Their Father Called Me Family, So His Four Sons Made Me Theirs novel · Chapter 1 of 24
Chapter 1: The Roof
At the Sunday table, Aldo announces Gemma's Christmas wedding to the Chicago partner's son and lists everything he has given her. She refuses, claims his four sons in front of the guests and kisses Nico first in the drive.
Aldo tapped his wineglass with his gold ring, and the dining room went quiet.
Forty people sat at his long table, and every one of them turned to look at me.
"Family," Aldo said, smiling. "I have news about our Gemma."
He said it warmly, certain of every word.
"She is getting married. At Christmas."
Nobody had asked me.
I was not even seeing anyone.
My fork stopped halfway to my mouth.
"To a sound man from a good family," Aldo went on. "Our friends from Chicago came all this way to hear me say it."
At the far end of the table, a gray man in a gray suit lifted his glass to me.
Beside him sat a soft-faced man a few years older than me, who studied his plate.
"Seven years ago, I promised my oldest friend I would look after his girl," Aldo said.
"I gave her a roof. I paid for her school. I kept her car on the road."
"Now she gives something back to this family. That is all family is."
The guests clapped politely.
I had put three hundred dollars in an envelope on the first Sunday of every month since I turned twenty-one.
Aldo took it from me with both hands, every time, and called me a good girl.
I had thought that made us nearly even.
I had never once asked what the roof really cost.
Down the table sat the four men I had grown up around, and none of them had moved.
Marco, the eldest, sat at his father's right hand with his reading glasses folded in his pocket and his jaw gone hard.
Dario had a glass halfway to his mouth and no smile at all, which I had never seen on him.
Luca's hand had closed around his water glass at the word roof, and it was still closed.
Nico was looking at his plate.
They had taught me to drive, to shoot pool, to throw a punch and to keep a secret.
Not one of them had ever called me sister.
Not one of them had ever touched me, either, and I had wanted every one of them for years.
Last New Year's Eve I had stood at the pool house door and waited for any of them to stay.
All four had found somewhere else to be.
I put my fork down.
"Aldo," I said. "Nobody asked me."
"Cara, it's a gift."
"I'm not marrying a stranger."
The man from Chicago raised his eyebrows at his host.
Aldo's smile stayed exactly where it was.
"After everything I have done for you, Gemma," he said gently, "I think you can sit and say thank you."
I had said thank you every Sunday for seven years.
I stood up.
The whole table watched me do it.
"If you want me married into this family," I said, "you have four sons right here. I'll take them."
Nobody breathed.
Then Marco laid his napkin on the cloth and folded it once, slowly, with his eyes on me.
Dario began to laugh, low and delighted, behind his hand.
Luca stood, walked around the table, and pulled out my chair.
He did not sit me in it.
He just held it there, so that everyone could see he had done it.
"Gem," Nico said, very quietly, and his voice cracked on it. "You're sure?"
"I'm sure."
I reached across and took Marco's glass of red wine.
I drank it to the bottom in front of the Chicago partner and his son.
I set the empty glass back in front of Marco.
"Walk me out," I said.
Aldo spoke behind me, still gentle. "Gemma. Sit down."
I did not.
The August heat hit me the moment I stepped through the front door.
It was still a hundred and four at eight in the evening, the gravel in the long drive ticking as it cooled.
Four sets of footsteps came out after me, and none of them hurried.
"That," Dario said, "is the single best thing I have ever seen at that table."
"Dario," Marco said.
"I'm just saying, he's going to need a minute."
Marco did not answer him.
He stood on the step with his hands at his sides, looking at me, and he did not blink.
"Gemma," he said, very low. "Say it again, out here."
I turned around in the drive.
Above us, the dining-room window glowed gold, and Aldo's tall shape stood behind the glass, watching.
I looked at Nico, who had come down the steps last and stopped an arm's length away, his glasses catching the porch light.
"You asked if I was sure," I said.
He nodded.
His whole face had gone red, up to his curls.
I took his face in both hands, felt him go still, and kissed him.
His mouth was warm and tasted of lemon water, and for one second he did nothing at all.
Then his hands came up and gripped my waist, hard, and a sound came out of his chest that I felt in my knees.
When I let him go, he was breathing hard.
I turned my head toward the window, and I looked up at the man who had raised me, and I did not look away.
Then I looked at the three men on the steps.
"Who's next?" I said.
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