My Father Traded Me for the Don's Sister, So I Married the Don novel · Chapter 29 of 32
Chapter 29: The Box
Luca brought the boat in himself, faster than the harbor patrol would have liked.
Nobody argued with him.
A driver had the car waiting at the pier, and he ran every light between the water and Amboy Road, with Silvio beside him saying his rosary under his breath.
I sat in the back with Gemma's hand locked in mine and watched Staten Island come up in the windows.
"Stay in the car," I told Luca, when we turned onto the block.
"Raffaela."
"I mean it. I'll call you if I need you."
His jaw tightened.
"I'll be at the curb," he said, and his voice cost him. "I'll be at the curb."
My father stood at the foot of the iron stairs beside the hardware store.
He wore a plain brown coat, not a suit.
He had shaved, badly, and he held a cardboard box against his stomach, tied with kitchen string.
The man from the hardware store stood in the shop door with his arms folded and a wrench in his fist.
I had never been so fond of anyone in my life.
Gemma got out first.
She did not run.
She walked up to my father and stopped a step in front of him, and I saw her small straight back in the blue coat.
"Papa Aurelio," she said.
"Gemma."
"You should not be here," Gemma said.
"I won't stay."
"You won't," Gemma said.
"Let me speak to my daughter."
"Not yet," Gemma said.
I came up beside her.
My father looked at me, and his eyes were red.
He was sober.
I could see it in his hands, which were steady, and in the smell of him, which was soap and old wool and nothing else.
"Raffi," he said.
"Papa."
"I brought you something."
He held out the box.
I did not take it.
"Your mother's cards," he said. "From the kitchen. The recipes. She'd have wanted you to." He cleared his throat. "And the picture. The one from the church steps. I thought. You should have it."
The rest of this chapter is part of the paid portion of the series. Chapters 1–8 of My Father Traded Me for the Don's Sister, So I Married the Don are free to read — start from the beginning, then unlock the rest with coins in the app.
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