Kissing The Moon Goodbye - A Midnight Mafia Novel

Fifty One

Kate

"Where are we going?" I asked again, to which he neglected to answer again.

"Talk." He urged and all of the rants and raving speeches I had prepared failed me in the small vicinity of this car. "Katherine?" He glanced in my direction.

I let out a sigh and looked out the window. "Just, try to consider it. Charlie should have one of our last names."

"Have you considered giving her mine?"

"No." I admitted. "Not ever." The thought hadn't crossed my mind since pregnancy in which the answer was hell fὑcking no. It was too dangerous, we wanted her as far removed from the mafia as possible, she wasn't a Genovese, she wasn't like the rest of them.

"Perhaps you should. There is no danger Katherine. It's not even an uncommon name. Besides, everyone who could know she exists, does know. She is safe."

"But she's not." I argued. "You have some honor, but that doesn't mean your enemies do! I've been used against you, in the past Aria has been used against you, your own father tortured your brother. There is no honor in the game. If you are still relevant then we are still in danger Alessio."

It was a topic that flooded my mind often. Occasionally, especially after Nigel had been living with us for some time, I would lull into a false sense of security. My guard would drop and I would start to get cozy with thoughts of a normal every day life and then suddenly a stray branch knocking on our window at night, or an intense news story, unmarked mail, little things would set me back off. We couldn't afford to be comfortable and naïve, we would always be at risk.

I had screamed, and yelled, and cried until I was blue in the face about this early into the pregnancy, but what could we do. My options were to have Charlie, or not. Alessio refused an adoption plan, he refused to step back from our lives, I knew if I did run I would never get far, not if I was holding something so precious to him as his daughter. My options were to have Charlie, knowing this is who Alessio was, knowing the risks, or abort her all together. I had chosen life and I would never in a million years wish I had chosen differently, but I had chosen knowing what Alessio was and what that would mean for our life. I had given up the fight under the promise that despite his involvement, little as he claimed it may be, Charlie wouldn't be exposed to it.

She wasn't supposed to talk about rats, and popping people, cement shoes or fishes. She was supposed to celebrate her fourth birthday as an innocent little girl with the world at her finger tips. I knew someday, someday this would be an issue we would have to broach again. But now? When she wasn't even yet four years old?

"Charlotte will never be in danger so long as I am alive."

"And what about when you're not?" I asked and turned back to him. "You won't quit, I've told you to, asked you to, begged you to, obviously you are never going to be out. I know that, and I won't ask you to be anything other than who you are again Alessio, but what about when you're gone? It's dangerous."

"I am as removed as I can be Katherine."

"You're still running the show."

"I assist when necessary."

"Silent partner." I muttered. "You know, regardless of that it is still dangerous. You've been shot, shot at, held captive, Pietro lost a freaking hand, and that's only in the time I've known you! What happens when you die? What about her safety then?"