I can’t tell whether my mother suspected any of that. Even if she did, it mustn’t have mattered to her.
The fact that Callum O’Hara, the man with hot Irish and Sicilian blood simmering in his veins, would become her third husband was all that mattered.
She was as sure of that as she was about the shade of the nail polish she would wear that day.
What can I say?
My mother had never been interested in the unpleasant parts of our lives.
The business, the money, the shady deals.
In all fairness, we, the women, had never been welcomed to the negotiation table, but some of us, like me, were more perceptive than others about the men’s wicked ways.
Giorgio must’ve talked to her about setting her up with an arranged marriage, and I’m sure she didn’t oppose the idea.
She must’ve salivated at the thought that she’d get her hands on Callum O’Hara, especially since so many stories about women who’d fallen prey to the Irish mobster’s eyes had circulated in our world.
He wasn’t a player.Not in the sense a lot of fuckers are in our creepy universe.
All men I know have kept mistresses.
Even Giorgio, although Sylvia has never taken it lightly, and if he’s keeping mistresses these days, he makes sure she never gets wind of it.
But most of them don’t make a secret out of it.
It’s one of the perks of this life.
Women know that.
Men know that.
The other women know that.
And everybody’s doing their bit.
Once in a while, things have been renegotiated in private, usually in the bedroom, and some lucky women have bent that rule a little.
Still, most women haven’t cared enough for their men to engage in deep negotiations, or they’ve been too scared to fight something so ancient as this unwritten law.
So Callum hadn’t been a player because he never had a wife or a steady woman.
But he fucked. He surely did.That’s how the women got their hearts broken.
He fucked for pleasure, and sometimes, to gain something, and Giorgio was aware of that, hence the idea of an arranged marriage.
In my grandfather’s mind, pressing the Irish mobster’s back against the wall before offering him a way out was a genius move.
What can I say? He kind of nailed it.
Callum’s empire was restored to its former glory, with one caveat, though.
He was now a married man.
He lost his freedom, but knowing him, that part didn’t matter much.
He could fuck on the side if he wanted to and also run his empire whichever way he saw fit as long as he remained loyal to us.
And my mother?
