Chapter 1 (Silence)
Omertà : (as practiced by the mafia) A code of silence about criminal activities, and a refusal to give evidence to the authorities.
Tick. Tick. Click.
Tick. Tick. Click.
Tick. Tick Click.
I stare at the ceiling, surrounded by silence that is only punctuated by the clock above the door, and my thumb cocking the silver pistol in my hand. I'm waiting. It feels like I'm always waiting.
Before he died, my father Carlisle used to say that my patience is what made me so good at what I did. It was my patience that made him choose me to take his place after he was gone. I hadn't taken him seriously. I thought I had years and years before that happened.
But then, my father was shot. The first assassination in our family's long history.
Tick. Tick. Click.
Tick. Tick. Click.
I was in the car with him when it happened. It was a '58 Mercedes-Benz SL Roadster. A beautiful beast of a car. Flashy, only because she was vintage. Carlisle was driving. We hadn't needed security that day. We were headed to the soup kitchen at Saint Mary's to hand out our annual donations. Hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of food and clothing for battered women and their children.
One minute, dad was driving, one hand comfortably on the wheel, the other resting on the door with the wind blowing through his silvering hair. The next, his brains were splattered all over me and the white upholstery. We crashed at 60 miles per hour into a corner store. I'm told that paramedics found me trying to hold my dad's head together. All I remember is the sound of silence.
No good deed goes unpunished, right?
Tick. Tick. Click.
Tick. Tick. Click.
Everyone kept saying it was a miracle. I should've died with my dad that day. But I escaped with a broken ankle. A fucking broken ankle. What a joke. I spun the chamber of my pistol. There was only one bullet within. It gleamed and winked at me.
Tick. Tick. Click.
The door of my room opened quietly. I didn't have to turn around to know who it was or what they wanted.
"Edward? Are you ready?"
I turned to face my mother. Her long, dark hair was tied back into a severe bun for the occasion. She was dressed in black. I nodded and offered her a smile to try to erase that look of concern from her eyes. She only frowned and stepped closer to me. When she put her hand on my arm, I had to look away.
"Your father knew you were ready," she said in a quiet voice. "I believe in you. Your brothers believe in you."
I nodded before pulling away.
In the chapel of old Saint Mary's, every eye in the audience turned to face me as I entered with my mother. My father's casket, austere and elegant as he had been, was resting at the front of the church. The crowd that had gathered was enormous, and there were even more people outside, waiting to catch a glimpse of my father's casket when it exited.
They all wanted a chance to reach out and touch it, as they cried Padre! Padre! Signor!
But for all my father had meant to them, he meant more to me. The difference was that I wasn't allowed to show it. I met my brothers' gazes as I approached the front of the chapel. Jasper nodded at me. Emmett's gaze remained fixed and clear as ever.
I turned to face the people who had gathered to pay respects to the man who had sired me. I cleared my throat.
Tick. Tick. Click.
As if guided by some unseen force, my gaze was drawn to the back of the chapel. A pair of familiar brown eyes gazed back at me. I faltered. The audience mistook my pause for emotion, and they clapped to encourage me. But it was as though time itself had hovered and paused, as if everything around me had slowed down just to prolong this moment. My heart hesitated in my chest.
Then, Isabella looked away, and just as quickly as the spell was cast, it was broken. I recovered.
"A beautiful eulogy," my mother whispered in my ear as she hugged me. I thanked her. Emmett clapped me on the back. And that was the extent of emotion I was allowed.
I looked for Isabella as soon as the funeral service was over. I must have shook hundreds of hands, and been kissed by thousands of grand mothers. Then, finally, I spied her. The stained glass window she was standing underneath cast a rainbow of light around her, glittering off of her skin as though she were covered in thousands of tiny diamonds. Her back was to me, as she spoke animatedly with a tall, brooding man I didn't recognize. Her hair, chestnut woven silk, tumbled down her back, accentuating the slimness of her waist, and the appealing curve of her hips.
My chest tightened. My arms itched to wrap her in them. I started for her, but two hands wrapped around me like a vise.
"Edward! You must be so...so sad!"
I looked down at the blonde who had twined herself around me. Tanya Denali. Her parents Eleazar and Sasha, and her sister Irina approached us, effectively trapping me in.
"Donna Esme," Tanya's father said warmly, kissing my mother's cheek as though they were old friends. "I am sorry for your loss."
