by Mae Doyle
Epilogue
Isabella
Nicolo had told me that we wanted to keep the ceremony small, and I did my best to respect that, but I kept coming up with names to add to the invitation list. It wasn’t enough for us to just have his friends and family members there, I felt like I had to have some people who had known me or cared for me before.
It was a huge debate between us whether or not we should invite the Torentis. He knew how badly I wanted to have actual family at the wedding, but in the end, he was right.
It was too much of a risk. As much as I wanted to see my mom’s aunt and uncle and have family there with me to celebrate, they came with their own baggage and threats. And the last thing that I wanted on my wedding day was to worry about someone coming in and trying to shoot someone.
So I called them and talked to then, and they understood. They understood enough that, even though they didn’t show up, there was a brand new truck sitting out front of the house with a huge red bow on top of it when I got up.
“I really thought that stuff like that only happened in the movies,” I told Nicolo over breakfast. Technically, we weren’t supposed to see each other on the day of our wedding, but it wasn’t like we’d done anything like the book before, so there wasn’t really a reason to start.
No relationship starts with kidnapping and being shot, right? But ours had, and somehow, it was working.
“It’s what happens when you’re mafia,” he told me, putting his fork down. “We tend to be a little over the top from time to time.” Standing up, he began to clear the table and I popped up to help him.
“Let me,” I told him, taking the dishes from him. They were my parents’ china, and I didn’t like the idea of them accidentally breaking on their way to the sink.
As soon as I’d put them down on the counter, Nicolo came up behind me and wrapped his arms around me. I leaned back, my head resting on his strong chest. It was hard for me to believe how far the two of us had come. We didn’t get along at first, but then it all changed.
It was like I suddenly realized that he was the person who was put here on the earth for me. I didn’t really believe in ridiculous shit like that, but it was hard not to think that it was true when he was so willing to sacrifice himself for me.
I knew that, out of all of the people on the earth, Nicolo was the one that I could depend on.
“I love you, Isabella,” he told me, his voice a little muffled from how he had pressed his lips into my hair. “You are amazing, you know that?”
Squirming from his grasp, I turned around and wrapped my arms around his neck. It was insane to me that only a few months ago the two of us met. We hadn’t known each other very long, but it didn’t matter. He was my life.
Or part of it, at least.
It was hard for me to stand as close to him as I had in the past because my belly was getting in the way. I’d been worried about what it would be like to walk down the aisle pregnant, but he’d assured me that nobody was going to say anything to me.
Or about me.
They were all afraid of him. It sounded insane at the time, but I’d been paying attention. I saw how people deferred to him, how willing everyone was to do anything that he told them to do. Nicolo wasn’t just good at what he did – he was the best.
That’s why he was the boss.
“You’re amazing too. You saved me, in more ways than one. I don’t know what I would have done or who I would be if it weren’t for you, you know that?”
He sighed and rested his hand on my belly. We had a few more months to go until the baby arrived, but I knew that we were both getting a little antsy. I was ready to take on my new role as his wife and a mother, and Nicolo just wanted our child out in the world so that he could make sure that he was able to take care of him.
Nicolo didn’t respond. Instead, he leaned forward, pressing his lips to mine. I melted under his kiss, reaching up for him and running my hands through his hair. He was delicious and strong, protective and unafraid, and he was mine.
All mine.
Nicolo
Three and a half months. That was how long Isabella and I were married before everything broke lose and our lives changed completely. Not like they hadn’t changed enough, but we’d managed to build a strong relationship and marriage on the fact that I’d kidnapped her. Saved her.
“You look great, hellcat,” I told her. She was sprawling on the sofa after checking the mail. Even though she wasn’t due for two weeks, she kept telling me that she was having pain in her lower back. I refused to believe that anything was going to go wrong.
Not with my wife.
Not with my hellcat.
She was the strongest woman that I knew and there wasn’t any way that something bad was going to happen to her, no matter what she was afraid of.
“I think I’m going to pop,” she replied, running her hands over her stomach. “I think it’s happening soon, Nicolo. Like, today, maybe.”
