Bound by Honor novel · Chapter 9 of 24

Chapter 9: The Engagement Party

The engagement party filled the Castellane ballroom in Bay Ridge with a hundred and fifty people and a string quartet.

I wore navy silk and my mother's gold chain.

Dario wore black, with a white flower in his lapel that Nonna had pinned there herself, muttering.

His hand held mine at the small of my back all through the receiving line.

It was warm and steady, and it was the only thing that kept my knees from shaking.

The pages from Silvio's safe lay folded inside the lining of my clutch.

The tow yard sheet lay in Dario's breast pocket, behind the flower.

At nine o'clock, Orazio tapped a glass for the toast.

The room quieted.

He stood on the little dais with his cane and his silver hair.

"My friends," he said. "Tonight I give you my son and the finest girl Chicago ever sent us."

Applause.

My father, near the front, raised his glass and smiled.

He did not look nervous.

That was the thing I noticed most, again, and I could not make it fit.

"Now my nephew Silvio would like to say a few words," Orazio said. "Silvio?"

Silvio walked up with a flute of champagne.

He was in white tie, his hair slicked back, his gold watch flashing under the chandelier.

He took the microphone from his uncle.

"To the happy couple," he said warmly. "And to honesty, which is the foundation of marriage."

Somebody laughed politely.

"I want to tell you something about the bride."

He turned and found me in the crowd and smiled right at me.

"Bianca Roselli walked into this family six days ago."

"She has already questioned our books and humiliated our captains."

"And she wired a large sum of money out of the Red Hook account."

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