by Bethany-Kris
He had his arm wrapped around her waist before she could even try to run. She barely weighed a thing—maybe one-hundred-ten pounds soaking wet, he thought. Like this, she just seemed so fucking fragile, and not at all ready for the hell her brothers wanted to put her through.
He’d known that from the beginning, though.
“Stop,” he ordered, dropped her onto a couch. “Don’t you move.”
Ginevra pushed up from the couch with her hands raised, and ready to slap him. “I don’t want to marry you! You can’t make me!”
Andino chuckled. “Good. As much as I like an angry woman, you’re not the one for me, Ginny. Now shut the fuck up, and sit the hell down if you want to leave this church as a single woman.”
Her eyes widened—still full of tears, and red-rimmed. “W-what?”
“Sit.”
She did.
Andino took the box out from under his arm, and set it on her lap. “A gift for you. Consider it your wedding gift, even if this wedding never happens. You’re to use everything you find in it, and if you follow every direction inside to the letter … there is someone outside in a black Porsche. He’s doing me a favor. You get in that car, use what I’ve given you in this box, and you stay gone until I say otherwise. Do you understand me?”
Ginevra’s gaze drifted from the box in her lap, to Andino’s face. “I don’t … Why?”
“You’re not the one for me,” he murmured. “I’m sorry it went on this long. It shouldn’t have happened to begin with.”
She untied the bow, and opened the box. Andino didn’t need to look down to know what she would find inside—paperwork and a fake identity to get her across the Canadian border. Money, and untraceable credit cards attached to said identity. New clothes, and even a sizeable church hat that would give her just enough of a different appearance to get her out of this place.
“His name is Corrado,” Andino said. “And he was told to leave by twelve-thirty whether you were in his car, or not.”
Ginevra looked up again. “Corrado?”
“Corrado Guzzi. He’s a friend, and he owed me a favor. What time is it, Ginny?”
She didn’t know.
Siena answered for her.
“Twelve-twenty.”
“Ten minutes, then,” Andino said. “You better hurry up, and make a choice.”
“That’s not enough time,” Ginevra whispered. “Kev and Darren are—”
“Busy, at the moment. And I can keep them busy for a while longer.”
“I’ll help,” Siena added. “I will, Ginny.”
Ginevra was still staring at Andino, and the tears had started falling again. “Is he nice?”
Andino laughed. “Corrado?”
“Yeah.”
“What does that matter? He’s just going to help for a while.”
“I just … I don’t know.”
“Corrado is … Corrado,” Andino settled on saying. “And he’s a hell of a lot better than what you’re facing if you stay.”
Ginevra nodded. “Okay.”
“Good. Hurry up—time is running out.”
Literally.
SIXTEEN
“What time does your flight leave?” her mother asked.
Haven slapped the ticket she’d printed off against her palm, and smiled even though her mother couldn’t see it. “Supposed to be five, but you know how it goes …”
“Probably three delays, and before you know it, you’ll be on the damn red-eye.”
She laughed. “Yeah, exactly that.”
Silence covered the phone for a moment. She knew that was just her mother overthinking again. She called them every single day. It didn’t matter that she knew they were fine, she still had to call. Their conversations had been like this ever since Haven called to let them know the house had finally sold.
Then, this became real. This whole Haven moving to Florida thing. For a while, her parents believed she wouldn’t. That she would do exactly what they wanted for her, and keep living her life because that’s what they felt she deserved.
Well, it was happening.
Today was her last day in the house. Everything was gone now except her laptop, and a printer she was ditching as soon as she left. Her luggage was already outside in the trunk of the car. A car that would stay in the parking garage of the airport until a friend could drive it down to Florida next month.
It was all done.
Today was the day.
“How’s Dad doing?” Haven asked.
“Outside mowing the grass.”
“Bet his allergies are loving that.”
Her mom made a quiet noise. “It’s not so bad, actually. Allergy pills do wonders for him, I guess.”
“Huh.” Sighing, Haven stared out the bare kitchen window to the outside. It was a beautiful June day—bright, sunny, and hot. The kind of day she would love to get a run in before heading to the club for a night of work. That had been her life. Her entire life. And it was all about to change. “You have chemo tomorrow, right?”
Mae cleared her throat. “I do—noon, sharp.”
“I’ll be able to go with you, then.”
“You don’t have to do that, Haven.”
“I know, but I want to, Ma.”
Mae let out a heavy breath. “I wish you wouldn’t put your whole life on pause for me, sweetheart. I’m fine.”
Her mom kept saying that, but Haven didn’t know if it was truth. That was part of the problem. Not that Mae understood, really. Haven had never properly explained it, she supposed. That wasn’t her mom’s fault.
Turning in the empty kitchen, Haven took another look around the space. The bare walls stared back, as did the freshly cleaned counters, and appliances. She’d opened the doors on the fridge and freezer to allow them to circulate air.
“I’m gonna miss this place,” Haven said.
It was the first time she admitted that out loud to one of her parents.
