Sal Gabrini: Don't Go Breaking My Heart by Mallory Monroe

Author:Mallory Monroe [Monroe, Mallory]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Austin Brook Publishing
Published: 2024-06-29T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Sal sat at his patio table around his pool holding his baby daughter in his arms. Marie sat at the table with him while Lucky, under punishment from Sal, cleaned the pool. They could hardly talk for Lucky’s constant interruptions.

“Daddy? Daddy?”

“What boy?”

“Do I have to get the grass out too?”

“No. Clean the pool, but leave the grass in. Yes, you get the grass out! Your ass getting it all out or I’ll sic those wall monsters on you.”

Teresa, who was sucking her bottle and half asleep, woke up enough to grin at her father when she heard his joke.

“You see that?” Sal said happily to Marie. “She’s gonna be a genius just like Carmine. Mark my words. She’s gonna give Carmine a run for his money. With his weird ass.”

“Are you saying she’s going to be weird like Carmine too, Daddy?” Marie asked him.

“No way. Reno’s got that kid all twisted up. Crocheting and all that bullshit. But my baby,” Sal said, smiling at Teresa, “won’t be like that. Smart like that, but that’s it.”

Marie stared at Sal. He really was a great father and husband too. He was gone a lot on business like all of the Gabrini and Sinatra men, but in Marie’s eyes he was always there for them too. He wasn’t a harsh and absent father like Uncle Mick. Or an overly protective father like Uncle Tommy. Or a hardcore father like Uncle Reno. He was caring and concerned. He was hard on all of them, she knew that. But sweet too. That was why she was still stunned. That was why she just couldn’t wrap her head around the real possibility that her stepfather who became her adopted father could do such a horrible thing to his wife and marriage and family. She was kind of devastated.

Sal didn’t notice her devastation, but he noticed her silence. She was usually a talk box. He looked at his oldest child, who was so beautiful that sometimes he worried about her the way he used to worry about his big brother Tommy and all that beauty he was saddled with. “Why are you so quiet over there?” he asked her.

Marie hunched her shoulder. “Just tired I guess,” she said, and then she looked at him.

But it was a strange look to Sal. “What are you looking at me like that for?”

“Like what?”

“Like you wanna kick my ass.”

Marie didn’t realize there was an anger element to her stare. “Like I said, I’m just tired.”

Then, as if to save the day, Gemma came home.

Marie was so relieved when her mother walked out onto that patio from inside their house that she immediately stood up and took Teresa out of Sal’s arms. “Lucky, come on!” she yelled out to her brother. “I’ll take the kids for ice cream,” she added.

“No hell you aren’t,” said Sal. “Not Lucci. He’s got work to do.”

But Gemma stepped in. “Take ‘em both,” she said so forthrightly that Sal looked at her. She never went against his order: not when it came to their children.

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