Chapter 3
That night was supposed to end with a toast.
I had known about the toast.
Not its purpose.
The donors would leave first. The capos and immediate family would remain inside the aquarium hall. Diane had asked to say a few words about “continuity.”
I assumed she meant the conservation foundation.
Apparently she meant blood.
Raymond Voss, one of my oldest capos, confirmed it.
“Diane told us Julian would make an announcement.”
Julian looked at him.
“I was announcing the baby’s name.”
Raymond frowned.
“No.”
The room tightened.
“She said you were accepting more responsibility.”
I looked at my son.
He looked as confused as I felt.
“What responsibility?”
Raymond hesitated.
“Acting underboss.”
There.
Julian turned toward Diane.
“You told them that?”
My sister did not blink.
“Someone has to think ahead.”
“I never agreed.”
“You would have.”
That sentence told me everything about how Diane viewed the family.
Consent was something people eventually supplied after she arranged enough circumstances around them.
I sat down.
The coral-display pieces still littered the carpet.
No one bothered cleaning yet.
Good.
Let the room look like the truth felt.
“Why would Vanessa’s pregnancy help Julian become underboss?”
Diane finally answered directly.
“Because stability matters.”
I laughed once.
“An imaginary fetus creates stability?”
“A son would.”
“No.”
I leaned forward.
“The promise of a son gave you a story.”
Julian as father of the next male Lombardi.
Julian as continuity.
Julian as the obvious man to stand beneath me and eventually after me.
Avice, meanwhile, became inconvenient.
A granddaughter.
A girl.
A child already occupying emotional space Diane wanted reserved for the unborn boy.
No wonder she had called her begging.
No wonder Vanessa told her she would lose her chair.
They were not preparing Avice for a sibling.
They were preparing her for demotion.
Then Ethan spoke from the floor.
“You’re making this sound worse than it was.”
I turned.
He immediately regretted it.
“What was it?”
“A family strategy.”
I stared at him.
“You attacked a sixty-one-year-old man because a toddler found foam under your sister’s dress.”
Raymond coughed to hide a laugh.
Ethan’s face hardened.
I continued.
“If that is strategy, your family has low standards.”
Vanessa whispered:
“Ethan only helped because Diane promised—”
He snapped:
“Shut up.”
There.
Another promise.
Different person.
I looked at him.
May you like
“What did my sister offer you?”
His silence told me the fake pregnancy had purchased more than Julian’s future.
