“Roman says the same about Angelica. Just yesterday he cradled her in his arms, and now she’s ten,” Isabella responds.
“Life charges on,” Elena says, looking around the room. My sense is she’s trying to figure out where I am so she can avoid me.
I turn away so she doesn’t know I’m watching her.
Isabella’s baby starts to cry. “I should feed him.” She heads off somewhere, presumably to feed the little guy.
"Mama! Look what Angelica showed us!" Elena’s daughter, Adalina, I think, calls, holding up a glass ornament that catches the light.
Elena rushes over to the girl in a panic. “Be careful with that, sweetheart. It's delicate."
I don’t know why, but I can’t not talk to her. It’s a fool’s errand. She’s just going to dismiss me.
But as she kneels by her daughter, I step up behind her. “The kids are bigger each year,” I say.
“Yes, well it’s been a year,” she says in the snarky tone I expected. "If you'll excuse me, I need to check on something…" She rushes off like she can’t get away fast enough.
I should let her go, but either I’m a glutton for punishment or I need to give her a piece of my mind. I follow her into the family room.
“Are you stalking me?” she demands.
“Why do you treat me like I have cooties every fucking year?” As kids, we used to play a tag game where the person who was “it” was said to have cooties. I figure I’ll try to remind her that we were once friends. For a short time, we were more.
She meets my gaze. "I don’t.”
"Bullshit." I step closer, unable to hide the frustration and pain in my voice.
"What do you want me to say, Luca?"
I give a small laugh. “Maybe tell me why you act like I’m the one who fucked things up, when it was you.”
Her eyes fill with anger. “Gee, was it that you put my father in prison… where he died?”
“I did not.” What the fuck? Not even her cousin Dom thinks I was behind her father’s conviction.
“Or maybe how you went to Italy and didn’t look back. Take your pick.”
My jaw tightens. If she thinks I put her father in jail, why would she care if I looked back or not, which I did?
Nearly every damn day until I learned she fucked someone else and was having his babies.
"I went to Italy for family business. You knew I was coming back."
“No, I didn’t.”
I shrug knowing that I won’t change her mind. “Why do you care? It’s not like you didn’t move on. Your kids are proof of that.”
For a moment, I think I see hatred, but she doesn’t say anything.
“What? You have no answer?” I shake my head. “Don’t act like I’m the bad guy when you’re the one who moved on within weeks of my leaving.”
“You put my father in prison?—”
“No. I didn’t. In fact, I tried to… You know what? Never mind. You only believe what you want.” What point is there in telling her I tried to help him, but Dominic’s father, who was Don at the time, said not to bother?
Even he seemed to think Elena’s father deserved to be put away.
"It doesn't matter now," she says. "We've all moved on."
