My Don Chose My Best Friend-So I Took His Empire novel · Chapter 19 of 24
Chapter 19: The Church
St. Peter's on Hylan Boulevard was full by ten, and every pew on the groom's side held a Balestra.
I stood in the back vestibule in the black dress I had worn to my father's funeral.
My father's watch was in my pocket.
Lidia's confession was on my phone, and my phone was in my fist.
Beside me, Santino wore a dark suit over his bruises, with the stitched lip and a closed left eye that had gone purple overnight.
"You don't have to do this in front of his mother," he said quietly.
"Yes, I do."
"Then I'm standing next to you."
"Stay by the door. If his men move, I want the captains' men to see you first."
Behind us, a wheelchair squeaked on the marble.
Nino sat in it with his leg in a cast to the hip, wearing his gray overcoat, pushed by a dock man.
"I wasn't going to miss this," he said.
"The doctor said bed rest."
"The doctor can bury me."
I laughed, and my voice cracked, and I took a long breath.
Inside the nave, the organ started.
Lidia came down the aisle in white, on the arm of a Balestra uncle, and her face was gray under her veil.
She had gone back at dawn.
She had walked back to the man who had bruised her wrist, because I had told her to, and because seven of my father's captains sat in the third pew on the bride's side.
She did not look at the pews.
Dario waited at the altar in a black morning coat with a white carnation.
He was smiling at the guests, and his mother sat in the first row, her hands folded.
The priest began.
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