by Sienna Mynx
"Oh? When it comes out will it know me? When Giovanni first saw Eve, she knew him. She let him hold her and give her cookies. The twins were very small and in little plastic boxes in the hospital. But if he spoke to them they moved their feet and hands. They knew him. Will the baby know me? Know how much I love him?"
"Yes, the baby knows you love her. Give me your hand," she said.
He gave her his hand, and she pressed it to her belly. "This is your baby. All yours. There is no one more special in the world to our child than her father and mother. The baby will come, and it will need you to be strong, to protect her. To love her no matter what mistakes she makes in life. To give her away at her wedding. To love her babies and make them tough. She will love you like I love you. Unconditionally."
"I want him named after me. Okay? To take my name," he said.
"Of course. And if it's a girl?" she asked.
"It's not. It's a boy," he sighed. "Stop calling it a girl."
There was something in his sigh that caught her by surprise. It sounded like worry.
"What is it?" she asked.
"Giovanni sent Renaldo home to his wife. I might have to delay our trip to Bellagio. I need to deal with our problem first. And I guess I will have to do it alone."
"Isabella? No word on her? Is she still in Italy?" Marietta asked.
"She's not going to leave until she gets what she wants."
"What does she want, Lo? She's your sister for goodness sake. You spoke to her. What is she really after?"
"I told you. She wants to destroy Gio," he said.
"No. That can't be it."
"Why can't it?" he asked.
"She's playing games, and for far too long. She could have blown your world apart years ago. First Kei and now this? She wants something else."
"She wants to destroy Gio. She thinks she can use me to do it. I'm not going to let that happen." He glanced over to her. "I made a lot of mistakes. I know that, Marie. But I'm devoted to you now, to our family. I won't let her come in and rip us apart."
"If Gio finds out what you did, how can you protect either of us?" Marietta asked.
"Gio's reasonable. We're brothers. If the worst happened and he heard those tapes, he would not kill me. He could not do it."
Marietta touched his face. "Are you willing to bet our lives on that?"
He didn't answer her. So she tried another approach. "Think of it this way. If you were him and Giovanni were you, would you be so forgiving with the clans and mafia looking over your shoulder? After all these years and all the lies you’ve told to cover your mistake. Tomosino is dead. Fabiana is dead. An entire family of Calderones is dead. Women and children died. Carlo lost his brothers to the never-ending wars. All of it happened because you got drunk one night and said things you never meant. And your being sorry for it changes nothing. It's unforgivable."
"Damn it, Marie!" he sat up and knocked her hand away. She watched him pace. "Why are you fucking with my head?"
"I'm not, baby. I swear I'm not. I'm thinking for you. There is no circumstance where this secret comes out, and we don't lose. Do you hear me, Lo? I know you love Gio. I know you think your bond is unbreakable. But I'm telling you it is breakable. Isabella is tightening the noose around your throat. And if you don't kill her now, me and you will be on the run for the rest of our lives with our children."
"You're her sister. Mirabella would not let Gio force us out of the family," he said.
"She will choose him over me. No one has ever chosen me first. Not even my mother. No one but you, Lo. And I accept that. Do you know why?"
He shook his head no.
"Because I will choose you and our child over her, over any of them. It doesn't mean I don't love Mirabella. I do. It means that I understand the price we have to pay for loving men like you. I don't wear the same blinders she does. I see life for what it is. Please, baby." She got out of bed and walked over to Lorenzo and took his hands. She kissed his knuckles. "Get dressed. Now. Go out there. Go to the ends of the earth if you have to, but find her! And kill her. Before she destroys our lives."
He nodded. "I'll find her. I did once. I'll find her again." He pulled her up into his arms. She was brought to her toes to hold on to him. "And I swear to you. I won't hesitate the next time."
Marietta led her husband back to bed. She wrapped her arms as best she could around his large frame and hugged him to her. He kissed her face and then eventually his mouth. She stroked his dark curly hair. His lips came up from hers. She stroked the side of his face.
