Kiss de La Notte - Book III (Mafia Romance)

Chapter Two: The Devil's Breakfast

I could hardly breathe. I had already put two and two together.

"Imagine my surprise," my father said, "when I find out my daughter held a gun up to the son of Lazzaro La Notte!" He slammed his hand against the table, startling me and Mia. "He is to potentially take over his father's business, and we were to sign an imperative agreement at the end of the night. However, when it came to it, he wouldn't sign. I asked why, of course I did––the meeting had gone so well between us that there was almost no question in my mind our family would finally be safe again. That is when he reluctantly told me of your shameful interaction with him!"

Mia took a large, crunchy bite into her toast, her eyes darting back and forth between dad and me.

"Luckily, he is empathetic toward our situation last year," Papà said at last, but I had a feeling it wasn't time to breathe yet. "We agreed to an arranged marriage between him and you to amend the broken trust you caused. A marriage to strengthen our alliance."

Mia pointed at me and laughed. "Ha-ha!"

I stood up so fast my chair knocked back. "Are you on CRACK?"

My father snapped his newspaper closed. "Stai attento!" Be careful!

I slammed my ass back down. "This has to be some sort of joke! You haven't even heard my side of the story––"

"Did you raise a gun to a La Notte or no?" Papà cut in sharply.

"Yes, I did, but I––"

"How could you be so careless? You know better!"

"Why are jumping to the conclusion that I made a mistake and not him?" I cried, feeling like I was going insane here. "Don't you want to know how the might have warranted that response from me? Don't you care?"

Papà completely didn't listen to me, as his shifted to Mia, who was building her eggs into a mountain with her fingers. "Mia, stop playing with your food Usa forchetta."

I gripped both sides of my head. "I feel like I'm a horror movie."

"Your mother and I had an arranged marriage," Papà said, already back to reading his newspaper. "It is normal in our culture."

"Yeah, and look how that turned out!" I snapped, before I could stop myself.

The look my father gave me made me want to wilt into my seat. I was really playing with fire today. "I'm sorry, Papà. I didn't mean it. Please, just listen to me. Your guests know not to interact with family or come up stairs. Mia told me he walked her upstairs by himself. I found him outside my bedroom, looming in the hallway like a freaking demon. He said he was using the bathroom, but I listened to my gut. I pulled my gun on him to protect myself."

"It is clear to me," Papà began, "you are so detached with your fantasy life at college that you have forgotten our ways. When I raise my gun, it is a last resort. It is with the intention to fire. What you have done has shamed me, and you didn't even come to me afterward to tell me. Your recklessness could have killed our entire family. Do you understand this?"

Feeling like I wasn't getting through to him, I slipped right into desperation to try and appease. "Papà, I recognize that I made a mistake. I'm so sorry. Please, this is a little extreme. This is my whole life we are effecting. Marriage is a big deal. I haven't even been in the room with this guy for five minutes. I don't even know his name!"