Twenty-Five

I went straight to my parents’ house the morning after we returned to Chicago, expecting hugs and kisses, maybe even a few tears. Instead, I got sarcasm and tightly leashed anger.

“She’s not dead,” Nani shouted when I walked in the door. “She’s just selfish and inconsiderate.”

“I was on a road trip to New York.” I reached for a fluffy pav from the basket on the kitchen table, and Nani slapped my hand away.

“No food for you until your parents have decided your punishment.”

“I’m thirty years old, Nani. Too old to be punished.”

“You’re never too old to be punished when you almost give your Nani a heart attack. Your mother was crying for three days.”

“I’ve only been out of touch for three days. Did she start crying the minute she hung up after our last call?”

“Three days,” she shouted, wagging her finger at me as Mom walked into the kitchen. “We couldn’t console her. The floor was wet with her tears.” Nani just loved her drama.

“Mom, did you flood the house crying for me because I didn’t message you?”

“I may have wondered why you hadn’t called…” She shook her head in exasperation. “Is Nani telling stories again?”

“The stories tell themselves,” Nani said. “I’m just the vessel.”

“Beta, nice to see you’re still alive.” My dad wrapped me in a hug. “Your mother cried for three days.”

“So I heard.” Part of me wished my mother had cried inconsolably for three days because I hadn’t been in touch, but my mother wasn’t an emotional person. It was my dad who was the emotional center of the family, with the occasional assist from Nani.

“I went to New York with some friends for a few days,” I said. “Work has been very stressful. I’m sorry I didn’t let you know. My phone got stolen and—”

“Of course it was stolen,” Nani said. “They’re all thieves in New York. I’m amazed you weren’t stolen, too.”

“What friends did you go with?” Mom asked, leaning against the counter. “Was Chloe there?”

“Yes. And Anil.”

My dad’s face brightened. “Anil? The drone boy? Are you seeing him now? I told you that your parents know best. He’s a little immature but he’ll grow up once he has the responsibility of children and a family.”

“Whoa.” I held up my hand. “No. I’m not seeing Anil. He’s just a friend. I was there with other friends, too, including Jack.”

“Jack, the man who broke your heart?” Dad’s smile faded. “Why were you with that loser?”

“He’s not a loser, Dad. We just had some things to work out.”

“You said he kissed a woman in front of you just to hurt you. That spells loser in my book. Where is he? I want a word with him. I’ll pull out his ears.”

“I’ll take a piece of him when you’re done,” Nani said. “We’ll make sure he never hurts our Simi again.”

My heart ached at the thought I might have to leave the country and never see my family again. Yes, I’d had a rough childhood, and sometimes my family could be annoying—okay, they could be especially annoying when it came to the idea of marriage—but they loved me in a way no one else would ever love me. I couldn’t imagine a life where I didn’t drop by at least once a week to share my news, ask for advice, or just drink a cup of chai and listen to them talk about work and family and how our next-door neighbor refused to cut the strip of grass beside our front lawn.

“She set him up,” I tried to explain. “She was trying to hurt him by hurting me. I didn’t believe him at first because part of me had never really believed what we had was real. But I trust him now. Not just because of things he’s done and said to ease my mind, but because I think I finally believe in myself. I’m worth loving.”

“Of course you are, but he’s still a loser.” Dad wasn’t impressed by my epiphany. “He must have hurt her to make her want to hurt him by hurting you. What kind of man hurts a woman so badly she would want to hurt a stranger?”

Mom laughed. “That’s a lot of hurts.”

“It’s the kind of thing Cristian used to do when he worked for me,” Dad said. “Always, the girlfriends coming in to see him when he was supposed to be selling suits, and there he was in the back room kissing a different girl, and then the crying and shouting and drama. Next day they’d be back to throw a drink in his face, or squirt ketchup on his shirt. One of them brought her brother, a big man with thick arms, to beat Cristian up, but he escaped out the back door. I think there was goodness in him, but I wasn’t sad when he decided to leave. When he rear-messaged last week, I didn’t respond in case he was thinking of coming back.” Dad shrugged. “He was good with the ladies. Not so good with the men.”

“Wait.” My heart skipped a beat. “What do you mean he rear-messaged last week?”

“He sent a text message that didn’t make sense,” Dad said. “Your brother said that happens if the phone is in the back pocket.”

“Butt dial?” I burst out laughing. “He butt-dialed you, Dad.”

“Simi, please.” Mom shook her head. “No bad language in front of Nani.”

“Nani could give us all lessons in inappropriate language.” I lifted an eyebrow at Nani, who waved me off with a sniff.

“You said it was last week? Can I see the message?” Cristian had been taken just over two weeks ago. Had they let him go and he forgot to tell us?