"Amore mio, what is your plan?"
"I'll find her, Marie," he said and tried to kiss her again. She grabbed his face and stopped him.
"How? Where will you look?" she asked.
"I know where to look, woman!"
"Listen to me, stop letting your pride get in the way. If she wants to hurt Gio, then she is going to do what she has always done. Use his enemies. She did it with Kei. Who else is powerful enough, hates Gio enough to help her?"
Lorenzo frowned.
Marietta smiled. "Be smart, sweetheart. Think like her and you will beat her."
"Or maybe I should think like you?" Lorenzo said.
Marietta smiled. "Maybe."
He rolled her over to his chest, and she lay there. She listened to his racing heart. It was hard to tell a man as stubborn as her husband what he should or should not do. But after loving and living with him for the past few years, she learned the ways to push him in the right direction. They were going to find and destroy Isabella. Together.
***
"Bella," he said. Giovanni reached for the guitar case and unzipped it. He put the strap around him and situated the guitar on his lap.
"For you." Giovanni strummed the strings with his thumb and tickled a melody that was soft and sweet. Mirabella wrapped her arms around her legs as she drew her knees up to her chest under her long skirt. She rested her chin on the top of her knees and closed her eyes. He played for her. He didn't sing. And soon she recognized the song. It was one of many played at their wedding.
"Do you remember this song?"
"You know I do," she replied.
"Sing for me," he said.
It wasn't a typical request of his. She sang in the shower, and he would just stare at her and smile. She sung to the babies, and he would stop to listen. She hummed and sung softly to herself as she held on to him and drifted to sleep. Growing up with a religious southern family, singing was natural for her. She had done it from a young age, like her mother. Not once did she explain it to Giovanni, or have him request her to do it for him.
She opened her eyes. She almost declined. She didn't know all of the words to the song, and it felt strange singing in Italian. He nodded with a smile to encourage her wavering confidence. Mirabella had hummed through the first few bars before she began to sing from memory. She didn't know all of the words. The phrases she forgot she hummed her way through. And he didn't mind. He played the guitar to the pitch of her voice perfectly. How did he learn to play so well? Why didn't he play more often? Many thoughts went through her mind. And when the song ended he stopped to clap for her. Mirabella laughed. She got to her feet in the back of the wagon and did a lady’s curtsy for him.
" Brava!" he said.
Giovanni had only thought of the guitar when he went back into the villa to fetch his briefcase before they left for Chianti. He told his men to bring it. After hearing from Umberto how upset she was with him for leaving in the middle of the night, he knew he had to find the perfect way to make it up to her. And once again he felt as if he were the one who got the reward. The woman made him so happy.
"Where did you learn to sing like this?"
"Church," she answered.
"You sang in church?" he frowned.
"Yep. I grew up Pentecostal, not Catholic, remember? And I sang in the choir. My Me-Ma played the piano, and my grandfather preached. Church was a big part of our lives. They say that my mother's voice was far better. I w
ish I had heard her sing."
"Does Marietta know how to sing?"
She reached over and dragged the basket closer. To the top of the basket was a bottle of their family Chianti. "I dunno. She can dance. She loves to dance for Lorenzo and the kids. But I've never heard her sing. Care for some?"
"I brought the wine for you, not me," he said and strummed the strings of the guitar.
"You gave up on drinking forever?"
"For now," he said.
"Because of me?" she asked.
"Because of us," he replied. He looked up to the sky and saw the moon disappearing again. He felt her staring. He didn't bother to explain his no alcohol rule. She of all people should rejoice. Not until his very last enemy was put into the ground would he take another drink. His Bella uncorked the bottle and poured herself a glass. He peeked up at her as she sipped the magenta vino. He strummed the strings and the guitar bellowed the beautiful song Amore Mio.
