etta

gged me into the main l

d against his chest, her posture a study in delicate sorrow. Her eyes were red. She was cr

er voice a fragile whisper that threatened to break with a guilt she did not feel. She whispered that Bianca

distant safehouse across the frost-covered grounds. He was waiting for my mother to storm in a

. The muscles in his neck strained against the starched linen of his collar

to the safehouse. He wanted to freeze my mot

umb as I opened my wooden drawer and dug out my mother's copy of the mafia marriage certificate. I tore the he

Gabriel could not erase her. He could rage and scream and tear the house apart, but he could not