Her mother made a sad noise. “I know, baby.”
“But … I have to get away from here. I can’t be here anymore.”
That silence was quick to saturate the line again. Haven wasn’t sure how long it lasted before her mother broke it.
“Haven?”
“Yeah, Mom?”
“You’re sad,” Mae murmured. “Why are you sad, dolly?”
Haven smiled at the affectionate nickname her mother used to call her when she was just a girl. She’d been that peach and cream-skinned kid with big blue eyes, and pouty pink lips. Her blonde hair had fallen in ringlets down her back. Just like a pretty little China doll, she supposed.
Or that’s what her mom always said.
Hence, dolly.
“I’m not sad,” Haven was quick to lie. The last thing she needed to do was burden her mother with all the shit that had been happening in her life. She’d managed to keep Andino and that mess far away from their notice. She wanted to keep it that way, especially now. “I’m … nostalgic. Yeah, that’s the right word.”
It worked, anyway.
Mae made a dismissive noise. “Do you know when you lie, you almost ask things as a question when you mean to state them?”
“I do not!”
“Okay,” her mother drawled. “Haven, what’s wrong?”
Her gaze caught the white cardstock sitting on the edge of the counter. It was crumpled now, and a little bit bent from being caught in her doorway a month ago when Andino showed up. She’d had no contact with him since then other than that one phone call she initiated. He listened, and stayed away. She was grateful.
Yet, that stupid invitation was still sitting there, and fucking taunting her. Nonstop. She couldn’t seem to get rid of it. Even though it hadn’t come from him, it was something. Just like all those other stupid notes of his were still stuffed in her journal—pressed safely between the pages where no one but her could read them.
“Haven?” her mom asked.
“I met someone,” she whispered.
Mae suck
ed in a fast breath. “Did you? Who?”
“His name is Andino. It was supposed to be fun, you know? And then it turned into something else entirely. I love him, but he hurts me. I can’t do that anymore. It doesn’t matter. Point is, he wasn’t who I thought he was, and … he was the worst mistake I ever made.”
“Nothing is ever a mistake, Haven,” her mom was quick to say. “Love is not ever a mistake.”
Haven felt that familiar prickling behind her eyes. The telltale sign her tears were about to make another show of themselves, the fucking things. She hated crying. She was so sick and goddamn tired of crying.
Hadn’t she done enough of that?
“Love can’t be a mistake when it’s one of the few things in life that can change us irrevocably in a second, Haven,” her mother said. “Love is a lot of things, but a mistake is not one of them.”
“Feels like it right now.”
“Because you’re hurting. That’s not the same.”
Haven let out a shaky breath of air. “He just comes from a different world than me, Mom. There’s a wall there that I can’t get over, and every time I tried, I ended up a little more broken when I fell. I’m tired of falling. I don’t fall. I climb.”
“Oh, Haven.”
“What?”
She hated the pity in her mother’s voice. The sadness there. This was exactly why she didn’t want to bring Andino up to her parents. They loved her so much. And it didn’t matter what she did, or what she chose for her life … they were going to say, go on, girl, and live your best life. Be your best person. Be happy.
Because they were wonderful.
She did not deserve them.
“How are you ever to learn if all you do is succeed?” Mae asked softly. “We learn best when we are challenged, and when everything seems the most impossible … when we are able to drag ourselves broken and bleeding out of despair, that is when we become the best version of who we are. You can only be a fraction of that person if the only thing you’ve ever done is succeed. Why would you think love was any different?”
“Love shouldn’t hurt, Mom.”
“Maybe not,” her mother agreed. “But love is crazy, dolly. Love is unlike anything else, and it is worth a second chance. It is worth pain, and hurt, and everything else that comes along with it if you can still drag your broken and bleeding body out of the rubble it leaves behind. When the fire finally goes out, and all that’s left is ash, what does the Phoenix do, Haven?”
“Mom.”
“What does it do?”
“It rises.”
“It rises,” her mom echoed. “And so does love, and so will you. If that’s what you want.”
Because it was her choice, she realized. Her choice to go back, and ask why. To finally give him that chance to explain. To decide to leave the rubble alone, or with him.
Except … none of that mattered.
Today was the day.
That date written on the wedding invitation. The day he was no longer hers.
“It’s too late,” Haven said.
Mae laughed softly. “Haven, it is never too late.”
• • •
Haven had never been a Sunday service, church dress, big hat kind of women. Sure, she believed in God. She had faith in a higher power, and trusted that at the end of someone’s days, the good went where they were intended to go, and those who were bad went where they deserved to spend eternity, too.
But organized religion?
Praying every day?
Church on Sundays?
That had never been her thing, or her family’s. She was baptized Protestant as a baby, but the last time Haven remembered stepping inside a church was when she was seven, and her only sibling—a baby boy her parents named Caleb—was laid to rest in a small, pale blue casket after dying from SIDs at only fourteen days old.
Her parents never had more children.
They’d never gone back to church, either.
