LUCA_Her Ruthless Don Page 12

  A dry joke. Amber’s back, and that almost argument was just a blip.

  One note sung wrong in an otherwise perfect Frank Sinatra song. Amber and I are still a very good year. A very, very good, in fact, incredible as fuck good year.

  That’s what I tell myself as she goes to the bathroom to clean herself up and I take care of the kitchen counter and the stuff I pushed into the sink.

  I consider throwing away the pork chops since they expire today, but put them back in the fridge just so I won’t have to hear any more jokes about how I’m the worst at living on a budget.

  The buzzer, letting us know the food is downstairs, goes off just as I’m closing the fridge. Loud and garish, and nothing like the gentle beeps from the intercom system at my old apartment on the Upper East side.

  “So why was it a weird day,” I ask after we’ve got all the food spread out on the little IKEA table just off the kitchen.

  For some reason, Amber looks startled by the question. But she recovers, and with an irritated huff, she tells me about her latest case. An IEP meeting with a school district that thinks to send in a semi-competent rotation of assistants is enough to meet their requirement to give Amber’s school-age client a free and appropriate public education.

  “It’s going to take a ton of research, and it pisses me off even more than usual, because, I was talking to Peter today, and he was telling me that his judge just sided with the district on a case almost exactly like mine. So basically this IEP team I’m meeting know they can get away with…”

  I’m not sure what she says after that, because the rest of her rant fades at the mention of her brother, Peter. The one working for the judge that loves to hand out life sentences to mafiosos. I’m a new man, with a clean record and no reason to fear the judge’s gavel like I used to.

  And really with the few family options Amber has, I probably shouldn’t blame her for big brother-figuring Peter. Technically, I shouldn’t out-and-out hate that Amber’s still in contact with that asshole. It’s just that he didn’t even show up for her at her own wedding, and he still hasn’t acknowledged to anybody that she’s his sister.

  But now, she’s suddenly consulting with him on cases out of the blue?

  The old obsession claws at me. Telling me to charge that old burner phone and check the app as soon as her back is turned—

  “This is boring, right?” she says, her voice yanking out of my dark thoughts.

  “No, no it isn’t,” I answer. “Sorry, Ambs. Guess, I kind of had a long day, too.”

  “Well, I told you about mine. Why don’t you tell me about yours?”

  I do, but it feels…I don’t know, forced. Like we’re playacting at being a happy couple even though she’s calmed down and we’re eating the food I ordered. I can still feel this distance between us.

  Along with her worry.

  Not only does she box half the food up for lunch the next day, but I wake up alone in the middle of the night to the smell of garlic and meat and the sound of the cast iron pan sizzling.

  Amber’s right. I’m kind of the worst at living on a budget. I still eat lunch out most days, even if there are leftovers in the fridge. Rather than downgrading to work casual khakis and a button up like some of the other young guys in my office, I’m still dropping over five hundy a month for delivery and pickup from Andre’s, the only Manhattan dry cleaner I trust with my bespoke babies. I’m also still taking taxis and Ubers everywhere I go, even though Amber keeps on telling me about this amazing new invention called a subway that would cost me less in a month than what I spend getting ferried around every week.

  But even though Amber’s right about me being clueless when it comes to living below our current means, I recognize what she’s doing. Cooking the pork chops, so we’ll have them to eat tomorrow. Getting up in the middle of the night to do it, because she’s so worried about money.

  I love her. If I had to do it all over again, I’d still choose Amber. Even faster this time, because I never knew what real happiness felt like until this year of wedded bliss. But she’s been beyond stressed since signing that lease, and maybe even worse than that, she doesn’t think I can take care of her. She doesn’t trust me to provide for her. So, she’s cooking pork chops for us to eat tomorrow.

  Pork chops I already know I’m going to have to choke down because, in this middle of the night moment, I’ve never felt like less of man.

  16

  Old Devil Moon

  I don’t check the app, but I do end up in Kevin’s office the next afternoon, asking a lot politer than I feel about the Paralegal position they still haven’t filled.

