I Bought His Love, Then He Became the Don novel · Chapter 54 of 76
Chapter 54: You Promised
"Rita," Augusto said, without looking away from me. "Make the Don some coffee."
Rita went past him down the stairs without a word.
Her brother sat down hard on the bed, with my pins still in his trousers.
"Leave them on," I told him. "I'll take them in on Tuesday."
Augusto laughed.
He held the door for me like a gentleman, and I went down his stairs in front of him, by the stair lift.
The kitchen smelled like basil and burnt coffee.
Rita set two cups on the table and went out to the yard and stood among the coffee cans with her back to the house.
Augusto sat down across from me.
He put two sugars in his cup, the way he had the first Sunday, and stirred.
"So," he said. "You've heard it twice now. Your husband's way and my boy's way."
"I've heard it."
"Then you know I don't lie to you, Donna. I only wait."
He didn't blink.
"My grandson went to collect a debt. Your husband sent him home on a door."
He sipped his coffee.
"Two years I sat at a table with the man who did it," he said, "and said, yes, Don, of course, Don."
"You told him it was closed."
"What else do you tell a Don? A Don can't be touched. Not by the table, not by anybody. You wait."
He set his cup down.
"Then he came to us in April and said, let me go build houses with Joe."
He smiled. It was the same smile he'd given me over the tomatoes.
"And I thought, God is good."
My hands were flat on his tablecloth. I made them stay there.
"The baptism," I said. "I'm taking it back. You won't stand for her."
"Then take it back," Augusto said. "At the font. In front of the table. Go ahead."
He spread his hands.
"You remember the first thing I taught you at this table. Over this coffee."
"Then I'll postpone it."
"Then the table hears that too, and it's the same thing."
He leaned forward.
"And on Monday, Donna, when you're not the Don, what is your husband?"
I didn't answer.
"A civilian," he said gently. "A builder with a stroller. Nobody in that chair to say 'nobody touches him.' Only the Don can say that. You said it yourself, with seven hands in the air."
I understood then.
All of it, all at once, the way you understand a dress that's been cut wrong when you finally turn it inside out.
"The table voted," I said.
The rest of this chapter is part of the paid portion of the series. Chapters 1–32 of I Bought His Love, Then He Became the Don are free to read — start from the beginning, then unlock the rest with coins in the app.
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