Bloody Hands

Vienna

I feel his hand on the small of my back.

“Keep your head high. And don’t lose the smile.”

I resist the urge to punch my new husband in the groin. “Don’t tell me what to do,” I whisper “I know how to keep up with appearance.”

He shoots me a look but remains silent as we glide through the doors of the ballroom.

The governor of Newark decided to throw a party for his daughter’s engagement and invited the Rossellinis so this makes it the first public outing I am making as a Rossellini.

The thought makes me want to puke all over Marco’s expensive shiny tux.

The only reason I agreed to come is because I’m hoping that the governor also invited the Mahonnas and Contis to the ball and I can finally get some heavily-needed answers.

Marco withdraws his hand to shake a minister who pulls him into a spontaneous conversation and I use the opportunity to scan the large hall for any sign of my parents.

I see them almost immediately, seated in the middle of an expensive looking table with the Governor to one side and an Alderman on the other. Their table is filled with the Mahonnas and the Contis, conversing in hushed tones with a slight dangerous air in place.

My heart yearns to go to my parents and hug them and I might have done just that if a hand didn’t clasp around my arm, pulling me back when from my position to flee.

“Don’t think about,” Marco growls in my ear, leading me to a round table opposite the Mahonnas surrounded by dangerous looking tattooed men.

He pulls out a chair for me and I plop on it as graceful as a girl with a laden heart can manage hoping not to cause a scene.

He smirks at my sullen face and then goes on to totally ignore me.

As the evening wears on I feel invisible to the thousand conversations going around me. The hall is a bubble of activity and energy but for some reason no one talks to me. I receive a lot of stares occasionally as expected but I am a Mahonnas sitting beside a Rossellini, a sight unseen in forever and you’ll expect my marriage to be the talk of the century.

Judging from the stares, it is the talk of the century, but no one feels pressured to mention it to my face at that particular moment and I know it is either they are acting like I don’t exist or they are too afraid of Marco to attempt a conversation with his wife.

I have a feeling it is both and more of the latter.

I’m not at all fazed because honestly, I don’t give two shits about some dumb looking mafia men. I grew up in boarding schools and a private university so it’s not like I have any friends in the mafia society anyway.

But realizing the Mahonnas also avoiding me totally hits more differently than the res of the crowd. All through the period, my father refuses to so much as let his gaze land on the table with the Rosselinis and my mother, meek and submissive, is following in his lead.

Even my cousins and uncles are choosing to ignore my presence across the room and even though I can't fault them because no one can go against Danielo Mahonnas and come out of it unscathed, I still feel the piercing in my heart.

For the umpteenth time since I got . . . abducted, I wish Alberto was here. Surely, my brother would never ignore me. In fact, if Andre was here, he would have put a stop to this nonsense at once. All these would have been non-existent. He’ll kill before he let me get taken by a Rossellini.

The Contis are beside the Mahonnas and as I observe them, they look unnaturally cheerful for a family whose son is in the hands of a Rossellini.

Speaking of people ignoring me, my dear husband is doing exactly that, but for different reasons altogether.

His eyes are fixed on the blond woman I’ve come across in his mansion a few times, and outside that stare, I find myself shrinking into plain nothingness.

I don’t know why she is present, I’ve never seen her in these circles before and she is too blond to be Italian.

I don’t know why I give a fuck about that.

All of a sudden, someone speaks to me from across the table, “I thought you’ll be dead by now.”

I drag my gaze from the Mahonnas table to the man who spoke to me. He looks to be in his late thirties and although he is in a black tailored suit I can still see the tattoos snaking up his neck.

He winks at me, “No Rossellini has ever been able to stop himself from attacking a Mahonnas.

I take a sip of my wine. It is the only thing I’ve been able to down since the evening started. “I guess I’m an exception,” I shoot back.

His eyes trail along my body, the deep neckline of my dress, the bareness of my shoulders, the swell of my breasts.

He runs a thick tongue across his lower lips, “It’s easy to see how you can be an exception, il mio tesoro.”

I stiffen.

And so does the whole table.

All eyes shoot to Marco as I feel him tense beside me.

“Una parola d ate e servivò il tuo sangue come vino”

One word from you and I’ll serve your blood as wine.

That was the only words that Marco produced and the man goes as still as ice.

He spares one cold glance at me before going back to his food and conversation and I sink back to being invisible.

After a while, Marco shoots up without warning leaving me behind as he makes for the open dance floor.

I feel my face flush a bright red as I see him take what I can only describe as his blond mistress to the dance floor, twirling her around as his eyes bores into hers.

