The Promise (The 'Burg #5)(29)
Until that moment, he didn’t realize that that was the only dream he had for his future. All he had to do was find his way to put money in the bank to make sure his family had what they needed. But the goal was to treat them more than occasionally to what they wanted. Not to mention, have times when he could afford to pile them in a car or on a plane to go see his sister, Carm, in California. Or take them to a beach where the kids could play in the sand and he could f**k his woman with the sounds of the surf coming through the window.
Wanting that—only that—he did not get where his brother went wrong. With the way they grew up, he couldn’t wrap his head around why the f**k anyone would want more.
Since Frankie got shot, he’d had to come to painful terms with why he’d been such a dick to her and then make a plan to sort that out.
But in that time, he had not given headspace to figuring out why Vinnie threw his life away.
Frankie, so f**king gorgeous, absolutely perfect…it was easy to go there. To twist it so it came down to her, Vinnie doing everything he could to give her everything she wanted in order to keep her. But Frankie never gave any indication she wanted anything but love and a solid life that she was right there, happy to help create.
So it was Vinnie who’d had something to prove.
Benny just did not get what there was to prove. Their pop was not a pushover, but he was not a driven man, driving his kids along with him. Their ma was definitely not a pushover, but she gave no indication she had great expectations, outside of hoping her sons wouldn’t knock up some girl too early or come home from carousing after the blood dried on their clothes so it was harder to get the stains out.
Both his folks just wanted their kids to be happy, however that came about.
Kids were kids to them. They had no choice but to mature and, if they were smart, learn along the way. His folks could and did provide support, advice, and, on occasion, showed disappointment in order to nudge their children to learn the right things, but neither of them did this with a thundering hand.
So Benny didn’t get it. He didn’t get his brother having that growing up, then getting what was right then na**d in Benny’s shower, and f**king up so f**king huge and losing it all so f**king early.
And the shit of it was, he knew he’d never get it. That would always be a question mark in his life that his mind would go to in order to pick at it, find an answer, erase that mark—a mark that would never go away.
Vinnie left him with that. He left his folks with that. And he left Frankie with that. Wondering why he was like he was. But worse, wondering if there was something one of them could have done to stop it.
He couldn’t deny this pissed him off. What he’d quit denying was that he was pissed at his dead brother, not the woman upstairs. It was not comfortable having that feeling about a brother he loved who could no longer make explanations or amends. That wound was arrested in time, gapping, sore, bloody, no way to heal it. And it was arguable, but Benny thought that might be worse than Vinnie turning to the dark side, working for Sal, and losing his life in a violent way doing it.
On that thought, he heard the coffeemaker beep that it was done. He had the mugs ready by the time the shower went off. He delivered them, setting them on the nightstand, then rapped on the bathroom door with his knuckles to communicate that fact. He came down the stairs and was walking back into the kitchen at the same time his parents walked in the back door.
“Caro,” his mother greeted, coming direct to him, giving him a distracted kiss on the cheek, then moving straight to the coffeepot.
“Ben,” his father greeted, looking not at Benny but at the ceiling.
Apparently, Vinnie Senior was done waiting to sort things out with Francesca. Eyeing him, Benny thought his father might be done waiting, but he wasn’t looking forward to it.
“She’s just out of the shower, Pop,” he told his old man, and Vinnie Senior’s eyes came to him. “That means you got at least an hour and forty-five minutes while she does her hair to get some coffee and come to terms with the fact that she’s Frankie. She never changed and she’s not gonna make you work for it.”
“I told him that,” his ma put in. “He’s decided to worry.”
Vinnie Senior directed a dark look to his wife, then he changed the subject by directing an order at her. “Coffee, woman.”
She turned to him, pot in hand, two mugs already on the counter in front of her. “You know, just like every time the last forty-one years I’ve been near a coffeepot, I already got your mug ready. And just like every time the last forty-one years you tell me to get you coffee instead of asking for it, I want to throw your mug at you. Now, after hearing that for forty-one years, I’m wonderin’ why I held back.”
“You do because, for forty-one years, you have not once filled up your gas tank. You take the good, Theresa, you gotta take the bad.”
“You fill up my tank maybe once a week. Maybe. I fill up your coffee mug more than once a day. I’m beginning to see this doesn’t balance out,” his ma returned.
Jesus. They’d been there two minutes and they were already at it.
“Right,” Benny cut in. “You wanna bicker, do it after I get a cup of coffee.”
At that, Theresa’s eyes went right to her son. “Caro, you’ve had no coffee?”
“Pot just got done. I just got done deliverin’ it to the women upstairs. So, no.”