“Don’t fucking lie to me, Alcina,” he said. “I can smell the old money in that tin.”
We stopped walking.
“It’s a secret,” I said. “Between two women. Why do you have to know about it? You do not tell me everything.”
He studied my face. “You want to leave me.”
“If I did?”
“Yes or no,” he said.
I did not say anything. After a minute, he put his lips closer to my ear, pulling me even closer. “If that’s a yes, tell me before you do, and I’ll give you the knife to carve my heart out.”
“You have been offering a knife to me a lot lately.”
“You’re the only person I would allow to kill me,” he said. “Without you, I’m dead anyway.” He said the words so nonchalantly, but with so much weight, I suddenly felt tired to the bone.
We stepped into the house, and after he walked me to the dining room and pulled my chair out, he cleared his throat. “What I told you the night of our wedding—” He paused. “It stands the test of time. I’m the only man in your life, whether you’re beside me or not. I’ll kill any man who even tries to get close to you.”
Then he left.
28
Alcina
He looked at her like she hung the moon.
That was why he named our daughter Eleonora Lucia Capitani—the night she was born, the moon was full and bright enough to see by. Like the night he came to me in Bronte, he was moved by something bigger than the life that ruled him.
Eleonora means “shining light.” Lucia means “graceful light.”
Her dark hair was hardly enough to brush through, and her skin was like fine porcelain. Her eyes were brown, but I had a feeling they were going to lighten to dark amber. She would share the color with her papà. Or maybe even hazel. A mixture between his and mine—amber and brown.
He could hold her with one hand, and she ruled his world.
He slept very little after Eleonora was born, and something about it satisfied me.
After the conversation with Teresa, I watched him at night while he slept. Towards the end of my pregnancy, I could not sleep anyway. He never stirred in his sleep, and he looked more peaceful than he did awake, but when one of us needed him the most, he kept guard.
I’d decided that consciences came in all different ways and in different forms. His happened to speak the loudest when he could see the difference between his world and ours, and how far he was away when he could compare the distance.
I knew who my husband was. I knew it the moment I looked at him. The moment I fell in love with him. The moment I married him—the moment of moments—and promised him forever.
I knew who my husband was.
That was why I fought a battle he could not see. If he became lost in a dangerous obsession that he could not let go of, I knew I would lose him to it.
He had enough wars to fight. The one with the mysterious man bothered me the most.
It was not about business, but something personal. I could see it in his eyes when he was alone for long periods of time, with too much time to think. How he could not let the idea of it go, especially since the man seemed to be playing games with him.
Corrado Capitani was not used to losing.
Neither was I.
I’d be damned if I lost him to anything other than natural causes when he was old and tired.
I was capable of doing all of the things my husband did on the streets. The difference between us: I would only do them for love. He did them for the family and obligations. It was almost instilled in him. He was a product of the life, as they called it.
Love is not a weakness; it is the greatest weapon of all. I reached inside of the pocket of my dress and touched the rosary there, knowing just how strong I was. What I would risk for love.
The life I had fought so hard to have—this was it. It was my husband and my daughter. La mia famiglia.
A soft, warm hand touched my shoulder, and I smiled, putting my hand over hers. “She’s a good sleeper,” mamma whispered.
Corrado had arranged for mamma and Anna to be here when Eleonora was born. We were going to take her to meet her nonno at the end of summer, when we flew back