Song: perigo - Jade Beraldo

(edited)

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Adelaide

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"Okay, I have my question."

I looked up from the heavenly spaghetti expectantly, waiting for him to pose his question.

"If I kissed you now, would you kiss me back?"

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His question took me off guard.

Kiss him?

I he kissed me, I knew I wouldn't let myself kiss him back, it would almost be like admitting that I wanted him the same way he wanted me and I couldn't let myself fall. 

It would only make it harder for me to leave after all was said and done.

I looked him dead in the eye without a hint of a smile on my face.

"No, I would not."

My voice was cold and detached, something that I didn't particularly like. 

His eyebrows raised in mock surprise as he refilled his wine glass, tipping mine up in the process.

"Why not?" He questioned, bringing his glass up to his lips.

I felt a smile tug at my lips and I turned to my spaghetti to quickly hide it from him. 

No way was I going to answer his question.

"My question," I replied, imitating his earlier response.

I already knew what I was going to ask him. 

I couldn't beat around the bush anymore, I needed to know what he was capable of, I needed to know if we were on the same level of evil.

"What's the worst thing you've done?"

I observed Romano's reaction to the question I posed. 

The wine glass, halfway up to his lips, stopped as he froze to his chair.

The glass was suspended in midair for only a second before he regained his sense, draining the entirety of it's contents before letting out a deep sigh.

"Do you really want me to answer that, poca lattuga?"
(Translation: Little lettuce)

He wasn't smiling anymore. 

I had switched the light switch inside of him and now instead of the easy-going Romano, he was replaced by the serious no nonsense version. 

Did I want to know?

"Yes."

His eyes flit up to mine and I fought with my inner self, managing somehow to return his penetrating gaze.

Without breaking our intense stare-off, he said,

"I killed my parents."

That wasn't what I was expecting, not in the least. 

His gaze never faltered as he continued to stare at my face, registering my reaction to his words.

I composed myself and thought over his words. 

His father would've been the previous don of the mafia, so the hunger for power probably ran through his family.

Did he kill his parents just for the title? Or was there something more to it?

I let my mind wander to my parents, or at least what I remembered. 

I didn't know what I would do if I were left in a room alone with them. 

It had been so long that I'd forgotten their faces, replaced only by hazy feelings. 

If I were alone with them I could hug them, speak to them, I could even kill them.

I smiled at the thought.

"Okay," I said monotonously.

I tipped my wine glass to my lips and gulped down the rest of its contents.

 I reached over for the bottle but soon realized that we had already drained the entirety of it, damn that was fast.

With nothing else to distract myself with, I looked up at Romano. 

For a moment, with his stoic features, he looked similar to Jamie.

"I thought you'd be more surprised."

I scoffed at his statement, did he not know what I did for a living?

"How'd you think I would react?" I pestered him, curious about what he thought about me.

As if I'd switched the light switch for a second time, his face lit up as he grinned and gazed at me through his thick lashes.

"Y'know, call me a monster, throw your drink all over me and fuck my brother, the usual."

I chuckled at his statement.

It was obvious it was meant as a joke due to the humour laced in histone but it was oddly specific.

"Are you speaking from personal experience?"

He smirked.

"Maybe."

I smiled at him. 

I was in no place to call him a monster when I had done much worse things in my shorter lifetime, I couldn't help but think that he should be the one calling me a monster, throwing his drink over me, and then fucking my brother.

That is if I had a brother.

"I guess that makes us both monsters." I joked back at him.

He looked up at me, "you're no monster."

I laughed at his statement before looking at over at him and seeing that he had a bewildered look on his face, almost as if he believed his words.

"I'm serious, stella."

I cleared my throat and shuffled in my seat.

"I killed a guy last night for no reason other than money, if that's not a monstrous act, I don't know what is"

He paused for a second, redirecting his gaze to the starry night sky outside.

"Yes, but I'm the one that ordered the hit, that makes me as guilty as you are, possibly even more so."

I studied his features, illuminated in the candlelight. 

He looked serene in the light, almost as if he were an angel, it was slightly ironic.

"I suppose that makes us equally guilty."

