“What the hell is wrong with you?” Leo asked.

“ME!? What does this have to do with me?”

“Oh let’s see… giving her to me for one thing. You could have killed her and never told me about it. Involving me was unfair. You shouldn’t have made her my responsibility. You shouldn’t have told me about her at all! Letting me think that I could save her… that if I didn’t it would be my fault she was dead… what is wrong with you? Do you hate me that much?” He looked down to find his hands shaking with anger, his fists clenching as everything inside him screamed to wrap those hands around his brother’s throat.

“Marone! Are you kidding me? You’ve always gotta be breaking my balls. Mother fuck.” Angelo took a slow breath to gain control of himself. “You’re my blood. My brother. But you’re so fucking uptight all the time. I wanted to give you what you wanted but didn’t have the balls to take yourself. And STILL don’t have the balls to take, it appears. She is your slave. Use her. She owes you her life. You should be collecting some form of payment. It’s such a waste giving you anything, you fucking Puritan. I don’t know why the hell I bothered.”

“I wish you hadn’t,” Leo said. In his brother’s mind, this was still an appropriate Christmas gift. It was the recipient of the gift that was the problem. Not the gift itself. Angelo didn’t appear to grasp that giving someone a human being for Christmas wasn’t just immoral, it was gauche.

“Don’t worry, this is the last time I try to help you in any way. Go ahead and long for what you want but can’t bring yourself to man up and take while it’s right under your nose in your goddamn house.”

“Why did you have to tell Ma we were engaged? The family is mostly over the gay thing.”

“Ma’s not over it. This whole week would have been all about me and Davide and how I need to settle down with a girl and give her grandchildren to carry on the family name. You know it would have. It’s time you picked up some of that slack and nagging.”

“So now Faith is supposed to be the family brood mare because you prefer men? Even if I could use her like you suggest, you think I could ever be so cruel as to force her to bear children on top of everything else we’ve done to her?”

Angelo shrugged. “I’ve given up trying to figure out how your mind works.”

“Same.”

“Are we done here?”

“We couldn’t be more done,” Leo said. Had he expected an apology from his brother or any remorse or sign of guilt or responsibility for the way the holiday had been ruined? Of course not. Nothing was ever Angelo’s fault. There was always someone else to blame, or kill if blaming alone turned out not to be satisfying enough.