"Cin-cin!" she said and toasted him once she'd swallowed the entire glass full. Under the light of the lanterns he saw her beauty differently. The wind was playful with her hair. A few times it lifted her long bangs and their eyes met. His Bella possessed an inner strength that didn't lessen her femininity. She looked angelic, graceful in any setting.
"What are you thinking?" she asked.
"About the moment I found you and Eve again. How lucky I felt when you said you would come back to Italy with me," he said.
"Lucky huh? That's not how I remember it. You were pissed. And if I recall correctly you didn't ask me to come, I was told."
"I was happy." He strummed the guitar. "I had a daughter, and the love of my life had risen from the dead. Not many men can reclaim his heart after it's lost so easily."
"Nothing was easy about our reunion. In fact, we owe Lorenzo for bringing us back together."
Giovanni stopped playing. He looked up. "I never thought of it that way. Lorenzo was the one who found you. I was really fucked up after I had thought you died. If it weren't for him, I'm not sure how I would get through it."
“Women? What about other women? Did they help you get through it?”
“I don’t remember,” he mumbled.
"Yes, you do."
He gave her a cheeky smile. "I was a drunk. And far crueler than I've ever been, that time, those two years were the worst and darkest moments of my life. I hated myself, and I hated the world. What I did, what I became, I have no excuse, Bella."
“I’m sorry love,” she said. “It was awful being away from you. I thought I would never see you again. But you came. And you forgave me. I remembered how sweet and cleansed I felt after forgiveness from you. I know people fear you, but your ability to be compassionate and forgiving is what makes me fall even deeper in love with you."
"I don't remember it the way you do,” he said and began to strum the guitar and play a song she wasn’t familiar with. “I was angry at myself. I was the reason you ran away, hid from the world, had our daughter alone with that... man."
"Kei?" she asked.
"Calderone," he said. "It all started with the Calderones. If Lorenzo and Giuseppe hadn’t tried to bring drugs into the triangle Fabiana would have never been killed, you wouldn’t have run for your life, Flavio wouldn’t be dead, Isabella wouldn’t be in our lives, I can go on and on...” he said.
“It started with Giuseppe Calderone?” Mirabella repeated. “I never really thought of it this way. I guess our lives are a chain of events; one action connects another reaction."
The guitar strap was brought from over his head and the instrument set aside. He crawled over to her. Mirabella drank down the last of the wine and licked her pouty lips. She tossed the glass into the basket. She was ready for him. He could see it in the teasing smile to her mouth, and the way she reclined on the pillows.
"It's time?" she asked in a playful voice.
He nodded. “It’s past time.”
He hovered over her, pushed up by her hands. He stared down at what was his. Yes, he slipped into darkness after he lost her. But he imagined most men would if they lost such a beautiful, loving woman.
“Dove sei stato per tutta la mia vita?--where have you been all my life?” he asked.
“Uhm, Apple Grove, New York, I spent some time in Los Angeles too,” she said.
He chuckled. She reached up and touched the side of his face.
“Finalmente ci siamo incontrati--finally we have met, Mirabella,” he said.
“Yes, we met, we fell in love, and we married and made more babies. Destino,” she said.
“I want to go back to that time. Before you knew the darkness in my life, before it came into yours. I want to go to the beginning. Visit New York, meet you in a café and ask for your phone number. I want to invite you to dinner and dancing. Then take you back to my suite. Make love to you, make you mine, and then start our life any way we choose.”
“Giovanni? Our life is perfect the way it is. And I would never erase our history.”
He blinked away the invisible tears he felt forming.
“Yes, there is pain, caro," she continued. "But that came and went. What stayed is this. It has been you and me, against the world. That’s what’s lasting.”
“Senza di te la mia vita non ha senso--without you my life has no meaning,” he said and brushed his lips over hers.
“Mine either,” she answered and lifted her arms up to his neck. She pulled him down on her. That sweet, almost too soft little murmur of surrender he loved to hear, escaped her after their first kiss. She had soft, pliable, succulent lips, and he savored the berry flavor of wine on her breath. The woodsy funk from the old relic of a wagon used to carry barrels of grapes and olives, mingled with the smell of grass, daffodils, and humid air bearing the first sheen of rain. None of it compared to the crisp floral beauty of his Bella's perfume.
