At this time, we had retreated to who we were from the start, but with barbs and claims that we could not free ourselves from. If she went left and I went right, we would tear each other apart.
My father had given me permission to make my own choice when it came to our marriage. Perhaps he had felt I was too much of a rule-keeper when it came to the laws of myfamigliato free myself by my own heart’s decree. However, my father perhaps did not understand my loyalty to Rosaria because his relationship with his first wife was overshadowed by the true love of his life, Margherita Granchio. His story was separated into two parts that acted out at once, a split screen to enhance the contrast between the two acts.
I also had two acts, but one was filled with characters and places, sights and smells, and one was empty save for myself and the lion in my chest. That side had forever searched. It would be eternally starved in a frigid winter.
From the balcony next to the one connected to the master suite, Rosaria stepped out in the cold air, hair billowing behind her, her fingers trailing along the frigid stone, and did notspare me a glance. Her face was turned up at the world defiantly, but when she sang, it was a haunting melody that saturated the barbs inside of me with water while the cold weather froze them over to ice.
I shivered from the sharpness of it against warm bone.
She finished what was left of my heart—froze it to ice.
And it seemed as if the ruthless truth in her song carried us into late spring, but the cold did not recede. We were frozen in a time and place neither of us could break free from.
Rosaria used Maranello as her cage, unless my father requested her presence somewhere else. This was a tremulous time for thefamiglia.My father would retire soon, and my name had been given as the next ruler. If it seemed as if my wife and I were on shaky ground, a challenge might spring up from the cracks and cause a war. I welcomed a challenge, but with Margherita’s health scare, I did not want her to worry. Over the years, she had become a warm maternal figure in my life, even if did not seem to come naturally to her.
There was also my nephew, Matteo, who would assume my role in the family once the event in Venice, planned for November, was complete. Matteo had recently rescued his heart from the Nemours, and they were learning how to live together. Since Matteo was my spare, my challenge would become his.
A great deal to consider.
In Rosaria’s opinion, considering was weak. We did not consider Margherita’s health or Matteo’s newfound love. We considered thefamigliaonly, even though the family believed in giving a man an entire year to grow close to his wife.
Rosaria considered thefamiglia,first and foremost,as she created war between my nephew’s heart, Stella, and herself. As she continued to sabotage our son’s happiness with Chloe. Plans would be made for the wedding, and she or her sister would call and cancel them, claiming the couple had split and would not be getting married. Other times, she would call and correct the names that should be printed.
Massimo & Ornella
instead of
Massimo & Chloe
At Brando and Scarlett’s farmhouse, Rosaria had invited Ornella, the actress who my son had been considering marrying before he met Chloe, into his bed while Chloe painted in the Tuscan fields. Chloe found them and did not take it well. She believed Massimo’s word when he said he did not touch the woman, but it was Rosaria who Chloe had had enough of.
Her wicked tongue. Her wicked scheming.
My son’s heart had had enough.
His heart was failing because of it.
Rosaria had killed it in the name of his last name.
In the span of less than a month, Rosaria had overshadowed the true love between my oldest son and his intended, causing her to run home and hide from him. She had also sent our third son, Marzio, after my nephew’s new wife, Stella, and he had pulled a snake on her. These were dishonorable actions in the eyes of my father, of our family. Since Marzio was named after my grandfather, that name was wiped from his record. He would be called after his middle name. Tiziano.
It was not only a dishonorable act to my son, butto me.
The family kept their distance, but they came sniffing around when my son, Massimo, followed Chloe home. Whether she was attempting to get away from him or to hurt him back, Chloe decided to marry someone from the small town Brando and Scarlett were from. My son killed the man and stole his heart. His judge and jury became my father. Since my father had once been where my son was, he decided to not intervene and to allow a justice system outside of ours to put him on trial and sentence him.
This only fed Rosaria’s quest for power. She was satisfied. She had done all this scheming from a gilded prison of my father’s making.
My father’s making? It was by her own making.
However.
Chloe was out of the picture.
Our son was serving a sentence for stealing a man’s heart in his heart’s honor—this was the only type of romance Rosaria could stand. The kind with raw pieces tinged with blood in the center of it.
Rosaria did not even consider Tiziano’s fate when she sent him after Stella to cause harm. Rosaria claimed it was in retribution to Stella holding a knife to her throat, but the strife was between two women. It should have kept between them. If Rosaria would have assaulted Stella in retribution, the offense would have been forgiven—if we give, we must remember we will take in return. Stella claimed Rosaria called her mamma a whore. Rosaria had taken the first strike then. To call someone’s mamma such a derogatory term was the equivalent of a knife swipe.
After Massimo was jailed, the family started to wake up and sniff around. They had started to smell blood behind our gates. Of course, Rosaria knew this, and perhaps sent the scent in the air on purpose as a show of defiance.
