Chapter 1
Who Says You Can't Go Home Again? Certainly Not My Husband
Aria Amora
Iwaited in the fast, dark car as Rocco took the steps to his place in Maranello.
He held a folded piece of paper in his hands.
He’d been keeping it with his things since the letter was delivered from an avvocato, which I learned was the Italian title for lawyer.
I’d made a lame joke about lawyers in Italy being avocados, because the word sounded similar, and Rocco had grinned, but we both had known.
The letter was from Rosaria. A letter she had written before her death—it was only to be delivered to Rocco after her death. It was, for her, a way to cleanse herself of all the secrets she held in life and all that she assumed she’d be doing after she left this world.
He didn’t read it on Aria Island, but after we had pulled up to the estate in Maranello, and he’d put the car in park, he had reached for it.
He read it, then handed it to me. Rosaria had summed up her feelings on their arrangement, Rocco’s sons, and the woman who was fated to capture Rocco’s heart and become all to him she knew she’d never be.
But most of all, she gave that woman—me—a first-hand account of who she was as a person.
“She’s freeing you,” I’d whispered.
“You freed me,” he’d said. “And she understood—the last part about freeing my heart would possibly free me from the Fausti family. That would spite my father, since my brother, Brando, has already freed himself. Till the end, her rage sent her on a dangerous path.”
“That would leave Dario to take over?”
“Matteo would step up, but there are some waves in the water for him right now. The family usually does not challenge a man who can only have one heir, but the sleeping monster has been known to wake for much less. Around the handing over of power, especially. It is a vulnerable time.”
“Matteo can’t have more children?”
“Neither he nor the niece of my heart.”
“Oh.” I’d sighed. “I didn’t realize…”
Rocco was good with family news, although he wasn’t a gossip, unless something came up and he mentioned it.
I had a feeling, though, that our current stop in Maranello was not for him to grab some clothes or anything valuable he’d left behind.
And the letter confirmed that feeling. Rosaria spoke of singing on a balcony, longing to be free of the constraints of this world, because not even those could keep her locked in.
Rocco was going to set her free, just as she had asked him to.
I refuse to be trapped anywhere your memories of our time together might keep me, out of loyalty or spite. Know that when I go, I am not going to linger. It is not my style. To linger means to be weak. To be subtle. I rip. I slash. I kick. I explode. I take over the entire room.
She was a hard woman to understand. Who wouldn’t want to be trapped wherever Rocco Fausti was?
And she said she wouldn’t linger, but she had.
I knew for certain that was her unfinished business below my window the night I’d found her beneath it.
Because Rocco was keeping her trapped on this side of things with his memories, and she wanted me to free her.
Good to know that she wouldn’t be making another appearance.
She’d demanded to be free. She was, or she was going to be—fully.
Pisolino, the cat who adopted me on Aria Island, was sitting in the driver’s seat, flicking his tail, staring at the estate before us.
The only reason Rocco felt comfortable leaving me in the car, because I could tell he was unmovable about bringing me inside (I didn’t want to go in either), was because his brothers stood around the car with their wives.
A few of his top men were around too. Plenty of time to get me to safety if something were to happen.
The gates around this place seemed top-notch.
Strong enough to give us time to find shelter if it was attacked.
I just needed a moment to process the letter and the new ground I’d shortly be standing on.
I leaned forward some to take it all in, how lush it all was, and Pisolino made a noise. “Yeah,” I whispered. “I get it. It’s so different than our apartment on the island.”
Rocco had “bought” the apartment for us.
I’d learned that no property on the island belonged to one family.
It was like timeshares, and the biggest ones were a perk to the top leaders in the family.
Which was why I’d been assigned to an apartment.
I was only a worker. Even Castello Sul Mare, the castle overlooking the sea that the king lion himself used when he vacationed there, wasn’t owned.
It was only reserved for whoever the current “king” of the family was and their close family.
But Rocco had spoken to the “manager” of the apartments and had agreed to pay monthly for the apartment all year round.
