré Rocco. It is the same man my babbo calls his friend. But he does not know my ma is paying him money. She says my babbo must never know.”
I slowed my steps. “Why not?”
“Cesaré is his oldest friend. It would break his heart.” Giovanni sighed. “That is all she told me.”
“Text me the names she gave you, and tomorrow, we’ll look into it.”
I spent the night making a list of questions to investigate tomorrow.
Why would Mr. Vitali’s best friend blackmail his friend’s wife, especially after knowing he had lost his job two weeks ago? What did this man have against Mrs. Vitali? It was her husband who’d turned his boss in. Why come to her for money and make threats?
Too many things didn’t add up.