  “No, we won’t be giving you that position, sorry,” Kevin says on the other side of the glass desk.

  Da fuck…?

  His voice is so brusque, it doesn’t sound like he even considered me for the position for a minute. But I don’t give up. I need this raise, more than I need my pride right now.

  “Kevin, I know you’re worried about this last name I’m lugging around with me, but I guarantee you, I’m done with that life now. And I don’t know who else you’re looking at for this paralegal job, but I guarantee you, no one you hire will work harder than me—I don’t care what kind of experience they have. I’m the person for this job.”

  Kevin tilts his head and readjust in his seat. “But the thing is, you’re not the best fit for the paralegal position, Ferraro.”

  Okay, so even after a year of impeccable work, he’s not going to let my family connections go? I shake my head, refusing to let him pigeonhole me into this bullshit coordinator job corner. That paralegal job is a 20K raise. Something I’ll be able to point to when Ambs decides she just must make clearance pork chops in the middle of the night, instead of me lying there, feeling like a helpless idiot. Then pretending to still be asleep when she crawls back into our bed.

  “Kevin, you’ve got to reconsider—”

  “No, I won’t,” he says, cutting me off with a stern look. “Because I’ve already made up my mind. We’re making the announcement on Monday. Denton’s getting promoted to a General Attorney slot, and you’ll be taking over his position, so sorry we’re going to have to go with someone else for the paralegal job.”

  I blink, because Sean Denton’s an associate attorney, and he worked for another law firm for seven years before he landed that job. As Holt explained when he came back with the offer of a crappy coordinator job after I asked him to help me out, “CalMart is a practical business, not some white-glove law firm, and we aren’t in the habit of hiring unseasoned lawyers, just because they graduated from Columbia.”

  “You’ve passed the bar now, and we like the way you’ve taken charge of a relatively lowly position,” Kevin’s saying as I sit there, stunned. “And though it’s true, you don’t have the years of experience we usually require, quite a few of my colleagues and I have noticed that you’re uniquely talented in a room.”

  Uniquely talented in a room…I think that’s his way of saying, despite the titanium wedding ring on my left hand, I have a way of rendering lady lawyers and a few men, unable to concentrate the few times Kevin’s taken me to negotiation meetings instead of Donna. And yeah, when they didn’t know I was still in my cubicle, working late, I overheard a trio of paralegals calling me “pretty Luca” in the breakroom and gossiping about how they couldn’t believe I had a blind wife. “I mean, does she even know what she’s missing out on? It feels cruel.”

  But I still can’t believe Kevin’s promoting me straight to Associate Attorney.

  Granted, it’s not the first time, I’ve gotten rewarded for my good looks. But this feels outsized. I mean, this isn’t just a 20K raise we’re talking about here. With this promotion, I’ll be adding a whole ‘nother zero to my monthly paycheck and a sixth figure to my annual income. I can only imagine what kind of sarcastic shit Amber will have to say about the white male patriarchy when she finds out about this.

  But I thank Kevin w
ith a wide grin. And for the first time since I started here, I cut out of work at five on the d. o.t, so I can get home to Amber. Just because it doesn’t feel like the sort of news I can tell over the phone. We’ve got to celebrate, I decide as I run up the stairs of our walk up, taking them two at a time.

  “No pork chops tonight, baby,” I call out as I come through the door. “I’m taking you to La Mira—”

  I stop when I see the apartment’s empty. Unlike most days, she hasn’t made it home before me, even though her office is only a few blocks away.

  “CALL ME RIGHT NOW,” I text her in all caps. “Or better yet come home.”

  Ten minutes pass, and no answer.

  So I try calling. No answer. On her cell. Or on her office phone.

  And you know, she could be with a client. Or maybe that IEP meeting she was talking about. She never did say where or when it was. There are a thousand reasons she might not be answering her phone.

  Then I go to my nightstand in our bedroom and pull out that Samsung burner anyway. Connect it to a wall and hit the home button as soon as the power indicator appears.

