My Husband Called Me a Trophy Wife, So I Saved the Mafia Don Instead novel · Chapter 20 of 24

Chapter 20: The Council

Luca's POV

My father's dining table seats twenty-two.

At noon every chair was full.

The capos sat down both sides, in dark suits, with their hands folded.

My uncle sat at the foot with his cane across his knees.

Giulia sat at the head, in my father's chair, in black, with her pearls on.

Franklin sat at her left hand with a leather folder.

He looked at me once, with his lawyer's smile, and I looked back at him until it faded.

I took the empty seat at her right.

Audrey stood behind my chair, in her plain grey dress, with her hands clasped at her waist.

Whitney sat in the corner with a bruise under powder, and she did not look at anyone.

I had taken Audrey's capsule at eleven.

By noon my heart was walking instead of running, and the edges of the room had gone soft.

"Thank you all for coming," Giulia said gently.

She stood.

She spoke for ten minutes about our father and about family and about a house that did not stand if the people inside it did not stand together.

I had heard her give that speech at every Christmas for twenty years.

I had loved it every time.

"My brother has been unwell," she said, and her voice broke. "He has been the strongest of us for a long time. Strong men hide things. They hide the things that are killing them."

"Giulia," I said.

"Yes, my love?"

"I'm not feeling well."

It was true by then.

The table tilted, and the faces went grey.

I put a hand on the edge of the wood and tried to stand, and my knees folded under me.

I heard a chair go over.

I heard Audrey say my name, once, sharp, and then I was on the carpet and her hands were on my chest.

"Luca. Luca!"

The floor was cool against my cheek.

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