Gratitude, pleasure, and anxiety tangle together inside me. These women are so welcoming to me, treating me like I belong here. If I’m family, that means Leon is family too. The Montonis and the Vicis, all connected by blood and violence and secrets I’m only just beginning to understand.
The kitchen is nothing like the stark, cold kitchen at the Montoni mansion. That one is all marble and steel, beautiful but sterile, a place where my mother works with efficiency, and I was always reminded that we didn’t belong.
This kitchen is alive. Warm wood cabinets, colorful tiles on the backsplash, copper pots hanging from hooks catching the morning light. There are herbs in small terra-cotta pots on the windowsill, their leaves bright green and fragrant. The wooden table is worn and scarred with the marks of family meals and lives being lived. It feels like people are allowed to laugh here, and children are able to make messes.
The smell of fresh coffee mingles with the scent of rain as Sofia sets a steaming cup in front of me, then she turns to the counter and begins cracking eggs into a bowl with practiced ease.
“He’s still out there,” I say, because I can’t stand the elephant in the room.
“We know,” Adora says gently.
“He’s suffering from all those injuries,” I cry. “What does he think he’s playing at?”
The two women exchange a look. Something passes between them that I can’t read.
“I know,” I sigh, scrubbing a hand over my face. “You’re judging me for feeling anything for a man who frightens me. It’s all my mom and sister have ever done, tell me I’m stupid for caring about him.”
“There’s no judgment in this house,” Adora interrupts me. She reaches across the table and covers my hand with hers. “I saw the ambulance arrive and leave without him. You called it, didn’t you? I talked to him myself, but he refuses to listen. I wish I knew my brother better so I could understand him, but I don’t judge you for loving him. Or for being afraid of him. Both things can be true at once.”
Tears prick at my eyes.
He’s a psychopath, I remind myself. He killed four men and felt nothing.
He also allowed himself to be cut open without hesitation to save our son’s life.
He locked me in a wardrobe. He tied me up.
He’s never reproached me for lying about Leon. For keeping his son from him for four years.
All these thoughts are at war in my mind. They keep going round and round in my head, and all the while, I can feel Cristiano out there in the rain, the life draining out of him.
I picture him keeling over onto the wet and muddy grass, and my heart convulses.
I shoot to my feet, the chair scraping against the floor. “He’s going to kill himself. I have to stop him.”
Adora and Sofia call after me, startled, but I’ve made up my mind.
I don’t bother with a coat or umbrella. I just run out the front door.
The rain soaks through my clothes immediately, cold and relentless. I cross the street, my shoes splashing through puddles, and stop a few feet away from him.
Up close, Cristiano looks even worse than he did from the window. His skin is gray and his lips are tinged with blue. He’s trembling, though whether from cold or exhaustion or blood loss I can’t tell. But he holds himself upright, his posture rigid with stubborn pride.
“What are you doing?” The words come out sharper than I intend, edged with panic. “Cristiano, why are you still out here?”
“I can’t let you and Leon out of my sight.” His voice is rough, hoarse. “I won’t.”
“Then why don’t you come inside and get us?” I gesture at the house behind me. “What’s stopping Don Cristiano Montoni from just walking in there and taking what he wants?”
His jaw tightens. “My son needs his rest.”
“What?”
“If I come in there, you’ll run.” He sways slightly but catches himself. “You’ll take Leon and go. You’ll fight so hard to protect him from me. And he needs to get stronger. He needs to heal.”
The logic is twisted and desperate. He’s trapped himself here. Paralyzed between the need to be near us and the fear of driving us away.
“Then go home,” I plead. “Go to a hospital. Rest. Recover. You’re injured. You’re going to hurt yourself.”
