by Bethany-Kris
If anything, it made it better.
She felt more.
She felt him deeper.
He was watching her, too, she found. Dark eyes, parted lips, and sex on his tongue. He watched her.
It was such a shame, she thought.
How good they could have been outside of this.
How good they had been.
How good it could have been.
How good this was.
Life certainly wasn’t fair for them.
Funny, though, how she didn’t care about life when Calisto was fucking her.
Author’s Note: Unseen files are typically events that take place after the last chapter of the final book, Thin Lives, but before the actual Epilogue, as that was twenty years into the future. These are not deleted scenes, but rather, events that readers expressed interest in seeing, and as such, were written exclusively for the Collection, and Behind the Bloodlines.
—Kris
The Donati Prince
Calisto watched as Cross’s dark curls bobbed up and down, in and out of his father’s sight from the other side of the desk. The two year old toddler had strewn cars, trucks, and trains from one end of his father’s office, to the other. Calisto should have been focusing on the documents that he had yet to go through on a business he was considering buying, but Cross’s fun and noise was keeping him distracted.
Not that Calisto minded, really.
His son—although his nephew to the outside world—was his pride.
His very greatest pride.
And the boy was only two.
Calisto could only imagine what Cross would be like as a young man. So for now, he did his very best to keep Cross close, to give him time, affection, and love that he would remember long after his younger years were forgotten.
Time, love, and affection that was so unlike what he had been given growing up under the man who had meant to be his father-figure. As a boy, he remembered being adored by Affonso, sure, but now it was tainted with all the lies, secrets, and manipulations to go along with it.
Calisto didn’t want that to be him and Cross in twenty or so years, when his boy looked back on his life with the man who raised him.
“Vroom, vroom, vroom, vroom!” Cross screeched, chasing a self-propelled car with one he was pushing. Then, the toys, and the toddler, crashed into the far wall. “Boom.”
Cross had mumbled the word at the same time he crashed into the wall. Calisto had all he could do to hold back the laughter.
He briefly wondered if Cross had hurt himself, but it didn’t last long. Cross groaned before rolling over, grabbing his cars, and beginning the game all over again. Perfectly safe, entirely unscathed.
As usual.
Calisto tried not to coddle his son too much. It was a sad fact of their life, but when his boy was older, no one would be watching Cross’s back, or standing him up on his own two feet when he crashed and burned. Cross, like Calisto, would have to eventually learn over time to do those things on his own.
So as much as he struggled and wavered, and as much as it sometimes killed him to see the tears well in Cross’s eyes every time he fell, missed a step, or if he got a little out of hand when he played, Calisto stayed back.
As long as there was no blood, no broken bones, and no visible bumps, Calisto let Cross learn to self-soothe and self-care.
It was not a boys will be boys sort of mentality, either.
For Calisto, it was more of a this boy needs to learn that he can handle things, and fix them, on his own.
Sometimes, Calisto failed, too.
Sometimes, he simply reacted to the sudden cries of his two year old son, only to find the boy had jammed his finger trying to sneak a cookie. Or even when Cross was pissed because his mother’s dog had stolen his toy.
But he thought, even in those moments, Cross knew exactly what he was doing. He would look to Calisto with the knowing smile and genuine joy only a toddler could have. He imagined in those moments, that Cross was thinking, See, Papa, I knew you would come.
Sometimes, it only took the right cry.
Sometimes, a louder than normal bang.
Sometimes, it was just Cross’s babyish, boyish giggles and his voice calling, “Da!”
Calisto would run.
Cross would be waiting.
“Da,” came the child-like voice at his feet.
Calisto broke from his daze to see Cross sitting on the floor, holding up a car for him to take. It was red, with a bright yellow racing stripe.
Cross’s favorite car.
“Da,” Cross said again, offering the toy still. “Play, Da.”
Calisto thought to correct his son about calling him his father, as he usually did when others were around. Though he had legally adopted Cross, everyone else knew him as the boy’s uncle, and it was safer that way. He often corrected the boy to say Zio, and not the Da or Papa that Cross preferred to use.
That killed Calisto, too.
But no one was there, no one who would care, anyway.
Calisto corrected nothing.
He preferred Da or Papa, too.
“Play?” Cross asked again. “Please, Da.”
He had work to do.
It was well past seven, and his son’s bedtime.
Calisto didn’t care.
He got down on the office floor, and played with his son until Cross crawled into his lap, his car in hand, and fell asleep.
These were the moments that he hoped Cross remembered the most.
These ones right here.
Calisto didn’t realize how long he had stayed like that, holding his sleeping son on the floor, until his wife arrived home and was standing in the office doorway. Emma didn’t go out with friends very often, so when she did, Calisto said nothing about it, simply let her go and have her bit of fun.
She was the love of his life.
The very best mother, too.
“Why didn’t you put him to bed?” she asked.
Calisto shrugged. “Because.”
“Because why?”
“Because someday, he’ll be older, Emmy. He won’t want to play on the floor, and he certainly won’t want to play with me.”