My mother nodded kindly. The Denali family was the butter to our bread. The friendship between our families reached back into antiquity. They washed our money, cleaned up our deals, and provided us with the political strength and cover that we needed to keep our businesses in order. It was no secret that Eleazar and Sasha hoped that I would marry Tanya.
I unraveled myself from the blonde only for her to latch onto my arm.
"How are you feeling?" she asked me, blinking up at me with large blue eyes.
"Fine," I answered curtly. I looked around. Our families were already engaged in conversation. There would be no escape. When I looked back to the stained glass window, Isabella was gone. "Tanya, I have to get ready for the reception," I tried. Her face brightened.
"Great! I'll come with you. I'm sure you can use my help," she answered with an affectionate squeeze. I had no choice. After all, some degree of her clinginess could certainly be blamed on me. I took her virginity a few years ago, and had found myself entwined among her sheets when I had been too stupid and too bored to appreciate the gravity of my actions. I had to take some responsibility. And I probably wouldn't have minded it, if it hadn't been for Isabella.
She was everything Tanya wasn't. Smart, sharp, witty. To say that I loved her would be an understatement. But of course, I'd never had her. Isabella's father had made damned good sure of that.
The drive to the reception hall was long, made even longer by Tanya's incessant chatter. I only wanted silence, but even that seemed like too much to ask.
My mother and brothers were already seated when I arrived. To my dismay, Eleazar, Sasha and Irina were also at our table. Of course, the only two seats left open were right next to each other. I met my mother's gaze, and I couldn't read her expression. She had always been oddly silent where the Denalis were concerned.
The reception was a send off fit for a king. Music, dancing, liquor and food flowed like unending rivers. But I couldn't handle it. Every second that passed was like a stab in my gut. I had to breathe. I needed fresh, cold air, and silence. I needed to be alone. I escaped as soon as I could, and found an empty third floor with a balcony that looked over the cliffs onto the city down below. The cold air on my face was exactly what I needed. Cold and silence. I closed my eyes and reached for the pistol with its single bullet that I always kept tucked in the waistband of my pants.
Tick. Tick. Click.
It felt good to be away from the crowd and the noise. I finally had a moment to think. To be consumed with thoughts of revenge. I didn't know who had assassinated my father, but I could think of a couple of people with a plethora of good reason. I spun the chamber of my pistol.
Whoever had orchestrated the hit had to have been someone we trusted. Someone who knew where we would be and when. Someone who knew that we would be unprotected. That narrowed the list down to my father's closest friends. How fucked.
"I know you like to be alone sometimes," a gentle voice said behind me. "I hope I'm not intruding."
I smiled despite myself and turned to face Isabella. Jesus Christ. This woman would be the death of me. She laughed when she saw my expression. It was a gentle, bell-like sound that seemed to lodge itself permanently in my brain and promise that as long as she could laugh, things would be okay.
"Don't look at me like that," she chided, as she approached me, hips swaying gently to the sound of her heels clicking against the floor.
"Look at you like what?" I asked, mesmerized by the way her eyes glittered with mirth. Her lips, thick and full, dared me to duck my head and capture them. I wanted her with my entire being. I had once tried to convince myself that I could get her out of my system by sleeping with her, just one time. But the damned woman had wormed her way past that lie and lodged herself firmly in my heart, without ever letting me lay as much as a finger on her.
"Like you could eat me," she answered with a devilish grin. I chuckled. I had never made my feelings for her a secret. How could I, when she had always been able to read me like an open book?
"It's been a long time," I said, turning back to admire the city lights below.
"Ten years," she answered quietly. We let the silence hang between us for a moment. She was right. Ten years had passed since she had left the city with no way of me to contact her. And yet, it was as if no time had passed at all. "I'm sorry for that, by the way," she said quietly. I met her gaze and raised an eyebrow in question.
"I'm sorry for leaving the way I did," she clarified. "I knew that if I told you, you would have convinced me to stay."
I gave a dry laugh and turned back to the city. She didn't have to apologize. She would always have my forgiveness. She reached out and gave my forearm a gentle squeeze. Something inside of me ached. There was so much to say and so few words I could use, and no time to say it all. So I didn't say anything.
"Edward?" she said after a long moment of quiet. I met her gaze with mine. "I'm back for good, this time. And..." she took a deep breath, and when she looked at me again, I could see steely resolve under the tremor of uncertainty. "And I know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that I'm still in love with you."
A/N: I've wanted to write a mob/mafia story for a long time, and I'm finally doing it because there's no time like the present. I'm still hammering out the little details, but I hope this story pleases you as much as it pleases me to write it.