Chapter 14: The Altar

"No," I said. "I came for my bakery."

Luca looked at the apron.

He looked at the book on the bench.

"Good," he said quietly.

His mother turned on him.

"Gianluca. Tell her to get out of my building."

He didn't answer her.

He looked at Elettra, who had honey in her hair and a spatula in her hand.

"Whatever she decides," he said to Elettra. "I meant it."

Then he went back out the door without his jacket, and I saw it lying on the floor where it had slid off his arm.

Nobody picked it up.

On Saturday the church in Bay Ridge was full to the doors.

Three hundred people.

The same captains. The same wives. The same old men who kissed cheeks.

I walked up the center aisle in a navy dress with Dora on my arm, and the whispering ran ahead of us.

An usher in a grey suit met us at the front.

"Miss Tierney," he said. "The bride has you here."

He pointed at the first pew on the groom's side.

The family pew.

The place where the mother of the groom sits.

Annunziata was already in it, in dove grey and pearls, with a gold cross on her chest.

She saw me coming.

Her hand closed on her prayer book.

"No," she said, out loud, to the usher. "That pew is for family."

"The bride's instructions, signora."

Dora sat down first, right next to her mother.

"Hi, Ma," she said. "I'm family."

Then I sat down beside Dora.

Annunziata stared straight ahead at the altar with two spots of red on her cheeks.

Behind us, three hundred people watched the baker's girl take a seat at the front of the Corvino church.

Nobody had to tell me to find another one.

The organ started.

Luca came out from the side door with the priest and stood at the altar in a black suit.

He looked at the doors at the back.

Then he looked down at the front pew.

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