I stared at the wall after the door shut.
A hundred years.
My entire life.
I’d die behind bars.
The door to the office opened, and Alcina came in, holding Eleonora’s hand. She was due any day with our second child.
“Someone die?” my wife whispered. “The men—”
I pulled her to me, making her lose her breath. It wasn’t hard these days, but it was from the strength of my embrace.
Eleonora hopped on a chair across from us, her little legs dangling. She lifted her brow at me, still refusing to smile.
“Corrado,” Alcina said, touching my face. “Tell me, or I will think it is worse than it is.”
“I’m looking at a hundred years,” I said.
She stared into my eyes, not understanding, until she did. She shook her head. “We will fight.”
“We will,” I said. “But I’ve seen it before. Even if I get parole, I’ll probably serve no less than sixty. It just depends on how many years I get. That’s what I’m preparing for.”
She tried to push away from me, but I held her close. She stared at me before she looked at Eleonora and then at her stomach.
“What can we do?” she whispered. “I refuse to accept this.”
“This is my life,” I said. “I go down with this family.”
“Your suit still on,” she hissed at me. “To the very end.”
I nodded.
This time she pushed away from me. “Not a gentleman’s suit, an orangejumpsuit,” she said, crossing her arms over her stomach.
One hard knuckle knock came at the door. Rocco Fausti stuck his head in. “Tito forgot his hat.”
He must have come with Mac. They were as close as two thieves.
He strode into the room, picking the hat up. He stuck it on Eleonora’s head, making her laugh when she knocked it off. He touched her chin after, and she smiled and giggled at him. He nodded at my wife.
She turned her face toward mine, narrowing her eyes when she noticed how I was looking at her. I’d been watching her eyes to see if she’d blink at him.
He shut the door, but his expensive fucking cologne lingered in the room.
Alcina took my chin in her hand. “He does not matter. Nothing else matters. But us. This moment.”
“You going to stay faithful to me for a hundred years?” I said to her. “When I’m locked behind bars and men like him are hovering around you constantly?”
“I will stay faithful to you until the day I die,” she said, squeezing my chin, coming down and giving me a kiss that was even more solidifying than a blood vow. “You have me forever, Corrado.”
“For every sunrise,” I said.
“For every sunset, too. You are my night, and I am your moon,” she said in Sicilian. “Something to live for. Something to die for. You are my body, and I am your heart. For as long as there is a breath in me.”
Epilogue
Alcina
