I poured myself a glass. “You know, I always wondered. How do women like you, shameless, underhanded, selfish—even when it comes to their own kids—ever come to be?”
She smiled at that. A true smile. “How innocent of you, especially since you were raised by the female equivalent of Olivier Nemours.”
I returned the smile. “It didn’t matter at the time.”
She ticked her mouth. “Little girl, nothing happens to us. We are just made that way.”
“Your son is miserable.”
“He is miserable because that is the way love makes you. His father has allowed this entire foolish situation to go on far too long. Massimo will realize one day what he has missed. But that day is too far off, and we have more than one son. We have spares in this family for this reason.”
So, since Massimo refused to challenge Matteo for what the men considered in this family their “right,” Rosaria had lined up another son to do it. All together, they had four sons: Massimo, Amadeo, Marzio, and Ludovico. I’d met the first three a couple of times, but the night of our wedding was the first time I’d met Marzio. None of them seemed hostile or anything, but Massimo, Amadeo, and Ludovico seemed friendlier than Marzio.
“You know what I think?” I didn’t stop to let her answer. I barreled right into how I really felt. “You’re the onlybitchin this room.”
She stood. “You believe that wearing the insignia of this family makes you one of us.” She laughed, and not going to lie, it was a grating sound. “You have no fucking clue what it takes to be a Fausti. Your spot is earned, not given. Compared to the women in this family, you are a common whore!”
Okay, I had to give her thespot is earned, not given, comment. I knew my spot was not given, and it would take time for the entire family to accept me as their leader’s wife, but that was what I was doing. Learning my way around, working for my place. This family was so important to Matteo, and I wanted to support him because his family was not only his blood, but his passion.
Still.
She was wrong about the rest.
I sighed, like I was so bored, even if I was trembling on the inside. She was a beautiful woman, but the kind who could cut a person down with a sharp look. “I never took my clothes off or had been with a man until my husband. So, it doesn’t sound like I fit that description—of a whore. However.” I lifted a finger. “Who knows if this is true or not, just rumors, you know, but you sleep around on your husband. An open marriage, right? So…sounds more like you than me.”
Her fists clenched. “Or like your mamma, ah? The exotic dancer who slept with a married man and had a child from him?”
She couldn’t move out of my way fast enough. I swiped the first thing I saw on the counter, the broken piece of glass from Scarlett’s broken mug, and held it to her throat.
She smiled. “What will you do with that, Little Girl?”
I answered her dare by cutting her underneath her chin with it. “No onewill disrespect my mom, or who I consider mine,” I said through tears. Why the fuck was I crying? But it was a mad cry. Like it took me getting to this space in my head to do it. “I don’t bother with words if I’m not going to do what I say. You’ve crossed a fucking line.”
Rosaria’s flitting eyes were on mine, but then she turned them so fast, it took me out of my head space, and I turned mine too. Oscar, who seriously resembled Oscar the Grouch, was standing in the doorway. The slowly fading light of the day was at his back, and he was standing in its glow.
He made the sign of the cross, called out to Jesus, and was about to turn his back and leave when Rosaria screeched, “Oscar!”
Oscar’s shoulders visibly went up and then down, and with a resolved sigh, he came into the kitchen. But I wasn’t going to make this hard on him. I tucked the broken piece of stone, the end stained by Rosaria’s blood, into my pocket.
Oscar was one of Matteo’s men, not Rocco’s—directly—so I knew Rosaria couldn’t step in and stop him.
“Oscar,” I said, “would you mind walking me home for eggs?” Scarlett usually got hers from the market, or another farm close by, since she said she and Brando were never in one spot long enough to have chickens. Even though we’d probably move around a lot, from how Matteo had spoken about having different places to call home, I thought it would be great to have them.
Apollonia’s farm wasn’t far from ours. She’d always wanted chickens, and since our hen house was the size of an actual small house, we decided to share the chickens and eggs. As rent, as she called it with a laugh, she’d take care of the chickens and eggs while we were away.
Oscar hesitated, running a hand through his hair, making it stick up. Then he seemed to remember something, and he stood up straight. “Sì.It would be my honor to protect you,SignoraFausti.”
It was odd that cousins called other cousins and their wives, or vice versa, the equivalent of Mr. or Mrs. or Ms. in English, but whatever they wanted to do.
“Thank you,” I whispered, nodding toward the door.
Oscar stiffened his shoulders and walked ahead of me, holding the door open. I stopped next to him and lifted the sharp piece of stone, making sure Rosaria saw it.
“That was nothing,” I said. “You say something like that again, and who knows, you might lose an ear, or maybe, if the words are even worse, I’ll go even further, to your chest.”
She smiled at me, blood running down her neck. “My son will speak to you soon.”
I shook my head. “All inquiries go through my husband first. Thanks.”
