Darkness gathers in his eyes again.Good.I’m done being mocked for everything I say.Just goes to prove he’s nothing more than my captor and I’m nothing more than a little diversion in this war he’s waging.
“My time with Moretti was nothing like you’re living now,” he says, the vein in his neck starting to pulse quicker and quicker.“He treated me like a slave, missed no opportunity to make my life hell.From making me clean toilets and sleep on the floor, to making me kill innocents.”
His voice cracks on that last word, and I absolutely don’t need to know who or what he means by the innocents.
“All while missing no opportunity to rub everything I’ve lost in my face,” he adds.“Now let’s eat.It’s getting cold.”
He picks up his spoon and starts eating like a starving man.I follow more slowly, because I’m suddenly not very hungry anymore.
His pain is a real, palpable thing between us now.I know this is the source of his darkness.I know none of that darkness he carries around would be there if it weren’t for Dante Moretti.I know we could be happy and simply in love if it weren’t for that man.If we’d ever met in that case at all.But we would have met.We’re meant to be together.A part of my mind is absolutely certain of that.
I eat a few spoonfuls then stop again.He’s almost done with his plate.
“I’m very sorry for what you went through, I really am,” I tell him.“I feel your pain and not just because I can relate to a part of it.But I still wish we’d met under different circumstances.Because so much more would be possible then.”
He spoons the last of his soup off his plate and leans back, raising his glass to me.
“But this is already so much better than it was last week,” he says.“So here’s to us.And things getting even better.”
When I don’t raise my glass to toast him, he shrugs and drinks some of his wine anyway.
Then he raises it at me again.“Here’s to you then.You stopped me from fucking up my dreams of revenge tonight, so here’s to your dreams.I hope they all come true.”
This time I do raise my glass and drink some of the smooth, pale gold wine.
But I don’t know any more what my dreams actually are.
To be free of him and reunited with my family?
Or that I could stop hating him so that this life he’s shown me a glimpse of today could be mine forever?
Chapter10
MATTEO
I might have brushedoff her concern that I’d be arrested and locked up if I had killed Dante tonight, but the truth is, she wasn’t wrong.My family used to have a huge deal of influence in this town and connections that would’ve kept me out of jail even for murder in a crowded restaurant.But that was then.Now I’m basically a nobody.I have to earn it all back.
Just the fact that she thought about helping me in that way was enough to make me see her in a whole new light.A light that made me believe that maybe there was hope for us yet.
She had other things to say to me.Scathing things.Hurtful things.
But I don’t know how much of all that she actually meant.
I’m driving us back to the house now.The top of Nonno Eddo’s sky blue 1959 Cadillac Eldorado Biarritz is down and I’m taking the scenic, coast road, the only light coming from the moon, our headlights, and the glow of her skin.It’s definitely one version of Heaven.
And one of the top five things I imagined doing with her when we got to LA.The number one thing is of course what we’ll do in the bedroom when we get back to the house…
Her eyes are reflecting the sea, glistening brighter than the diamonds around her neck.I think she likes it.I think she’s enjoying this too.
But I’m not foolish enough to ask.
I don’t think she can tell me the truth of all that.She can only show me.
The ride is over before I want it to be, and yet it feels like it was much too long.The gate opens for us, operated by one of the many men here to fight with me and help me get everything back.
The garden is lit up, most of the outbuildings are too.I only have Caputo, Francesco Leone and Nico staying in the house with us, though Nico seems to prefer the guest house.I don’t even want to know who he brought home with him tonight.But I’m gonna let him have fun for one more night.After that, he’s gonna have to get serious.Because him, and the other two are the only three I truly trust.Nico because he’s blood, Caputo because he swore to Ferro to see me right and Conti, because there’s not much love lost between him and Ferro and he’s looking to make a life for himself out here with me.
The rest of the men are housed in the posh guest rooms where movie stars sometimes stayed after the big parties we used to throw here.Some are also in the servants’ quarters with rooms bigger than a lot of NYC apartments.I mean to keep everyone happy while they’re here, I mean to reward them generously for their help, but they are mercenaries and not my friends, not my family.I will have to rebuild that too.Hopefully with the help of the gorgeous woman accepting my arm as I help her out of the car now.