“You said that yesterday.” I dropped a kiss on her head and walked into the kitchen. We were fully moved into my house, but had plans to get away to the cabin for the weekend. Isabella had convinced me that we didn’t need to put the doors back up in the bathroom and the bedroom, so the whole place was just as open and free as we had left it.
But first we had to get through the rest of the day. Even though Isabella had tried her best to convince me that she didn’t want a baby shower, my sister and cousins hadn’t remained convinced. There wasn’t any way that they were going to let her have a baby without tons of gifts, and that was on the menu for the rest of the day. After that though? We were off to the cabin where nobody could get in touch with us, and I couldn’t wait.
To be honest, I know that Isabella was a little sad that she was pregnant and couldn’t sneak a glass of wine. She didn’t always see eye-to-eye with my sister, Cecelia, but that was fine. I didn’t either, but she was family, and that was all that mattered.
Cecelia was a doctor, and I’d called on her more than once when one of my guys had gotten injured on the job. She knew how to get the work done, keep her mouth shut, and move one, and I had to admit, that was pretty damn good.
The doorbell rang and then the front door swung open. I heard Isabella swear as she got up to greet whoever it was who had arrived. I looked at the clock. 10:30, which meant that whoever it was was half an hour early.
Cecelia. I knew it.
“Isabella, you look amazing!” My sister called. I could hear Isabella’s voice, but I couldn’t quite make out what she said in response. “Nicolo told me that you were almost due, but I’ve been so busy with work I haven’t seen you in a while. Man, you look great. Feeling good?”
I walked into the living room from the kitchen in time to see Cecelia helping my wife back to the sofa. Honestly, Isabella did look amazing. She also looked exhausted and like she might pop at any moment, but I’d learned better than to mention that to her.
“Big brother!” My sister ran over and hugged me before stepping back to really look at me. “Do you know how lucky you are to have such a wonderful wife? She looks great.”
I grinned at her. Even though Cecelia and I sometimes didn’t get along, she was my sister, and I loved her. She was almost as tall as me, which made her a great basketball player when we were younger. Cecelia loved her job but tended to be married to it instead of having fun and dating. I’d been on her more than once that she needed to settle down and have some kids before it got too late, but she’d shut me up.
She’d paid to go to school to be a doctor, not a wife.
Okay.
“Everyone else will be here in half an hour,” I told her, “but do you want something to eat? Something to drink?”
Cecelia opened her mouth to respond, but before she could, Isabella cried out.
“You guys? I think…I think that something’s happening.” She pushed herself off of the sofa and I ran around Cecelia to get to my wife. Isabella’s face was pale and contorted with p
ain, but before I could say anything, my sister appeared and got in between us to look at her.
“Are you having contractions?” Cecelia asked, putting her hand firmly on Isabella’s stomach. Isabella didn’t answer, but cried out in pain and reached for me. I grabbed her, wincing a little as her nails dug into my arm.
It didn’t matter. I’d do anything, suffer anything, to make sure that she was okay.
“I’ll take that as a yes,” my sister murmured, dropping her hand to Isabella’s wrist. I watched as she looked at her watch and took her pulse. “She’s good, but that baby’s coming. No shower for you two today, we need to get you to the hospital.”
Isabella shook her head as the two of us tried to help guide her to the door. Her feet seemed to be stuck to the floor, and she wasn’t moving. “No, I can’t,” she gasped out as another contraction tore through her. “I can’t go to the hospital.”
“Honey, that’s where you and the baby will be safest,” Cecelia responded gently. My mouth dropped open to see such a calm and caring side of her. She was my sibling, the person I’d grown up punching in the backseat of the car, not a doctor who could calm someone down like that. I was surprised.
Isabella shook her head again and turned to me. “Please, Nicolo, you can’t make me go. That’s where…” she paused and a contraction tore a scream from her before she could continue. “That’s where I lost her.”
Her mom. She didn’t want to go to the hospital because that was the last place she’d seen her mom alive. I wished that we’d talked about that before, but it just hadn’t come up. I assumed that we’d go to the hospital for delivery, and she’d never fought me on it.
