Chapter 1
My five-year-old son asked me if he was still part of my family.
That was the moment Christmas dinner ended.
Not when Marguerite shoved three empty plates toward my children.
Not when she laughed while their cousins were served second portions of prime rib.
Not even when I realized Faye, Della, and Beckett had been standing beside the coat rail long enough for everyone at the table to notice.
Dinner ended when Beckett looked at me with tears trapped behind his eyes and asked the one question no child should ever have to ask his father.
“Dad… are we not family?”
I set down my knife.
Slowly.
Marguerite smiled across the table.
She was forty-five years old.
My older cousin.
A woman who had sat at Vescari tables since before I could walk.
And apparently someone who had become very comfortable humiliating my children while I was still in the room.
I stood.
But I didn't look at her.
That confused her.
I looked at everyone else.
Twenty-three adults.
Family.
Capos.
People who had eaten in my house for years.
People whose children had slept under my roof.
“Who here agrees with her?”
Nobody moved at first.
Then one hand rose.
My uncle Peter.
Another.
My cousin Elaine.
Two capos.
Then three relatives from Marguerite's side.
Seven hands.
Damian smiled.
That smile told me more than the hands did.
He thought something had just gone right.
I looked at each raised hand carefully.
Memorized them.
Then Damian understood.
His smile disappeared.
He stood so quickly his chair slammed backward.
“Anthony—”
He came at me.
Bad decision.
I moved aside from his first punch and put him into the silver-platter display hard enough to bring half of it down around him.
Marguerite screamed.
Then she grabbed Beckett.
That was worse.
I removed her hand from my son's arm and sent her backward into the coat rail.
Garment bags collapsed over her.
Boxes opened.
Hangers scattered across the marble.
And every hand that had been raised began lowering.
Too late.
My bodyguards were already behind them.
I looked toward the doors.
“Lock them.”
The doors closed.
Nobody spoke.
Beckett still held the empty plate.
I walked toward him.
Took it from his hands.
Then I took Faye's.
Then Della's.
Three empty plates.
Three children who had been standing ten feet away while adults decided whether they deserved food.
I placed the plates on the center of the dining table.
One beside another.
“Bring them dinner.”
The kitchen staff moved immediately.
Marguerite pushed herself out from beneath the coats.
“You're embarrassing the family.”
I looked at her.
“No.”
My children sat beside me while fresh plates were brought.
Prime rib.
Potatoes.
Vegetables.
Exactly what everyone else had been served.
Beckett didn't start eating.
He kept looking at the adults standing under guard.
“Dad?”
“Yes?”
“Why did they raise their hands?”
The room went silent.
I looked at Marguerite.
Then Damian.
Then the seven people who suddenly found the tablecloth fascinating.
“That,” I said, “is what we're going to find out.”
My uncle Peter finally spoke.
“You're turning dinner into an interrogation.”
I looked at his untouched wine.
“No.”
I glanced at the three empty plates still sitting in the center of the table.
“Someone else turned my children into a question.”
Then Faye, my three-year-old, tugged my sleeve.
“Daddy?”
I bent down.
She whispered loudly enough for the nearest half of the table to hear.
“Aunt Marguerite said we weren't supposed to eat until you chose.”
I stopped.
“Chose what?”
Faye looked confused.
“I don't know.”
Damian closed his eyes.
Marguerite didn't.
She stared at my daughter.
And suddenly I understood something.
May you like
This had never been about dinner.
My children had been waiting for me to make a decision I didn't even know existed.