Dad pulled out his phone and showed me Cristian’s message: 9114401wmonroewgp. “Maybe he was meaning to call or text you,” he said. “We are both Chopra. He might still have me in his contacts.”

“That does look like a butt dial.” I tried to make sense of the seemingly random letters and numbers. “But the timing is odd. He’s been away somewhere without cell service for the last two and a half weeks.” I forwarded the message to Chloe to post on the server to see if anyone could figure it out. She answered right away and said she would send Gage to check out Cristian’s apartment and studio to ask if he’d been around.

“Let me see the butt dial.” Mom held out her hand and I passed her the phone.

“I might have to go away for a while, too,” I told them, bringing the conversation around to the topic I’d been trying to avoid. “I won’t be able to contact you, so I just wanted to say while I’m here that I love you and I forgive you and—”

“What’s going on?” Nani looked up from her recipe book. “Are you eloping with the loser? You’d better not elope. Your parents have saved money for your wedding and your mother will be devastated if she doesn’t get to be with you for the big day. She’ll cry rivers of tears.”

“I might shed a tear or two,” Mom said. “But if you want to marry him—”

“I’m not getting married.”

“Are you pregnant?” Dad stood so quickly, his chair toppled over. “Are we going to have another grandchild?”

“No, Dad. It’s work related. There’s something I need to sort out and it would be better if I do it from another location.”

“She’s in trouble with the Mafia,” Nani said. “That’s the only reason people skip town. They’ll come after the family and Simi is trying to keep us safe.”

Damn Nani, her sixth sense, and her razor-sharp intellect. “There are other reasons people leave town,” I said evenly. “I could just want a change of scenery. I could have a new job. I could want to make a fresh start. I could be running from debt collectors, bounty hunters, assassins, the police, or one of many other different types of organized crime gangs—Russian, Irish, Mexican drug cartels, triads, outlaw bikers…”

“Look at her eye twitch,” Dad said. “She’s hiding something.”

“It’s the mob.” Nani sighed. “I told you so.”

Dad leaned across the table. “Is it the Angelini brothers? Did you take a loan from them and you owe them money?”

I startled, sitting upright in my chair. “How do you know the Angelini brothers?”

“I’m the top custom tailor in the city,” Dad said. “I dress everybody.” He pulled out his wallet. “How much do you need?”

“Dad.” I covered his hand with mine. “I don’t need your money.”

“We can’t have you going on the run,” Mom said. “You aren’t even married yet. We only have two grandchildren. Look at the size of this yard. We need at least six grandchildren, and I have little hope for the twins.”

“You want me to have four kids?” I fiddled with the edge of the faded red tablecloth that had been a kitchen staple for as long as I could remember. “You’re making me want to run away.”

“I suppose we’ll just have to go with her.” Dad put down his men’s fashion magazine. He liked to stay up-to-date on the current trends the old-school way. “We’ll all go on the run. I’d better pack a bag.”

“In my day, we didn’t run from our problems,” Nani said. “But if that’s all she can come up with, then it would be better to hide her. There are enough people in the family that she could stay with everyone for two or three days and then we would move her. We could circle her through the family for years and no one would ever know. Everyone has a basement or an attic. Even a closet would do.”

I stared at her, aghast. “I’m not spending the rest of my life hiding in closets or attics, and I’m not putting anyone at risk…I mean, I wouldn’t put them at risk if I were running from the mob, which isn’t true.” Yet.

She lifted an eyebrow. “So why the good-bye speech?”

“It was…” I shrugged. “Just in case. I might have to leave suddenly, and I wanted to be prepared.”

“I’ll call the Angelinis and sort this out.” Dad gestured to my mom. “Hand me my phone.”

“Dad…you can’t…please. Don’t get involved.”

“This looks like an address,” Mom said, studying Cristian’s message. “ ‘Wmonroe’ could be West Monroe. Is there a West Monroe Street in the city?” She handed me her phone and I looked up the street name.

“There’s one in West Garfield Park.” I looked over at the string of letters and numbers, 9114401wmonroewgp. “That’s the ‘wgp.’ He was giving an address: 9114401.” I did a map search but couldn’t find anything with that number.

Someone rang the doorbell and Dad left to answer the door.

“I think the address is 4401,” Mom said. “And the 911…”

Emergency services. Cristian had been calling for help.

“Someone is at the door for you,” Dad called out. “Her name is Emma. She says it’s urgent. Something about Jack. Simone knows his boss? She was talking very quickly. Is this the good-bye time?”

“No.” I jumped up from the table. “This is the ‘save the friends’ time. I might not have to leave after all.”