"Did she know what she was doing?" Agent Wilks asks.
"No. She's seen me at her father's house a few times. She thinks I'm on the take." Davis claps Wilks on the shoulder and walks away. Agent Wilks stands in the hallway a moment before a large smile paints his face and he walks down the hall after Officer Davis. I wait until they’re both out of sight to follow behind them, praying I won't see either in the waiting room. Aunt Gloria could have stared at me all day with her looks of pity and fear, and I’d much prefer it to Agent Wilks and Officer Davis's proud voices. What I did was make a horrible mistake, but I suppose for them my greatest failure is their greatest luck.
Chapter 4
Alex
The hardest thing to learn in life is which bridge to cross and which to burn.
David Russell
WE FINALLY GET back to the house. Gloria pulls up in the driveway and slams on the breaks to avoid hitting the garage door, she was going so fast. The outside is eerily desolate, which is unusual. We don't always have men guarding the house, but with both my father and brother elsewhere for God-only-knows how long, we should have guards keeping an eye on things. Gloria seems to notice that the lack of bodies around the house have captured my attention.
"I sent them away, miele," she says. I follow out of the car, fumbling, after her. She races up the drive and dives into the side door that welcomes us into the kitchen. I’m a total disaster, not knowing what else to do but follow her. She moves fluidly through the kitchen to the mud room. I wait by the door as I watch her open the cabinet where I keep the laundry detergent. She throws the laundry supplies aside and pulls out a gun. For a moment I let my imagination wander as to where else my father keeps weapons in this house.
Gloria shoves past me and makes her way across the main hall and into the game room. My stomach lurches when I realize she’s headed right for my father's office. We aren't supposed to be in there—nobody is—not without my father. Oh, Gloria is going to get it this time. There’s only so much Carlo Mancuso can put up with from his sister. This woman is insane. Still, I follow her as she bursts into his office. The house is strangely silent. I don't feel safe being here and it’s amplified the farther Gloria gets away from me. She looked around for a moment and then storms back out.
Gloria says nothing as she sets the gun down on the counter and pulls a clean glass out of a cupboard and grabs an open bottle of scotch from the dining room table. She pours herself two fingers, drinks it, and then refills her glass.
"Do you remember what we talked about at the hospital?" she asks, downing the contents of her glass. I haven't forgotten, and I tell her as much as I watch her refill her glass twice more. She lean over the kitchen counter, hands splayed apart as she stares out the window into the backyard. She reminds me so much of my father in this moment—calm, calculating, and aware of everything around her.
"Good," she says. "Now go get some sleep." I want to protest, but I’m too tired. I leave her in the kitchen and go upstairs to my room. I stand before the full-length mirror in my room and notice for the first time that my clothes are covered in dried blood and my eyes are cracked and swollen.
I force myself into the shower and scrub my body as vigorously. It doesn't matter how much soap I use or how hard I scrub, I don't feel clean. I’m not sure I’ll feel clean ever again. Eventually though, I give up and dry myself off. I dig through my drawers until I find what I’ve been looking for.
The old, ratted nightgown I pull out and shimmy into was my mother's. It was the one she wore just before she died. My father thought I was sick and nearly sent me to a hospital because I wore this nightgown for a week straight after she died. I didn't even clean it. I just pulled it on and wrapped myself in her smell. I needed the comfort then just as much as I need it now. Only now her smell has long since faded and been washed away.
I give up on my nap after only a few hours. I’m not sure if it’s the sunlight that keeps me up or the horror that fills my mind when I close my eyes. I can’t stay still, my body thrashing around with the thoughts of the night. The small amount of time that I did sleep, I remembered that Leo Scavo was also shot, and awoke with a twinge of guilt for having forgotten about his injury.
I lie awake for what seems like hours more, at first numb to the terror that fills my heart and mind, then so uncompromisingly aware of it that I can do nothing but scream.