“Bad memories?” Cecelia asked, gently stroking Isabella’s cheek. When my wife nodded, my sister set her jaw.
Oh, there it was. There was the drive and passion that I knew from when we were younger. Isabella was still her sister-in-law, but she’d just become something else, too. A patient.
I saw the switch clear as day, and Isabella saw it too.
Understanding dawned on her face. “Can you help me here?” The hope in her voice was almost painful to hear, and I reached out to take her hand.
My sister nodded. “I will, but I don’t deliver a lot of babies. That’s just…not what I normally do, so if things start to go wrong then we’re calling for help and you’re not going to fight me on this, you got it? That, or I can ask my brother here to put you over his shoulder and carry you to the car. Your choice.”
“I won’t fight you.” Isabella shook her head and looked like she wanted to say something else, but another contraction stopped her. Beads of sweat broke out on her forehead as she screamed.
“What can I do?” I didn’t want to be helpless, but that was exactly how I felt watching my poor wife struggle with the pain that tore through her body. I wanted to help, and I was willing to do anything that my sister told me to do, as long as it helped Isabella.
◆◆◆
“How is she?” Cecelia had made me carry Isabella to the bedroom and then sent me out for a few things. Rags, hot water in a pot, some Tylenol. I carried it all back into the bedroom where Isabella was stretched out on the bed, her eyes closed, her stomach surprisingly fast.
“You took a while. Get lost on the way to the kitchen?” Cecelia asked, taking the rags and water from me. “You have a son and he’s perfect.”
“Already?” my jaw dropped. “I heard her cry out once but then…that was it?”
My sister nodded. “Your wife is a damn champ, Nicolo, but I doubt that she’s going to be game to have a lot of people over later today for a baby shower, so I started sending out texts to cancel. No worries. I took care of it.”
That was something that I’d forgotten about my sister – how, when you really needed her to, she came through with flying colors. That was something amazing about her – that she never hesitated when someone needed her. It was probably why she was such a damn good doctor.
“Thank you.” I locked eyes with her and, for a moment, it was like looking at our mom. Cecelia looked so much like our mom sometimes that it took my breath away. She had her long dark hair pulled back from her face and looked Italian through and through, but we both had our mom’s eyes.
Bright blue. Not an Italian trait, but then again, our dad had caused quite the hubbub when he married a non-Italian girl.
“Go see your son. I’m going to clean her up, but you can just pretend that I’m not here.” She turned away from me before I could answer and went to Isabella, touching her lightly on the shoulder.
My wife immediately turned and looked at me, her eyes widening when she saw me. “That was the easiest thing ever,” she said with a grin. I tugged the blanket down to see our son. He was nestled against her chest, his little hand closed on the air, but when I took it in mine, he immediately grabbed my finger.
Joy rushed through me. I’d never felt anything like that before. Ever.
“He’s perfect.” I pushed some blankets out of the way and got into the bed next to Isabella. “I mean really, honey, he’s absolutely the most perfect thing I’ve ever seen. Look at him.”
He had a darling little nose and was sound asleep as I poured over him. Not only was he gorgeous, but he had a head full of dark hair that I knew would look just like mine when he got older.
“He’s alright. I think we did pretty damn good on our first try.” Isabella leaned up and kissed me.
“First try? You saying something that I need to hear?”
She laughed. “We both know that little Dante will need a sibling or two. And if they’re all as easy as he was and as perfect as he is, then I want to start trying again as soon as the doctor gives me the okay.”
“Sounds good to me.” I glanced around the room. The house was small, but perfect for a growing family. If Isabella wanted, though, I was more than happy to start looking for something bigger. The cabin could be our family escape, but we’d need something big enough to house the whole family.
“Excellent.” Isabella shifted position and Dante woke up, his soft cry surprisingly loud. I took him from her and got up to bounce my son. He was perfect in every way. It took us a hell of a lot to get to this point, but I wouldn’t change a damn thing about it.
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