Mafia Queen

Chapter Fifty Four

Luca

I sighed, shoving the box of memories to the edge of my desk. I had been completely consumed with this all morning, I didn't even know how long I had been holed up in my office. It was never good for me to look at this stuff, and I'm not even sure why I kept it. All it did was dredge up old, bad memories about my father, and put me in a pissed off mood.

It was even worse now that I knew what Niko had done. It didn't have to end the way it did. My father might have had more time, he could've come around and we might've fixed things. Now, I would never know, and it wasn't even like I could go after Niko.

I wanted to make him pay with every last breath, to see the blood vessels pop in his eyes as I choked him out. I wanted to do unimaginable things to make sure he knew just how much he hurt me, but I couldn't. He was dead. And now, I was left to sort through all of this without any kind of outlet.

"Are you alive in here?" Angelo ducked his head around the door.

"Yeah." I grunted. "How long have you been here?"

"About forty-five minutes. Julia said you were working on something." He walked into the room, stopping at the corner of my desk. His eyes fell to the giant box on the end of it and he reached inside, picking up a picture of me and my dad. "This is what you're working on?"

I leaned back in my chair, stretching my arms over my head. "Just reminiscing."

"Why do you do this to yourself?" He said, plopping down in the seat in front of me.

I shrugged, laughing it off. "Maybe I'm a sadist. I need to feel the pain."

Angelo rolled his eyes. "He's been dead eleven years, Luca. We've been through this a hundred times. No good can come from going through all of this shit."

I let out a heavy sigh, realizing Angelo wasn't going to let me off the hook. I wasn't in the mood to get into any of this with him. "It's just been on my mind since I found out what Niko did."

"Luca, what Niko did makes no difference. Your dad had cancer, and he was dying anyway." Angelo said flatly.

"Yeah, but he didn't have to die as soon as he did. We could've had more time..."

"Time to what?" Angelo let out a sharp laugh. "The last time you saw the guy, he told you he never wanted you. All the time in the world wouldn't have changed that man. He was a stone cold, heartless bastard."

I grimaced. "He wasn't all bad."

"Really?" Angelo arched an eyebrow at me. "What's one good memory you have of him?"

"He brought home a puppy once." I offered, saying the first thing that came to my mind.

"And he drowned the same puppy when you came home late one night." Angelo frowned. "Luca, you get in these moods and you try to make him into a less evil person. And I get it, it sucked having him as a father. I don't blame you for wanting to see him another light and forget everything that happened, but you can't do that to yourself. You have to let this go. All of it. You get yourself so worked up about this and you turn into an angry jerk."

"I thought anger was good to hold on to."

"For a while, yeah, but it's been years. You have a wife, and a family, and if you're not careful, you're going to let him ruin it. You've done way more than anybody ever could've imagined with this mafia. You have nothing left to prove. Let yourself off the hook a bit."

"I'm not trying to prove anything. I just..." I shoved my fingers through my hair. "Fuck it. You're right. Everything I've ever done is about trying to be better than him."