So, it was ours, to a certain extent. Still. It was filled with framed pictures of us and our family, Pisolino included, and ceramics we had purchased from an island vendor. Small touches that made it feel like home.
It was vibrant, cozy, ours.
This place felt almost…hot. Like midnight trysts for more than two and hot candle wax on perfumed bodies.
I wasn’t opposed to hot candle wax dripping on an already overheated body, but…
I knew how much having so many...wrong bodies had cost Rocco.
I might not have been skilled in the art of sex, yet, but I knew how it felt to have a fantasy of the right person, then coming up empty day after day, always one step closer to thinking and accepting: this person for me doesn’t exist.
Castello Sul Mare had felt ice cold to me. It was almost too beautiful for words, but it felt empty, even with the view of the water and all the sunshine the sky had to offer.
Which told me our little love nest had hit the right chord, in terms of what felt like ours in this world. It was a place that sheltered and protected us.
Sighing, I turned the car off and set my hand on the door handle. Dario must have noticed, and he opened my door for me. I smiled and thanked him as Pisolino shot out behind me, ready to explore.
“Don’t get too comfortable,” I muttered after him.
The property was vast, and I was worried he wouldn’t come back. But the island was vast, too, and he always returned to me. It almost seemed like he had a radar on me when he knew I wanted him home.
Scarlett hugged me again, and then, without a word spoken, she pointed to a certain side of the estate.
I started that way, Dario following not far behind.
He was the brother who spoke the least, and that was saying something, since Rocco and Brando weren’t all that chatty either.
Romeo spoke the most, mostly about his hair.
Or as all the women instructed me to call it, the hair.
Romeo was going to be after me to follow the hair’s Instagram account soon. He told me he’d remind me once we were in a place that had better reception for such things.
“All the sisters of my heart follow me.” He had shrugged, like it was no big deal, but I could tell it would be a big deal to the hair if I didn’t.
“Will you follow me back?” I’d asked.
“The hair approves of your hair, so, sì.”
A grin came to my face and Dario matched it, like he could read my mind.
The loudest thing about Dario was when he slapped Romeo on the back of the head for doing something out of line.
I wondered if Romeo had ever had the balls to slap him back, like normal brothers do.
I didn’t think so. The only one who I could see stepping out of line, and not in such a childish way, was Brando.
He seemed to march to whatever beat his wife did.
Though the woman didn’t march. She almost… floated.
Brando’s independent nature, though, had a lot to do with the information Rocco had confided in me about his mamma.
Rocco was “created” to be a solider. To be a pawn for this family.
Brando had been created out of love and was never required to claim the family name, if he didn’t want to.
He had choices Rocco, Dario, and Romeo never had. Rocco bore the brunt of them.
My heart broke for him, and I crossed my arms over my chest, narrowing my eyes against the sun, trying not to think about all that had hurt Rocco over the years as gravel crunched underneath my heels.
Rocco’s heart was mine, and I was determined to make it better.
Heal old wounds, then apply scar cream on them, until they were nothing but a slight discoloration on his skin.
Only a surface reminder of the times he suffered, times that only made him stronger.
Dario stopped walking. So did I. He nudged his head toward the side of the estate.
My eyes narrowed on a beautiful balcony made from stone and iron.
It was Romeo and Juliette-esque. The fair Juliette leaning against it, her hands caressing the stone, pining for her handsome Romeo.
Romeo standing underneath the balcony, so in love with her that he would defy the entire world to be with her.
Nothing about the story this balcony conjured up seemed to fit Rocco and Rosaria. But the balcony must have been attached to the master suite, and that was where she must have gone to sing—to long to be free, as she’d said. The view seemed to lead into a magical forest.
That was perfect for a songbird. She always had an audience.
“I proposed to Abree once,” Dario whispered.
Turning toward him, I blinked. I had almost forgotten he was there. For as big as these men were, they barely made any noise—barely breathed heavy, even when they exerted themselves.
“Rocco told me,” I whispered back, pushing my hair back over my shoulder. It was windy out. I’d secured the sides, but the back was on its own.