Exit Strategy. Jen J. Danna
“Joanna, I can see you’re at the end of your rope, but what you’re doing is very dangerous. For you and your baby.” Out of sight, Gemma gripped the man’s hand harder and felt the answering hold in response. Her lieutenant would have her head for taking such a chance, but there was no time and no other way to get the woman back inside. Taking a deep breath, she extended her free hand. “I can help you, or I can find someone who can. Take my hand. Come back in, talk to me about what’s upset you.”
“What’s upset me?” Joanna’s head whipped toward Gemma, even that small, isolated movement causing her to wobble slightly on the ledge.
But the life in her eyes gave Gemma hope. Joanna had just opened the door to a conversation that could save two lives. “Tell me about it.” When the woman’s lips folded into a tight white line, Gemma pushed on. “I’m a great listener. I might even know a little bit about what you’re feeling.”
“You have children?”
“No, but I’m an aunt several times over, and I’ve watched my sisters-in-law with their newborns. Those are tough days. I know you must be feeling stretched to the breaking point. How old is your baby?”
“Four weeks tomorrow.” She took one hand off the pillar and slapped it over her ear. “And she won’t stop screaming. I need her to stop screaming. I can’t do anything to help her.”
Gemma eyed the infant, trying to evaluate if there was any way to free her from the sling. Wrapped too tight. “That must be very distressing for you. You must feel useless, but it’s not your fault.”
“I’m her mother. If I can’t help her, who can? Her father works shifts and can’t be home all the time. I. Just. Need. To. Make. It. Stop.”
Her expression never changed, but Gemma’s heart rate spiked at the slightly hysterical edge in Joanna’s tone. This wasn’t working. Time to try a different tack. “Haven’t you thought about life with her? Watching her first steps? Dropping her off at her first day of kindergarten? Helping her find her feet in life with your guidance? A daughter needs her mother for that.”
A scene streaked through her mind at her own words: Huddled bodies, terrified eyes, screaming, a gunshot. Feeling utterly alone in the middle of the chaos.
She pushed it away. Focus.
As if hearing Gemma’s words, the infant’s wail dissolved into a weak whimper punctuated by squeaky, gasping hiccups.
Joanna’s hand dropped from her ear to reach behind her and scrabble for the pillar.
Gemma reached out farther, leaning far enough over the wrought iron railing to make her mouth go desert dry. “You feel alone and overwhelmed. Like nothing you do is right, and you’re going to mess her up. Like some days you can hardly get out of bed. But this isn’t the way. Don’t you love your daughter?”
Joanna’s eyes slid closed and a single tear broke from her lashes to trail down her pale cheek.
“Help me save her life. You brought her into this world, now keep her safe in it. You’re not alone. There are many people who want to help you. Who will help you. You just have to reach out your hand. Trust me, Joanna. You both have so much to live for.”
Joanna took a shaky breath and opened her eyes. Then she reached out with her left hand.
Gemma caught it in hers, feeling the tremor that wracked it.
How lost would you have to be to not only feel the need to take your own life, but that of your child as well?
Gemma prayed she’d never experience it.
“That’s it, step slowly to your left. Slow. Careful. That’s it. Just about there.”
When Joanna stepped up to the railing, hands appeared from all around, closing over arms and clothing, coaxing her over the railing, and the two women in and back down to safety.
The young mother’s knees buckled and Gemma went down to the floor with her, wrapping her arms around both woman and child as Joanna broke into sobs.
Gemma rubbed a hand up and down her back soothingly. “It’s going to be all right. You’re going to make it.”
A hand squeezed her shoulder and Gemma looked up to find Frankie standing behind her.
“You’re amazing,” Frankie said, grinning. “My mother would be so proud of you.”
The laugh that bubbled up was part joy, part overflowing nervous energy. Now that she was down and safe, Gemma shivered with a delayed adrenaline reaction.
The baby between them made a small noise and Gemma pulled back far enough to run a hand over the warm, downy head.
Two lives saved and a family brought back from the brink of devastation.
Not bad for a Saturday night out on the town.
CHAPTER 2
Gemma crowded the last golden ball into the layer of tomato sauce pooled on the platter. “Rachel, the arancini is ready,” she said, turning to face her sister-in-law. “Can you carry it out?”
The slender blonde shifted to reveal the baby balanced on her hip. His toothless gums gnawed at the tiny hand jammed into his mouth as a long line of drool slid slowly down his chin. “I would, but I’d need two hands for it, and...” Rachel indicated the teething baby with a cocked head and raised eyebrow.
“I thought Teo was taking him outside.”
“He was going to, but then Dad grabbed him to help set up the tables.”
“Well, I’ll swap you this”—Gemma tapped the edge of a large white platter loaded with deep-fried risotto balls—“for him, if you can send the boys back in to help carry everything out. You can nail them with the mom eye and they’ll do your bidding.”
“I think you’re overestimating the power of the mom eye. Plus, you’ll get soaked.”
“I’ll love every minute of it. Hand him over. Come on, Nate, my man. You can be my plus one at lunch.” She accepted the baby from Rachel and settled him on her hip. “Now go. I’m not overestimating your power. The men will be back in here inside of three minutes, you just watch.”
Gemma’s only overestimation was in how long it would take to corral the men back inside. In under two minutes, the kitchen was filled with three rowdy brothers jockeying for who got to take which favorite family dish outside. Just as Gemma was about to pull out a whip and a chair, her fourth brother, Alessandro—Alex—her closest sibling in both age and personality, arrived.
“Hey, look who’s here!” Joe called out as Alex stepped into the room. “Find any pizza in the subway today?”
Alex sent him a slitted, sideways glare and flipped him the bird.
Gemma rolled her eyes hard enough she could have cataloged the spice rack behind her. Three of the four men were NYPD cops; the third brother, Matteo, broke with family tradition to join the FDNY. The cops in the family, especially Joe, the eldest, could be merciless to their youngest sibling. Alex was a member of the Internal Affairs Bureau, or the Rat Squad, as New York’s finest sneeringly labeled it. Thus, the pizza rat smear.
“Sei tutto idiota.” All eyes swiveled to the sole woman in the room. She might be the only female sibling, but Gemma knew how to manage her brothers. “Enough with the rat gags.” She laid one hand on the top of a covered cake stand. “Or I’m taking my torta setteveli and my cannoli home without you getting even a single taste.” Gemma knew the power of desserts in this family, and her seven-layer, sky-high, chocolate-and-hazelnut seven-veils cake was legendary. No other leverage was needed.
Groans of dissent were followed by some good-natured grumbling, but they mostly laid off Alex and even helped him with the plates he carried. As they went out the door, she heard Teo ragging on