On the other end of our estate, they were probably mopping his son’s blood from the servants’ quarters floors as we spoke.
I pulled the sheets over us. “Did you tell him he was tight, too?”
“Tight as in narrow, not tight as in cool.” She snorted out her laughter and squeezed me to her side. “You’re too innocent for your own good, Liliana.”
And that’s how the world saw me.
Liliana Vitali: innocent, naïve, and official property of the Vitali family.
As soon as Dad resumed his phone call, Dr. Mancini fixed the stirrups to part my legs wider.
Every year, Papà escorted me to the OBGYN.
Every year, Dr. Mancini concluded my annual exam by checking for my virginity.
And every year, he confirmed what we all already knew—I got less action than the fucking Pope.
This was normal when your dad was Paolo Vitali, brother to il condottieri of the Vitali family. One day, my marriage will be arranged to some hot shot mafioso, and I’ll be forced to lose my virginity during a deflowering ceremony in front of mafia bosses from all of Italy’s crime families.
Until then, I had to deal with Dr. Mancini’s prying fingers.
He distributed lube across his fingers and spread my lips open, breathing loud enough to pass for Darth Vader.
Stop being so nice, Lil. Fuck with him.
I could practically hear Carlotta goading me on.
But I wasn’t nice, and she didn’t know me.
Not really.
No one did.
I adjusted a little, so Dr. Mancini’s fingertips brushed against my clit. Just to see how uncomfortable he’d get.
He froze for a split second, swallowed, and grabbed the speculum. “This will be cold.”
I nodded, like the good girl everyone expected me to be. “Okay.”
When he slid the metal inside me, I bit my lip on a barely restrained laugh, made sure Papà couldn’t hear above his own voice, and let out a little fake moan. Dr. Mancini’s eyes shot to my face before darting to the curtain and back.
I blinked back at him. “Did you say something, doctor?”
He cleared his throat and expanded the speculum. “No.” His fingers began their probe. “Your vaginal ring is placed properly. Do you still check its placement and swap it regularly?”
“I forgot how,” I lied. “Can you show me?”
“You squeeze the ring between two fingers and slide your fingers inside yourself until you reach the back.”
“Is that where your fingers are right now?”
“Yes.”
I bit my lip and shifted a bit on the exam bed. “But your fingers are so deep inside me, and I’m so tight.”
He froze. “Excuse me?”
“I said—”
Dr. Mancini snatched his fingers back, scratched at his jaw, and pulled back when the lubricated surface met his skin. “Well, you have to swap your vaginal ring regularly, or we can switch you to another more manageable birth control method.”
Papà’s footsteps drew closer to the curtain divider. “Jacopo.”
Mancini eyed the curtain. “Yes, sir?”
“Take out her birth control.”
“Papà!” I clenched my fists and forced myself to be-fucking-have. “I told you, it’s for my period. It’s not for sex. I’m a virgin. Tell him, Doctor Mancini.”
Mancini returned to his seat and prodded inside me for my hymen. I didn’t bother messing with him, because this was serious. I had this argument with Papà once a year, and it was probably the only thing I ever won.
“Yes.” Mancini pulled out of me, snapped his gloves off, and tossed them into the trash can. “Her hymen is intact.”
I moved the curtain just enough to expose my face. “See, Papà?”
His face spoke of a youth he’d never possessed. I swore, Nonna had given birth to Benjamin Button.
“Lily.”
My name was Liliana, but Papà called me Lily whenever he wanted to patronize me. I hated the nickname. It reminded me of every moment I was forced to comply. To be weak. “Family above all, including happiness,” should have been the Vitali motto.
“Yes, Papà?”
“I just got off the phone with Samuel,” he began.
Samuel Bruno was the head of the Bruno family. Maybe I should have paid attention to his call instead of messing with Dr. Mancini.
I tuned Papà out, dread unfurling in the pit of my stomach. I didn’t need to hear what he said. I’d seen that face once before. Four years ago, when Carlotta’s wedding had been arranged.
That Summer, she hadn’t passed her deflowering ceremony.
By the time Fall came, we’d buried her in an unmarked grave in the darkest corner of the Vitali crypt.
A fate I would rather bear than marry whomever Papà’s brother had selected.
Frankie
“We have a problem.”
Don Amato’s words weren’t especially portentous because of what they meant.
We were le mafie, a criminal family deep in the heart of Sicily. We ate problems for breakfast and made trouble for lunch.
So, none of the made men sitting around the glossy mahogany table in the back of Mama Sofia’s restaurant in the marina even batted an eye at the head of the family.
But he was looking right at me, black eyes fathomless and narrowed as if I was directly correlated with said issue.
Quickly, I thought over my actions the last few weeks and came up blank. Sure, I’d slept with Carlo Moretti’s wife, and Marco Umberto’s sister and girlfriend…at the same time. But I was discreet, and those women risked more than I did by fucking me.
My deceased father’s great uncle continued, his eyes still pinned on me, “The Bruno family plans to marry into the Vitali outfit.” The very same family that had murdered and terrorized mine for decades. Just five years ago, they took my brother from me. “By marrying a Vitali, they would ensure a position of power over us. I do not intend to allow this.”
Pain burst behind my eyes at the thought of my brother, who should have been sitting beside me at the table. Instead, he was buried in the family crypt, alive in memory only for as long as the people who knew him remembered to speak his name.
On the heels of hurt, came the fury.
“Cazzo.” I rubbed at my jaw and leaned forward. “Who are they trying to pawn off?”
“Tommaso Bruno to Liliana Vitali.”
I cursed under my breath.
Tom was my age, relatively good looking, and an arrogant stronzo. We grew up in Gerosa together, two sons of opposing mafia families playing together in the piazza, our knees deep in the dirt of the cliffs along the coastline, shooting finger guns and sling shots.
It was only when we hit puberty that we understood we were enemies, and the finger guns were exchanged for real guns.
We’d matched each other move for move as we climbed the ranks of our respective organizations. There was no way in hell I’d let Tom marry into the Vitali family and become the golden boy of his family.
No way in hell.
My mind whirred, chasing a fast-forming plan. “Is there a virginity pact?”
Don Amato steepled his fingers and stared at me over the peak. “Don’t be slow, Frankie. Of course, there is. The Vitalis are as old fashioned as they come.”