Bound to My Mafia Stepuncle novel · Chapter 10 of 32
Chapter 10: Rain
"Which brother?" I said.
My mother stood up off the arm of the sofa.
She picked up her clipboard and her keys.
"The one who calls everybody sweetheart." She pushed past me to the door. "I have to lock up."
"Mom."
"Lock up, Riley. Go."
She locked the door with me still on the step and walked to her car without looking back.
I sat in my Corolla on that Fishtown street for an hour.
The sky went dark at five.
At six the rain started, hard and cold, drumming on the roof.
I didn't go back to Gladwyne.
I drove to Washington Avenue.
The gym was closed on Sundays.
The light was on upstairs anyway.
I could hear it from the sidewalk, through the rain.
The slap of a fist on a heavy bag, over and over.
The street door was unlocked.
I went up the narrow stairs.
He was alone in the dim gym, in a gray T-shirt soaked dark down the spine, hitting the bag with bare, split hands.
He saw me in the mirror and stopped.
The bag swung back and he caught it without looking.
"You went to see her," he said.
"Yes."
"What did she say?"
"That she took two hundred thousand dollars not to ask who killed my father." I walked out onto the mats in my wet sneakers. "And that I should ask your brother who gave the order."
He didn't move.
That was how I knew.
"Angelo."
"Riley."
"Was it Paulie?"
The rain hammered the tall front windows.
He let go of the bag.
"Eight years ago," he said, "a man died on the Packer Avenue dock. A container came down on him at night. They called it an accident."
Keep reading free with an account. Start Bound to My Mafia Stepuncle from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.
← Chapter 9 · All chapters · Chapter 11 →
Want to keep talking to characters like these? Chat with AI romance characters: AI Boyfriend · AI Girlfriend · Dark Romance · Fantasy Romance · BL (Boys’ Love) · Billionaire Boyfriend · Mafia Boyfriend · Possessive Boyfriend · Hockey Boyfriend · Older Boyfriend · K-Drama Boyfriend · Anime Boyfriend · Vampire Boyfriend · Werewolf Boyfriend · Demon Boyfriend · Fae Romance · GL (Girls’ Love) · Anime Girlfriend · Goth & Alt Girlfriend · Gamer Girlfriend · Tsundere Girlfriend · Fantasy Girlfriend