“They know better,” he said. “I doubt any of them want to go blind. My men watch the areas they’re ordered to, or they watch other men under them. Only a few watch me. Nothing slips past me.” He lifted my chin, examining my neck. He placed a firm kiss on a spot that was a little bruised from the night before. “This hurt?”
“No.” I shook my head. “Just a little tender. Myculo…” I made a face. “That hurts.”
I opened my eyes to judge his expression. He had none either way, but there was more to it.
It took me a minute to figure it out, but after he had left me alone this morning, I thought about what had happened before we left my grandparents’casa. He had been watching me talk to Ezio, who had returned from Greece a single man. I could tell by the look in Corrado’s eyes that he did not like it. At first, I thought his mood was because of his grandfather, but after what he had said and what he had done the night before, I connected the dots. He was jealous.
“It’ll be my pleasure to kiss that, too.”
I smiled. “You did. It did not help.”
“The water will.”
“It is nice,” I sighed, leaning my head back, turning my face up to the sun, while his mouth worked over my throat. “Where do we go from here?”
“I’m going to spoil you, angel eyes,” he said, weighing my breasts in his hands as they floated close to the surface of the water. He caressed my nipples with his thumbs. “After breakfast, we’ll do some shopping. I’ve already arranged it. You need clothes, and the house needs furniture.”
I forced myself to focus on him and not what he was doing to my body again. “I mean in the future. Your grandfather. What he meant about you going home and taking his place. When?”
After his grandfather had said it, I heard Adriano call Corrado the future Don Capitani. Corrado had told me he had enemies in New York, and I was no fool to his business, but I wanted to know what was going to happen now that we were married. Would it take years or months for his problems in America to be resolved? Or was our future in Italy just as uncertain as anything else?
His hands moved to my back, and he swam us around for a while before he answered me. “It depends.”
I nodded. “You will be Don Capitani after we get to New York,” I said, staring into his eyes.
He nodded once.
“You are so…young,” I said.
“Age is just a number.” Then he said something about not being the youngest in history.
“What about the bul—Junior?”
He studied my face for a second. “He won’t be a problem.”
I grinned at him, but it was weak. It bothered me that he did not trust me with this part of his life. Not fully. “Nothing is a problem forDonCapitani,” I said.
“Not a fucking thing,” he said, his answer quick and solid.
I looked away from him, staring into the distance at the mountains, wondering how that was going to work. I was not afraid of the bull, but I did not want to see him either. The bull’spatriseemed even more eager to make me pay than his son.
Corrado turned my face toward his, his grip firm, staring into my eyes for a second before he tilted his head. “Tell me you trust me, Alcina.”
“I trust you.” It wasthemthat I did not trust.
He shook his head. “You trust mewhat?” He turned his ear closer to my face.
“I trust you,DonCapitani,” I breathed in his ear.
“That mouth is going to get you into fucking trouble,mia moglie.”My wife.Then he dunked me under the water. I could hear him laughing as I started to resurface, the sound of it deep and raspy.
19
Alcina
Corrado had a car waiting to take us to Milan after our morning swim. I asked him what kind of car it was. He said it was an Aston Martin Vantage. It was not sleek, but strong and sporty.
It sounded like an animal on the hunt as it raced against the twisting and turning roads that led us closer to the city. Since it only had two seats, Nunzio and Adriano stayed close behind in a fast car of their own. More men followed behind them in a van.