  My thumb hovers above the icon I haven’t tapped in over a half a year. Hesitating…but only for a few short moments before pressing down and killing my six-month streak.

  It takes a while for the app to update. It starts off with a congratulations from Talia on Amber’s new office. And then there’s a text from Naima about a pro bono cafeteria accessibility case for one of her high school clients, that I know Ambs already handled back in March. I scroll as fast as the struggling to sync app will let me.

  Nothing…

  Nothing…

  Then suddenly a short text to Naima: “Can you meet up? Need to talk.”

  There’s not much more detail than that, but the message is marked three months ago, around the same time I started noticing the shift in Amber’s general attitude. Also, around the time our sex life took a sudden nosedive from one to two times a day to once a week if I was lucky and it wasn’t her time of the month.

  I keep scrolling until I get to one from Amber to Naima, “I had to lie to him, so he wouldn’t get suspicious. I feel so guilty. And awful. Tell me I’m not awful.”

  “You’re not awful,” Naima assured her. “I mean I might be feeling the same kind of way as you about not telling him, especially considering his history. This is why I wanted you to live with him for a while longer before you got married…”

  I have a feeling what they’re talking about now. A bad one.

  Amber technically knows that she’s beautiful. Enough people, including me, have described her face situation in detail. But being homeschooled and blinded before she ever had any kind of social life, I still don’t think she truly gets it.

  But I do.

  Everyone at work thinks I’m the catch, but that’s just because they haven’t met her. I see the way guys look at her when we go out, and that’s before they even know how smart and dedicated she is. I can just imagine one of those bleeding-heart lawyers at Legal Aid hitting on her, luring her in because they have way more in common with her, than her barely legit husband. Or maybe it was one of her clients. Somebody who thinks he can do better by her, take care of her like her loser husband can’t.

  I don’t know. Fuck, I don’t want to know the details. I’m pretty sure something will crack inside my mind as soon as I find out. But I keep scrolling, curious the way you get at a horror movie.

  “Have you made a decision yet?” Naima asked about a month ago.

  “Not yet. I keep on going back and forth with myself because he’s going to freak out when I tell him. This could seriously destroy our relationship.”

  Okay, that’s it. I break off reading. Try to call Amber again. No fucking answer. But this time I leave a message. “Amber, where are you. Call me as soon as you fucking get this.”

  I stab the red phone icon, feeling the fucking opposite of satisfied with my message. Then cursing myself for taking the tracking device out of Amber’s mobility cane, I call Rock.

  “Hey, Luc, what’s wrong,” he says, right off the bat. Because like most people our age, he’s not used to getting actual phone calls unless somebody’s died or some crazy shit like that.

  “You still got that friend at Blade Mobile?”

  “Yeah, Brad. What’s up?”

  “I need him to track a phone for me.”

  “Uh…should we be talking about this on the pho—”

  “Just do it,” I say like I’m still the incoming crime boss with no time to deal with a by-the-books foot soldier, too worried about the Fed’s listening in to take an order.

  “Alright, gimme the number. It’s going to take like thirty.”

  I give him Amber’s number, but add, “Tell Brad I’m coming down there myself if he doesn’t get me her location in fifteen.”

  “But—”

  I hang up before he can start mealy-mouthing about that, too.

  And then there’s nothing left to do but wait…and read, with all the Frank Sinatra heartbreak songs I don’t listen to anymore clanging in my head.

  Nothing from Naima after that, but the day before the pork chop fight in the kitchen there’s a text to Peter. “Hey, can we have a talk tomorrow? Need some advice.”

  Peter agrees but less than twenty hours later sends a new message, “Sorry about the argument, Bella. I’m just worried about you. Ferraro is bad news. I don’t care about how he’s trying to act now. You don’t get raised the way he did and decide you’re just going to live life on the straight and narrow. He’s an animal, and there’s no telling what he’ll do when he finds out about this.”

