“We need to find out. If she won’t tell you, I will arrange for some digging tomorrow. The men we captured from the club will need to be interrogated too, and the police will have a report for me first thing, but I think we should all try and get a few hours’ sleep.”
“Yeah, before Gina sends out a search party for you.” Marco smirked, knowing if anyone’s wife would come searching, it would be Gina.
Getting to his feet, Carlo said nothing, simply opening the door for us all to leave.
Climbing the stairs, I wondered if Anna had settled in, her and the baby, and then I replayed Carlos’ question about Amina’s father. Would I be overstepping the mark if I straight out asked who he was? Perhaps I should wait for her to bring up the subject or even allow Carlo to get the investigators on the case and leave well alone.
Entering my home, I spotted Anna sitting on the sofa, cradling the baby . . . Shit! She was nursing her and as I got closer, I couldn’t stop looking at them, the image of her feeding the baby who was noisily suckling her mother’s breast. This wasn’t the first time I’d seen a woman nursing; hell, in this house alone there was a constant stream of babies being born and a good many of them were breastfed, so why was I so enamoured by the image of this particular one? This woman, this baby, this breast?
“I can take her somewhere else.” Anna was already attempting to get to her feet without disturbing the baby.
I felt like an ass for having made her feel uncomfortable with what had probably looked like an ogle or disapproval as I had a tendency to wear a frown. “No, stay. Can I get you a drink or some food?”
She settled back in her seat and looked across at the clock. “Dante, it’s three in the morning, you need sleep not food.”
Dropping into the space next to her, I reached across and stroked across Amina’s head. “Is she okay? You have everything you need?”
“Yes, she’s fine and we do. Gina and Jay stopped by and made sure we had everything we needed.”
“We can arrange for anything else to be here tomorrow.”
She nodded and offered the tiniest of smiles as the baby released a snore.
“About before,” she began, but I interrupted.
“Anna, you’re right, it’s late, we should sleep.”
Her scowl told me that she wasn’t happy at my dismissal of her conversation, but the last thing I needed to do was to talk about the reason for her earlier fear. Fear of me? Perhaps, although it was clear that my actions may have been responsible for her obvious fright, but somehow, I felt sure I was incidental. My own scowl deepened as I wondered who was the catalyst for the terror that had been clearly etched on her face. Moreover, what had they done to her? Rage coursed through me as I thought of all the horrific things that would befall them if I ever found out their identity.
“Should I take the sofa? I’ll just need to bring the crib out–”
My head was spinning and right now, I just wanted to sleep and to switch my brain off.
“Nobody is taking the sofa, nor moving the crib. I have a perfectly good bed, big enough for us both, so please . . .” I squeezed my eyes tightly shut and pinched the bridge of my nose, warning off a headache that threatened.
“We can’t share a bed.” She glared up at me, her lips turning into a determined pout.
“We can, and we will. I am not sleeping on the sofa, and neither are you, so you can walk in there and climb into bed, or I will carry you. Your choice.”
The firmness of her objection faded before my eyes as nervousness replaced it. I dropped to my haunches so we were eye to eye.
“Do you trust me?”
She studied me and seemed to consider her response.
“Anna, you know me, always have, we were the best of friends, we made promises to one another.”
Her cheeks flushed, telling me that she remembered those promises, not that she’d kept all of them.
“You murdered my brother.” Her words weren’t even an accusation, more of a statement.
“Anna . . . you and Amina are here, under my protection, as family . . . your brother, he betrayed us, and he knew what would happen, you both did, but the one thing he asked of me was to take care of you, and I will, always.” I reached for her, stroking a thumb across her cheek. “You were, you are and always will be, mia ragazza. I will never hurt you. Tell me you believe that.”
She nodded, moving into my touch before suddenly withdrawing. “Aldo didn’t betray you.”
I admired her love and loyalty to her brother but I wasn’t going to argue or discuss this. As much as it had needed to be done, that night hadn’t given me any satisfaction and when I thought about it, a bad taste rose in my throat like bile and I didn’t really know why. Instead, I reached for the sleeping baby and pulled her into my arms, hoping not to look at Anna’s breast as she returned it to her clothing while I took Amina into the bedroom.
“There you go, bella ragazza, goodnight and god bless you.” With two fingers pressed to my lips, I kissed them and transferred that to the beautiful, sleeping bundle’s head. “If you want the bathroom help yourself,” I told Anna who stood behind me and headed into my dressing room, and as my customary naked sleeping was out of the question, I found a pair of check pyjama bottoms Mama had bought in case of an emergency. I smirked and wondered what sort of emergency would have me reaching for pyjama bottoms.