He turned his face to meet my eyes, scrutinizing my face before giving me a curt nod as a response to my statement.

"He worked for my father when he was the don. We were known for human trafficking. Enslaved women, children and men all captured and taken to different corners of the world to be sold like cattle."

He took a stabilizing breath before continuing.

"Fawker handled the transactions in America, making them look legitimate and all that stuff. When I became the father of the mafia, I stopped it all. I redirected our focus on guns and prostitution. And before you ask, prostitution and human trafficking are different. Human trafficking is forced while prostitution is not. All my girls are taken care of, I make sure of it."

He stopped his speech and looked over to me as I was processing everything he just said to me. Human trafficking, huh? 

That's something I was unfortunately familiar with.

I sighed. 

It was one hell of a good reason to murder someone, but to me, nothing can justify taking away a life unless it was in self-defence, and I didn't kill Simon Fawker out of self-defence.

"Murder is only justifiable in self-defence, Romano, there's no point in trying to justify the fact that we killed a man in cold blood."

He furrowed his eyebrows, confused at my response.

"But what he did was wrong, we were taking a terrible person out of the world."

I inwardly sighed. 

An outsider may find it funny that me, an assassin, was trying to teach a mafia don the burden that comes along with first-degree murder.

I looked up to the starry night sky, feeling small. 

Sometimes, they made me feel so small that I felt that the wind would sweep me away, somewhere far, where nobody could hurt me.

"Just because what he did was wrong, doesn't make what we did any less wrong. We still killed a man. If we were to eliminate all the terrible people of the world, objectively, we would have to kill ourselves too."

My voice was small and quiet.

When I met Romano's eyes again, instead of seeing light there, all I saw was a dejected and defeated man, maybe I was too harsh on him.

"You can try to justify it all you want but two wrongs don't make a right, Mano."

He smiled a little at my terrible nickname for him and yet again, the door swung open for the server to collect our empty plates.

Silence engulfed the room as the server set down new dishes in front of us, dark chocolate ice cream.

I couldn't concentrate on the chocolatey goodness in front of me due to the creepy way Mano was staring at me. 

"Your ice cream is going to melt if you keep staring at me like that."

I didn't look at him but I could sense that he was smiling at my comment and that made a warm feeling settle in my stomach.

"I'm sorry carota, it is just that you are four years younger than me and the things you say are much wiser."

I smiled at his comment. 

I was well-read, but that was because I was basically on house arrest my whole life except for when I could leave to kill, but wise?

I didn't think so.

"So you're 28 then?" I asked him, trying to get off of the topic of death.

Of course, I already knew this when I had acquired his case file but it was the only thing I could think of asking him off the top of my head that wasn't about death or destruction.

"Si, carota, does the age gap matter to you?"

I chuckled. He was still under the impression that I wanted to date him even though I told him I wouldn't kiss him back.

I admired his persistence.

"You're basically a granddad, mafia man."

He looked over at me and smirked.

"I wouldn't mind if you called me daddy in bed."

I snorted.

"You wish."

I finished off my ice cream and set the small bowl back down on the table.

"Well, tata, tonight has been lovely. You make for some good conversation."
(Translation: Daddy)

Romano's eyebrows furrowed again at my new nickname for him.

"Tata?" He asked.

"It's your new nickname. Latin."

I stood up to leave, wiping my palms on the front of my dress before running my hand through my hair.

"What does it mean, cavolo?"

I giggled.

"Secret."

Letting out a deep chuckle and interlocked our arms, leading me outside of the beautiful room and through to the hallway.

He guided me up the spiral staircase and only let my arm go once we were directly in front of my door, stopping me before I left.

"I'm sorry carota, I have one last question."

I turned back to him, waiting in anticipation for him to speak.

"How were you so accepting of the fact that I killed my parents? Is there something I'm missing?"

I paused. 

He sounded vulnerable and pleading, maybe that's what made me tell him the truth.

"Because, if I were to meet my parents again, I might do the same thing."

I pulled my arm away from his warm grasp.

"Goodnight tata."

He smiled.

"Goodnight stella."

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