  Finds out. My heart’s all the way iced over now, and I can feel the freeze spreading to the rest of my body, as I grimly continue to scroll through a bunch of texts with clients. The thing is Peter’s wrong. If Amber’s doing what I suspect. If she’s trying to leave me for another guy, it’ll be easy for anyone who knows me to tell what I’ll do. Kill him. With my bare fucking hands.

  But that murderous thought disappears from my head when I see the next text that appears soon after Peter’s from Naima.

  “Sorry, the talk with Peter went so bad, but don’t worry, girl, you know I’ve got your back. And for what it’s worth, I don’t agree with Peter. I think you’re making the right choice. And I know you didn’t ask, but I did some research and here’s the name of a doctor in Brooklyn who’s handled a couple of blind births. Her site’s not at all accessible (ugh! no surprise), but I called ahead, and she said she’d be happy to talk with you on the phone before you come in. Contact info below. Just let me know, and I’ll make you an appointment and take you myself.”

  I don’t get to the contact info. The words blur. And the Atlantic Ocean suddenly takes up residence between my ears, roaring with the realization….

  Amber’s not cheating on me.

  She’s pregnant.

  She’s pregnant with my baby.

  I don’t know how much time passes with me staring down mutely at my phone, but it suddenly erupts in my hand with a call from Rock.

  “Where is she?” I demand on what feels like the first breath I’ve expelled since finding out Amber’s pregnant.

  I can’t stop thinking about how close I almost came to losing this baby with her. She was so worried about money and how I’d react to the news, and all I did was act like an ass who couldn’t be bothered to wash out a pan. She didn’t know…still doesn’t know the plans I have for us. And that kids were always included, even if she is blind. She could have gotten rid of it, and I would have never known.

  “Luc,” Rock says, and he’s got that same hedging tone he used when he was trying to convince me not to go after Amber in the first place.

  “No, Rock, I need to find her,” I say. “Right fucking now.”

  “Okay…I hate to tell you this—” Rock expels a huge breath of his own, “—but her phone’s saying she’s at St. Joseph’s Hos
pital.”

  17

  Going Out Of My Head

  At St. Joseph’s…

  My heart slices open, ice churning in my gut. Amber’s at the hospital just a few blocks over from our apartment. And she’s been there since four. Over two hours. The whole time I was spying on her messages.

  I tear out of the apartment. And forget a cab, I run the whole ten blocks to St. Joseph’s. Needing to see her. Needing to know she’s alright, even as I assure myself she’s just with a client, as I tear down city blocks in wingtips.

  That’s got to be the reason. But I guess I don’t believe me, because after busting through the ER’s doors, I cut straight to the front of a long line and say to the nurse, “My wife, Amber Reynolds. Is she here? Was she brought in?”

  I’m a sweaty mess, and I guess not quite as distracting as Kevin thinks I’ll be across a negotiating table, because the nurse glances up and says, “Get back in line, sir. We’ll help you when it’s your turn.”

  “No, I can’t wait in line,” I tell her. And even though Amber once threatened to cut off my balls if I ever pulled the disabled wife card behind her back, I say, “My wife is blind. If she’s here, she’ll need me to assist her—”

  I stop, my heart beating erratic with dread because the nurse’s expression changes from stern to sympathetic as soon as she hears the word “blind.”

  “Yes, she was brought in,” she says, without having to consult her computer. “Here, let me get someone out here to talk to you.

  So, no…Amber isn’t here to see a client.

  When a nurse walks me into the room they’ve put her in, my heart shrivels inside my chest. All the blood freezing in my veins.

  The doctor warned me, as did the police officer still hovering outside the room, waiting to ask me a whole lot of questions after “you visit with your wife.” But there’s no warning on Earth that could’ve prepared me for the sight of Amber in that hospital bed.

  I rush to the side of her hospital bed, but then stop short, afraid to touch her. Everything on her face is swollen, her nose, her lips, even the spaces underneath her eyes. The beautiful brown skin I watched her clean and moisturize last night is now a mix of unnatural colors that tells me she took more than one punch to the face. Just like I did. God…