Because that’s what happened when little princes grew up to be kings.
Principessa
“But, Emma—”
“Cal, we’ve been over this a hundred times already. It’s too risky.”
He knew that.
She was right.
“We know, though. And Cross was perfectly fine at thirty-two weeks, just a bit small.”
“Cal, he spent over a week in the hospital, had jaundice, difficulty latching, and just the fact that he was even that healthy considering his gestational age at birth was nothing more than fucking luck.”
Calisto sighed, rubbing a hand down his jaw to ease the tension settling there. It didn’t really help. He fucking hated fighting with his wife, even if this wasn’t technically them fighting, per say. But he wanted this one thing for them, and him, so badly, that he was willing to risk it turning into a fight just on the off chance his desires would be heard. A simple “no” was not going to be good enough for this.
“Emma, just think about it.”
His wife turned on her heel in the walk-in closet, stopping Calisto from following her further. Anger and hurt blazed in her eyes. “Do you really think that I haven’t stopped to consider something like that?”
“Well—”
“Do you think I’m that callous?”
“I never said that,” Calisto rushed to say. “And I never would, Emmy.”
“Good,” Emma replied sharply. “But in case you might have forgotten, I can’t not think about it, Cal. It’s my body; my babies lost. One on a kitchen floor, and one in a graveyard. How dare anyone, but especially you, even suggest that I don’t, or can’t, think of having another child, when I’ve already lost two? I think about another—and them—all the fucking time!”
Calisto felt properly chastised f
or speaking without, at the very least, considering his wife’s feelings. “I’m sorry, Emma. That wasn’t what I meant to say, or how I meant for it to sound, and I’m sorry if I made you feel that way.”
Emma glanced away, but not before Calisto saw the tears gathering in her eyes. “I know you want another baby.”
“Not to the detriment of us, though.”
She nodded. “I thought Cross was going to be enough.”
Calisto quickly crossed the space between him and his wife, taking Emma into his embrace and holding her tight. He carefully wiped the silent tears from her cheeks, and then kissed her softly.
“He is enough. He has always been enough, Emma.”
“But he’s not yours, too, right?” she asked quietly. “Not to everyone else, and I know how much that kills you inside. They look at him and think he’s Affonso’s boy, not yours. I see it in your eyes every time you have to correct him to call you uncle in front of others. Or worse, when someone else calls you his uncle to him. You raise him, you love him, and yet, he can’t fully be yours to them, even if he really is.”
Calisto frowned. He hated that his one thing—his one cause of sadness—was so clear and on display for his wife. She didn’t need to be burdened with these sorts of things. It was his issue, something he had done and it was his sole choice to continue. Even if it hurt him, and it did, it was in the best interests of his wife and son. Emma knew this, of course, but that didn’t make it easier on either of them.
“He is enough,” Calisto repeated.
“But?”
“There doesn’t have to be a ‘but’ at all, Emma.”
“But is there?”
Sort of.
Probably not what she thought, though.
“I see you too, you know,” Calisto murmured into Emma’s hair. “But especially when you think that I don’t. When you get invited to a baby shower. Or when you see babies at the park. When someone asks about a sibling for Cross. I see, too, Emma.”
She sighed. “I think about it all the time, but I think about a kitchen floor and a tiny casket, too.”
Yeah, he knew that now.
Calisto wasn’t so selfish of a man, or so full of foolish pride, that he would hurt his wife in an effort to fill their house with more children.
“As long as we’re happy like we are,” Calisto said, “then nothing else matters. Right?”
“But are we?”
That was the million dollar question.
“I don’t know, Emmy. You tell me. I’m leaving this up to you, now. I won’t say another thing about it until you do.”
“Cal … Calisto!”
The sheer desperation in Emma’s scream sent Calisto flying from his office. Three and a half year old Cross stumbled after his father, likely confused.
“Cal!”
He wasn’t quite sure what to expect as he took the stairs three at a time to the second level. Emma had been napping, as she needed her rest. Especially now, considering her state.
Rest.
Relaxation.
No stress.
Those were the doctor’s orders. They had been the doctor’s orders from the day, fifteen weeks earlier, when they found out they were expecting their second child, and that his wife had already been a month along at that point.
“Cal!”
Each time that Emma shrieked for him, her voice became impossibly higher. More terrified. Heartbroken, even.
He found his nineteen-week pregnant wife on the middle of their bed, straddling a small streak of red that stained the white sheets. Emma looked to him, horrified. That expression she wore was so sadly familiar; he had seen it on her before, remembered all too vividly her pain and terror as he opened a public bathroom stall in a restaurant only to find her miscarrying her unborn child.
Calisto knew what Emma was going to say before she even said it. He still let her.
“It’s happening again,” Emma rasped.
He was stunned, frozen to the spot, and so fucking useless in that moment. Things were supposed to be good with the pregnancy, even the doctors thought so. Twice weekly appointments to monitor the baby and Emma’s cervix had given them a sense of security that everything would be just fine.
