Gemma stood in the middle of the snow like an abandoned angel with her mouth gaping open, unable to believe the truth had been spoken.

Everybody else went to their own cars. Maybe they were too jaded and used to pretending bad things didn’t happen to behave any differently. They’d all probably reboot like a bunch of computers and forget all this unpleasantness in the morning. Suddenly the night felt colder, so cold that it could suck the soul out of each of them, leaving only frozen corpses behind.

“Seriously!?!” Gemma shrieked, her breath making large white puffs in the air as she spoke. “He kills my husband, and you’re all turning to get in your cars like it’s nothing?”

“Emilio was a vicious bastard,” Leo said. He’d stopped and turned back to the group.

“If Leo hadn’t done it, I would have,” Sal admitted.

“You’ll never know what it cost me to kill him,” Leo said, his voice cracking. “Never. I thought joining the priesthood would fix what’s inside me, but after Emilio I couldn’t.”

“What did you have that needed to be fixed before killing my husband? What could you possibly have done in your perfect little life to give you a big enough complex to take holy orders? Because I know you didn’t have some big dream to become a priest.” Gemma turned to Faith. “Is this the family you want to marry into? Do you even know who the Raspallo family is?”

“Yes,” Faith whispered. “I know.”

Gina crossed herself again.

“You TOLD her?” Sal bellowed.

Leo turned at his uncle’s sharp voice. “Of course not. But it’s not like rumors don’t fly around about us. It’s the 21^st century. It’s not as if she knows any incriminating details. No more than any of the other women in this family.” He glared daggers at Faith, as if this were her fault. Or maybe he was daring her to challenge the white lie he’d told to paint over the cracks and make things okay again.

What was she supposed to do? Pretend she hadn’t heard what Gemma said? Act too stupid to pick up on the innuendo? It was too insulting to pretend to be that idiotic surrounded by a bunch of men that looked like they’d stepped out of Goodfellas.

“Well, hell, why don’t we take an ad out in the paper, if everybody’s gonna know everybody’s business? It wasn’t like this when I was young,” Sal said.

If looks could kill, Faith would be swimming with the fishes. Wisely, she chose not to verbalize the cliché. It wouldn’t endear her to Uncle Sal, who had only just made peace with her heritage.

The ride back to the house was tense. Lily stared out the window while Gina quietly cried. Both women were trying, in their own way, to insulate themselves from the almost visible, demonic rage curling off Uncle Sal in the backseat.

“You’d better not become a liability to us,” Sal said.

Faith didn’t turn around. If she’d thought she wouldn’t die at the hands of a member of this family, she’d been kidding herself. What difference did it make if it was Angelo, Uncle Sal, Leo, or some random hired gun? She’d be dead no matter what. Yet something stupid inside her wanted to cling to the slim hope Leo had extended, that he was up to the task of saving her, that there was something in him that was good and decent and not like the others. Some noble instinct that had moved him in the direction of the Church and prayer instead of crime and death.