Haven suspected that was because her parents’ relationship with God had been severely tested from the death of their son. Up until that moment in her life, she remembered spending every Sunday in church sitting between her parents in a pew. But after that? They spent Sundays living.
Because wasn’t that what life was for? The living?
Maybe that was why as an adult, Haven had never found herself drawn to church. God was still on the back of her mind, sure. And maybe that was just her personal way of keeping connected to him in the privacy of her own mind. Prayers that no one knew she was saying, and faith that no one could question.
He knew.
Wasn’t that what counted?
Haven’s awkwardness at standing on the steps of the church could certainly be attributed to her tenuous relationship with organized religion, but that was only a part of it. A lot of it was the fact that she knew the love of her life was about to be married inside this church.
And he was not getting married to her.
She looked no different than any of the other guests rushing up the steps. She was dressed up in the most suitable thing she had been able to pull from one of her suitcases. A pale yellow dress that hugged her curves, and fell just below her knees. Certainly church and wedding appropriate, even for a Catholic ceremony. She used a large similarly colored sun hat that Valeria had left behind when she left to pull off the outfit. Plus, it might keep her face hidden.
Win, win.
If only …
Haven was too late. She didn’t need to be told to know it was true. She could tell by the way the last few guests were rushing up the stairs of the church, and the fact that a car was already waiting at the bottom with painted-white tins tied to the bumper.
If the ceremony had not already started, it would soon.
She was too late.
She thought, maybe, she might get there in enough time to see Andino before all of this took place, but it seemed like she hoped for way too much. And now she was only left heartbroken all over again.
Turning on the stairs, Haven moved to leave altogether. She didn’t need to be there to see her future walk away, too. This was more than enough.
“Late too, are you?” came a familiar voice.
Haven’s gaze lifted to find a hazel-eyed, grinning Marcello standing just a few steps below hers. Andino’s uncle.
Lucian.
“I’m not here for … the wedding,” she said lamely.
Lucian nodded. “I don’t want to be here for it either, frankly.”
Yet, he was.
Like her.
The man tipped his head to the side, and drew a hard puff from the cigarette in his hand. He eyed the cancerous stick with a keen eye. “My wife hates these fucking things, and for the most part, I gave them up years ago. Like a lot of other bad habits. But on days like today, it gets me out of shitty situations that I don’t want to be in for at least ten minutes while I have a smoke. Lucky me, huh?”
Haven blinked. “I should go.”
“Why?” Lucian asked, glancing back at her. “Because you think he’s actually getting married today?”
That lump in her throat was back, and harder than ever. She swore it stuck to her throat like hot, sticky tar. Burning, and refusing to budge no matter how many times she tried to swallow it down.
“Isn’t he?” Haven gestured at the car at the bottom of the steps with the words Just Married painted on the rear windshield, and then waved the invitation in her hand. “I’m too late, I guess. Not that it would matter. I wasn’t what the rest of you wanted for him, anyway.”
Lucian smiled softly. “On that, you are most wrong. Things always appear one way to those who are on the outside looking in on our life, and for that, we can’t apologize. But I assure you that when Andino says you are what he wants, then you are what we will give him.”
“Has he?”
“What?”
“Said that. Has he?”
Lucian flicked that cigarette down the steps, and climbed the last few stairs t
o come stand at Haven’s side. He offered his arm, and she only stared down at it. “Go ahead and take it. You and I will sit in the back together, and watch just how my nephew decides to tell the world—and the rest of them who haven’t figured it out yet—exactly what kind of man he is willing to be, and all the things he wants, Haven.”
She still hesitated. “I don’t understand.”
“I was told you didn’t give him the chance to explain. Might that be why you don’t know?”
It definitely was.
She was regretting that now.
Haven took Lucian’s arm even knowing that it might mean more pain. She took his offer to find out the things she hadn’t bothered to ask. Even knowing that it would mean she was likely going to miss her flight, and all over again, upset her entire life and world.
She took his arm because what did she have to lose now?
She’d already lost it all.
Haven just wanted to get it back.
• • •
Sitting in the pew with Lucian beside her, Haven was momentarily distracted by the size of the church. Sure, the place had looked big from the outside, but not this big. The vaulted ceilings seemed to go on forever. There were at least a hundred rows of pews. Maybe that was being a bit dramatic, but there was a lot. She could see the altar from her position, but just barely.
Lucian smiled over at her. “I remember that feeling.”
“Pardon?”
“The first time I walked into this church as a boy, I was overwhelmed. I was so small, and it was so big. Large spaces bothered me as a child for reasons that don’t matter right now. And even though the place scared me because of its size, it also … well, it comforted me. I have found the greatest comfort behind these walls. I may not seem like a God-fearing man, but we all are. Every Marcello has their own unique relationship with God, but especially this church.”
Haven glanced upward again. “It’s your family’s church?”
“It is.”
Oh.
“I don’t really do church,” Haven admitted. “At least, not since I was a girl.”