It was a false sense, clearly.
It took the smallest gasp from Cross to finally break Calisto from his stupor. The boy pushed past his father and moved further into the bedroom, pointing his finger right at his mother with wide eyes.
“Oh, noes,” Cross said loudly, “Ma’s got a bleeds!”
Emma’s tears flowed harder, which only spurred tiny Cross into his own round of cries. Likely at the confusion of what was happening around him. His small world was not usually so chaotic and unsure.
Calisto said nothing as he scooped his now wailing son into his arms, grabbed the cordless phone on the nightstand, and made a call. Twenty-four-seven, he had someone watching the house, or very close by. Less than three minutes later, Calisto passed his son off to the enforcer that rushed inside the house.
By that time, Emma had managed to get out of the bed and make her way to the stairs. Calisto met her there, and carried his wife to their own car. He didn’t care to call emergency services and wait for an ambulance.
He would always make it there faster.
“Oh, I’m sorry,” the ultrasound technician said, giving a squirming Cross an annoyed look. “Our policy is not to allow young children, even siblings, into the room.”
Calisto glared, refusing to let go of his son who wanted down on the floor. “You’re fucking kidding me, right?”
“Uh, well, no.”
Emma glanced up at Calisto from her wheelchair, a staple in her daily life since being admitted to the hospital two weeks prior. “It’s … okay.”
“See,” the tech said, far too chipper for Calisto’s liking. “You can handle the little one. She will be fine to go in alone.”
No.
Hell no.
It was most certainly not fine.
Calisto barked out a laugh before he could check the impulse. “No, I’ll be going in, and so will our son.”
The tech put her hands on her hips. “Policy says—”
“Fuck your policy,” Calisto snapped. “I don’t know if you’ve bothered to give more than a passing glance at my wife, or if she’s just another appointment for you, but take a moment to do that.”
The woman did, and Calisto knew exactly what she was seeing. A tired, worried Emma who looked small in her chair, and really just needed to get this whole day over with.
“She’s in a hospital gown, in a hospital-issued wheelchair,” Calisto said before the woman could speak again. “Because right now, and for the unforeseeable future, this hospital is where she fucking lives. Her pregnancy is so high risk, that for the moment, the doctors can’t afford for her to be outside of this place. Now, I know you probably haven’t opened her file yet to know what you need to check for on the ultrasound, so you don’t really know any of these things, but let me fill you in really quick.”
Calisto smiled, but it was cold. “The only thing that is keeping my child inside my wife’s body right now is a hope, a prayer, and a goddamn fucking stitch. A stitch that may or may not be infected, but we have to wait until the specialist finishes his appointments for the day before we can get a start on those tests. Now, we had the option of having a portable ultrasound machine brought up into my wife’s room today, but given she hasn’t seen the outside of it since she had the stitch put in, the nurses and I thought that she might like a bit of a break by taking a trip down here.”
“Mr.—”
“Shut up and listen,” Calisto interjected sharply.
“Cal,” Emma murmured.
He ignored his wife.
She was not the type to cause a fuss, while he most certainly would.
“This is literally a day-by-day thing for us right now. One day, to the next, and then to the next again. That’s how we’ve been told to treat this pregnancy, at least
with the hopes we will make it to a safe threshold so that our child is viable.”
Calisto ran his hand through Cross’s mop of black curls. “So today is one of the only days that our son has been able to come in and see his mother this week. And we told him that he would also be able to see his baby brother or sister today on the screen. Do you understand what that means?”
“No,” the tech admitted.
“It means: Fuck. Your. Policy.”
Cross got to see his sibling.
Calisto and Emma learned they were having a beautiful little girl.
A princess.
A Donati principessa.
“Papa?”
Calisto’s eyes cracked open to see the darkness of his bedroom staring back at him. He was acutely aware of how empty his bed was without his wife sleeping beside him. It felt cold and uninviting, but he didn’t have much of a choice.
His bed would continue to be a cold and empty place until Emma was back at home. He spent as much time at the hospital as he possibly could, but with their newly turned four year old, his position in la famiglia, and life in general, his time had to be split between the hospital, home, and the business.
Speaking of Cross …
“Papa, can I sleeps with you?”
Calisto blinked awake further, his gaze focusing on Cross standing just a foot away from his side of the bed. In one hand, Cross clutched his favorite blanket. His other hand was stuck in his mouth. Or rather, his thumb was.
“Cross,” Calisto mumbled.
The boy’s thumb slipped from his mouth with a wet, loud pop. “Yeah, Papa?”
Calisto sighed, trying to decide which issue to deal with first where his son was concerned. The fact Cross was out of his bed, or sucking his thumb. The ‘Papa’ thing was a whole other matter. Cross called Calisto his father whether he was corrected on it or not, however, he had learned not to do it in front of others.
“Why are you out of bed, buddy?” Calisto asked.
“Wanna see Ma,” Cross said simply.