outside the hospital. Maury and the little man hustle Carlo toward the entrance. I trail behind them, largely forgotten until Carlo is on the stretcher being wheeled into emergency surgery. Then the Albino touches my shoulder and gestures at a doctor.
“Check on her right now. She is pregnant. A full check, do you understand?”
“I want to be with Carlo,” I protest. “I want to—”
Maury leans close to me. “I found Ubert half dead on the floor of your apartment. Do you know what he said to me? He said: ‘Keep her safe no matter what.’ That’s not even mentioning what Carlo would do if he discovered I let you join him without making sure you were safe first.”
“Wait, so Ubert’s alive?”
“Yes, but critical. Just like Durante. Just like Nario. We’re all fucking critical in this Family.”
I’m hustled off to a doctor’s room where they re-clean my wound and give me stitches, and then bandage me up. They do a whole bunch of tests to make sure the baby wasn’t harmed. Apart from the wound in the leg, I’m okay. But I’m not sure if I can say the same for Carlo. When I’m finally allowed to leave, he’s still in surgery. Sil and her children come running up to me in the waiting room.
“It’s a good omen,” she says. “Nario is out of the danger zone. Those men were always close, always alike. They were each other’s shadows growing up.”
Shadow. My shadow.
“He will pull through. I know he will.”
Maury leans against the wall and next to him sits Emily, Alda standing close behind her, her hand on her daughter’s shoulder. They’re all deep in conversation but when they see me, Alda comes running over and Emily isn’t far behind. She throws her arms around me, her veil tickling my cheek, as Emily sort of squeezes onto my elbow. They only step back when it looks like I might stumble on the crutches.
“Sit in my lap if you want,” Emily giggles, though she looks sick. She glances at the door that leads to Carlo’s room.
“What’s happening in there?” I must look as panicked as I feel, because Alda puts her hand on my shoulder and leads me to the seats.
“They’re fixing him, dear,” she tells me. “Making him all better.” The baby talk would be patronizing if it wasn’t so reassuring.
We wait, we wait, we wait. I wonder what’s going to be worse: this or labor. Somehow, I think I’ll regret even putting that out there in the universe, but right now I don’t care.
Just let him be okay.
“At least I have an ending to my book now, right?” Emily smiles through her tears. “The barbarian and the lady fight off the bandits together. The barbarian is wounded but recovers. The lady gives birth to a beautiful baby. The End. Right?”
I put my hand on her shoulder. Alda does the same. We make a triangle of support.
Then the Albino is standing beside us. “I am sorry,” he says. “But the police will want to speak with her soon. I have done my best to hold them off, but Carlo is injured. They are vultures. It will not take them long to descend.”
Alda sucks in breath through her teeth, looking every inch a mafiosa queen for a few moments. “That is business you will have to discuss with Hazel.”
He turns to me with an apologetic shrug. “I can’t force you to come with me, but it will help protect our Family, your family.”
I nod and stand. “Just tell me what I have to do.”
The old Hazel never would’ve agreed to lie to the police. The old Hazel never would’ve told them that she doesn’t know why she was abducted, that she was kept blindfolded the whole time, that she had no clue her father and her brother were criminals. But that Hazel saw the world in black and white, and didn’t understand that it takes men like Carlo and Ubert and Durante and Nario and Maury to keep men like my father from taking over this city.
Because both of these police officers are Irish, and one of them gives me a sour look as I answer their questions. He knows I’m lying because he used to play poker with my father. I’m sure I recognize him. But he can’t say it in front of his colleague, who maybe isn’t as corrupt as him.
“We’ll be seeing you,” he says, tipping his hat. “Ma’am.”
I don’t pay them a moment’s more attention as I spin