Giovanni’s mouth lifted from hers. He’d never been loved so completely. The sundress she wore reminded him of a long stretch t-shirt, and he loved the way it clung to her hips, and defined the round sweet plump cheeks of her ass. He tugged on the material and pushed it up to her hips.
“Vuoi spogliarci--wanna get naked?” he breathed. He pressed his erection hard against the soft heat protected by the thin layer of her panties
“Out here? Are we alone?” she asked.
“We’re alone,” he said with the intent of stripping her bare. It would be nice to have her consent. He looked into her eyes and saw a hint of fear and excitement. His balls hardened and drew close to his groin.
“Okay. Let’s do it!” she grinned.
He lifted off her. He pulled his shirt over his head and tossed it. He started to unbuckle his belt. Her gaze flickered lower to the wisps of chest hair that reached out of the top of the tee. She touched them lightly.
Mirabella smiled. "Come home to Virginia with me, Gio. No more delaying this trip. Let me show you who I was before we met. Where I come from. The kids need to meet my family, too."
He helped her pull her sundress over her head. "What about the doctor? And the nightmares? I know you still suffer from the nightmares. Just yesterday you saw Kei in the bathroom."
Mirabella reached behind her and unlatched her half bra. She covered her breasts with her hands and sat in nothing but her panties. "Let me meet the doctor and then we decide on my therapy. Have her come here to the vineyard and meet us both."
"I don't want her here."
"Why not? If I see a therapist, you are inviting her into our lives. Let's do it together. Decide together. Bring her here, okay?"
“Take off your panties,” he said.
She faked shock at his request. Inviting strangers into their lives was risky. However, that argument was for another time. Right now he wanted his wife.
“Hai un guanto,” she said.
“What did you say?”
“Hai un guanto,” She crossed her arms and gave him a look of defiance.
“You’re asking me if I have a preservativo?” he chuckled.
“Yes. Do you have a condom? Aren’t we waiting on making a baby? This looks like some baby making stuff out here to me.”
"Come here!" he grabbed her, and she screamed. She fell back on the pillows and laughed as he grabbed her foot and tickled the bottom of her feet. Laughter exploded from her. She kicked and twisted and fought to get free.
"No! No! No! Please, Gio! No!"
He had a good grip on her foot so she couldn’t escape.
"You've got secrets, Bella?" he asked.
"No, no, no secrets,” she laughed and cried. She flopped around trying to get free.
“You sure? You keeping secrets from me in America?”
“Nooooo! Gio, stop!” she screamed.
He let her foot go. She rolled over to her tummy and continued to giggle and kick her feet. He smacked her ass. The upside down heart shaped swell of her butt cheeks that dropped out of her panties jiggled. He loved the svelte curve of hips. He loved fucking her from behind. Giovanni removed his belt. And then pushed down his pants. He was going to be in her within seconds, and he wasn’t going to wear a fucking condom.
“That wasn’t fair!” she said. She wiped her tears and looked back at her.
"You think I don't know you?" he asked and reached for her panties. He must have been rough because the elastic waist snapped back and she howled.
"I think there is more to learn," she said and rubbed the sting. She whirled around and sat up. She took her panties off for him.
"Maybe," he said and crawled over her. He dragged his nose from her ear across her cheek, and inhaled her. He could care less about mistakes she made before him. She was absolved of all of them when she became his wife. He knew his woman. He knew the deepest and the best part of her. He knew all he needed to know. The horses stirred. He straightened and pushed up with his hands to look over the top of the wagon at the animals.
"Something wrong?" she asked with a quiver of fear in her voice.
"Don't move," he said. He hated to leave her. The moment he pulled away she reached for her panties and her dress. "Don't move!"