I don’t care if he danced with a monkey, but sitting here alone instead of dancing with my ‘husband’ causes more eyes than usual to turn to my direction.

Marco looks my way, catches my eyes and winks, before going back to his partner.

I scowl and take a sip of my wine trying to calm my nerves. He is doing it on purpose, putting me on the spot in a wave of embarrassment while he twirled the woman around the dance floor. She is in an exotic white dress that shows off her luscious body in different angles and she is using the stared she is receiving to her advantage, twisting and twirling her body sensually.

I roll my eyes, trying hard not to look down at my own plain black dress that hangs on my body because I’ve been refusing meals in the Rossellini mansion and starving myself to death.

But as the dance floor crowds with more people, it gives me the opportunity I’ve been looking for all night.

I drop my napkin on the table and slide out of my seat to the twirling bodies on the floor, being careful not to stumble against a particularly vigor dancer. As I walk, my eyes come into contact with the man I am looking for and I tap my mother on her shoulders, forcing her to give way for me to dance with my father.

I know Marco asked me not to contact my family but the idiot is in the arms of another woman, tarnishing my reputation in the process so why should I treat him any better?

My father scowls down at me when he sees me but his pride and wish to save face stops him from pushing me away even though the look on his face shows clearly that he wants to do just that.

“Why are you here?” he asks.

“Father,” I cut my self short as he twirls me around, “what’s happening?”

“What do you mean?”

I bite my lips, choosing my words carefully. My father is an impatient man and even though he is likely not to, there is a high chance that he’ll leave me standing there in the middle of the dance floor if I so much as ask the wrong question “You never came to see me.”

His eyes refuse to meet mine when he says, “Why should I?” he spits, “You are a Rossellini now. The Mahonnas never mix with a Rossellini.”

He spits the name with so much venom that I suck in my breath unintentionally. “You made me marry him. I never wanted to.”

His eyes are stone-cold. Silent.

“Father! I would never have done it if you didn’t ask me to.”

“Vienna, at the end of the day you are now a Rossellini and —”

“I love Raphael,” I hiss, tears bristling in my eyes, “you made me do this. You pushed me away to the Rossellinis.”

“You don’t know what—”

“You could have fought for me father. You could have stopped the invasion. But you just sat there… he made some kind of deal with you didn’t he? You sold me out on a deal.”

My father glares at me, “Who put these thoughts into your head?”

“Marco said—”

“You’re listening to Marco now? I always knew your mother fucked you up with her stupid pampering,” his eyes are still avoiding mine, looking anywhere but directly at me.

Did he feel guilty for letting me go? Pained? Angry?

Whatever emotions he is going through, I must use it to my advantage.

“I need you to come get me, Father,” I plead, my eyes darting around in search for Marco. I don’t see him anywhere and I figure he is somewhere stripping the dress off his mistress.

“Marco, he hates me. He is going to . . . ”

I think of the gun he threatened me with. He hasn’t hurt me yet, but something tells me that there isn’t much holding him back.

My father shakes me off, “You are a Rossellini now, don’t run from it.”

“Father, please. You must come get me!”

My father closes his eyes and says his next words like an automated robot. “You are a Rossellini and as the head of the Mahonnas and The Vices I can't be seen with you.”

I suck in a sharp breath. “Are—are you choosing The Vices over me? Your own child?”

Silence. He can't even bring himself to look at me.

Pain pierces at my chest, but I push on.

“The Contis must also be enraged for Raphael. Together you can—”

My father spins me around, forcing me to stare at where the Contis are seated. Raphael’s father has his head thrown back in laughter as he listens to something the Governor is saying.

“Look, Vienna, do they look like they are grieving?” my father asks from behind me.

I turn to face him. “I – I don’t understa—”

“Everybody has moved on, mi chica,” he says, “you’ve got to move on too.”

I swallow. How can he say that to me? How can he doom me to a future which he pushed me into? How can he lay my life for me and expect me to walk in the thorns he created?

He steps back, his eyes hardening. “A Mahonnas never mixes with a Rossellini.”

The words break my heart, shattering it into a tiny million pieces. To him, I am no longer a Mahonnas. To him I belong to the family he has loathed his whole life.

Doomed and damned to be a Rossellini.

To my father, I am damaged goods.

Just then, I catch sight of Marco walking up to me, his gaze hard, his lips snarling and his hand –

Oh my fucking God!

His hands are covered in blood. Thick, dark red blood and he is making no attempt to clean it off as he walks through the gaping crowd.

He smirks as my face goes pale white as a ghost and he wraps his bloody fingers around my upper arm.

When he speaks to me, his gaze is locked on my father’s, his eyes taunting as he says, “Time to go, mi chica.”