We stood that way for an hour or so, both of us lost to our own thoughts, starting over from the last time we were here.
“I love you,” she whispered.
“Ti amo di più.”I love you more.
She squeezed my hand and closed her eyes. A minute later she opened them, looking around. “What’s that noise?”
I listened. I hadn’t heard anything until Scarlett pointed it out. I heard it then too. Quiet crying, heavy sniffing. We both looked around but saw no one.
“It’s coming from the other side of the villa.” I pointed.
I helped Scarlett up, and we walked hand in hand to the other side of the house, where Rocco’s men had taken over. Most of them slept in the converted chapel. They used the entrance to come and go. It wasn’t the sound of a man crying, though; it was a woman. She wasn’t hard to find.
Chiara, the ballet dancer Scarlett had set up with Donato, hid her face in her hands, her knuckles pressed against the stones of the chapel, her shoulders rising and falling.
“Chiara?” Scarlett said gently.
The ballerina’s shoulders stilled for a moment before she turned and flung herself into Scarlett’s arms, disconnecting our hands.
Chiara was a tallish woman, willowy in shape, with brown hair and dark eyes. She had sharp features, fair skin, and pink lips. From those lips a litany of Italian streamed without pause.
“Hah?” Scarlett said, after Chiara paused to take a breather.
I hid my smile. I hid it only because I had experience when it came to weeping women. I didn’t want Chiara to think I found humor in her situation. It was Scarlett’s reaction that got me.
Scarlett fixed me with a look that clearly saidhere we go, and we haven’t even been home two hours.She wasn’t ready for the barrage, but here we were. It had started.
Encouraged, Chiara started up again, and I could tell that Scarlett was having a hard time keeping up, but it was time for me to move the hell on.
“I’m going to—” I ran a hand through my hair, making it stand up. “Ah.” I pointed toward the lemon groves. “Wait—”
“No!” Scarlett said, slipping a hand from Chiara’s hold and taking my shirt hostage. “Tell me what she’s saying. She’s going too fast for me.”
Chiara took a step back, sniffing. The rims of her eyes were pink from hysteria. The tip of her nose was red. She crossed her arms and tapped her foot. Why she couldn’t translate to English was beyond me, but she waited for me to do it.
I scratched my head, then ran a hand through my hair again. “It seems that her and Donato—ah, he slept with her. Yesterday. Today, he broke up with her.”
Scarlett inhaled sharply, scandalized. I could hear her voice in my head, from our time in Fiji—he took the nooky and then ran!
“Ti ha detto perché?” I said.Did he tell you why?
Chiara narrowed her eyes at me, not as intimidating as my wife’s narrow gaze, but it was clear that she was about to assault me with displaced anger.
“La guerra!” she snapped. “Egli è preoccupato per me.Mah!”The war. He is worried for me.Thenshe made a noise to convey her irritation with this incomprehensible logic.
“War,” I said, my instincts starting to prickle.
She shrugged and started to cry again. She mumbled a few things. The general gist of it was that she thought he lied about the war.What fucking war?Now he refused to see her.
“Sono io?” she pleaded, looking at me.Is it me?
I looked at Scarlett. How was I supposed to fucking know? Sometimes people clicked on the street, but not in the bedroom. Sometimes when people felt too much, they ran. Sometimes when men got the nooky, they did run, because it’s all they wanted in the first place. Women too, come to think of it. Yeah, women are not all that innocent either. I knew better than to utter a word, though.
“Let’s go inside,” Scarlett said, wrapping an arm around Chiara’s slim shoulders. “I’ll talk to him.”
“Scarlett,” I said, stopping them. “I need to talk to you, over—” I pointed to the trail leading to the lemon groves.
Scarlett advised Chiara to take advantage of the time to fix herself up. After, I took my wife by the arm and brought her far enough out of hearing distance.
