I Bought His Love, Then He Became the Don novel · Chapter 21 of 76
Chapter 21: The Night You Left
Pasquale fell asleep with my hand still in his.
I sat there until the nurse came to check his drains and shooed me out.
Damiano was alone in the waiting room.
Dad had gone home with the cousins. The TV was off.
Damiano was in the chair under the TV with his coat over his knees.
He looked up when I came in.
"He's asleep," I said.
"Did he talk your ear off?"
"Nonno told me to ask you something," I said.
"I'll bet he did."
"Where did you go the night I left?"
Damiano was quiet for a long time.
Then he stood up and put on his coat.
"Not here," he said.
We went down to the parking garage.
His car was on the third level, under a buzzing light. He didn't start it.
He sat with both hands on the wheel and looked straight ahead at a concrete wall.
"Your father told me you never loved me," he said. "I told him he was wrong. He told me to go home and forget your name."
"I know."
"I walked away from your house at two-thirty in the morning in my graduation suit. I didn't go home."
He was still looking at the wall.
"I took a cab to Rush Street. To Vito's club."
My stomach dropped.
"I walked in the front door. I was twenty-two. I had my diploma under my arm in a cardboard tube."
He almost smiled.
"I asked to see Mr. Lazzaro. They laughed at me. I asked again. I asked until someone took me upstairs to get rid of me."
"What did you say to him?"
"I said, 'Joe Morelli owes you money. I'll work it off. All of it. Leave the Morellis alone.'"
I put my hand over my mouth.
"He laughed so hard he had to sit down," Damiano said. "Then he asked what I could do. I said I could read a building and I could read a balance sheet."
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