4. Rage that is Contained is Bad for the Health
Chapter 4
Rage that is Contained is Bad for the Health
T he villa in Maranello was dark except for swaying candlelight and the red hue of fireplaces blazing, scenting the air with beeswax and toasting wood. Underneath it all, I smelled the richness of Rosaria’s perfume. Perhaps we had not built this place with our own two hands, but it was the place we had made our bed and lain in it—even if we were not alone.
I had made the most of the loneliness, and she had made the most of whatever was left of me. Those times were gone. Dead and shriveled. What we were left with was an emptiness that could not be filled, not even as the ornate furniture filled this palatial villa. I would not grieve for them, and neither would she. Neither of us were built in that fashion. On the outside, we were both made of stone, but on the inside, we were whiting and linseed oil. Easily manipulated by the Fausti famiglia, but able to recover without much fanfare.
Removing the jacket from my shoulders, resting it over my arm, I stopped in the grand entrance and took a deep breath, sensing the atmosphere.
The villa was as silent as a dead city. Not even my footfalls echoed. The air was cold, not even the fires heating it. I was immune to the temperature, but the air seemed to be filled with a haze—a haze from the warmth of the fires and the chill in the air battling for control.
The chill was, so far, the victor.
From the rooms where the fires raged on, shadows danced along the walls and spilled out on the floors in red and black shapes.
Cool air seemed to drift past me, and in it, I caught the scent of Monica lingering on my clothes and skin. The taste of her was still on my tongue. Her voice echoed inside of my memories, a whisper ending our intimate relationship. She was still chasing a ghost from long ago and was becoming tired of filling the emptiness with the wrong men. She would love me as a dear friend, speak to me, but that aspect of our relationship had finally come to an end. She had come face to face with mortality, and she decided not to live a lie any longer.
My father was not hers, and she was not his.
The truth had finally set her free.
This was what I had advised her all along. This was why the Fausti family believed in it. Was able to create a term from it and repeat it as a vow. La mia parola è buona come il mio sangue.
Monica had suggested I take my own advice. But as my father did not understand, neither did she. Rosaria and I were twisted in a life we could not unravel. Even though we could no longer understand each other, we both remembered the time when we had. Those memories were fumes that kept us barely going.
I would miss the long nights in Monica’s bed. However, she was not mine to fight for, in terms of her love, and I was not hers. We both had understood this and used each other to fill the emptiness. There were times we would almost destroy each other’s bodies to get to something deeper that did not exist in each other, but we hungered nonetheless.
Sighing, I started for the steps, stopping in my office. I rested my jacket over the back of the chair before I lit the fireplace. The first rush of heat in the air was immediate, but the chill that followed began the war in the room. I went to the stereo system and pressed play. Rosaria’s father serenaded me from the box. I rolled my sleeves up, going for the bar. I made myself a glass of whiskey and sat in the moody darkness drinking glass after glass, until the flames stood still instead of swaying. The bottle glistened amber, and the crystal glass sparked a rainbow of colors.
I stared at the fire until my vision turned dark and smoky, the thoughts in my mind bright and clear. I thought of my son’s wedding, the one he should have had, and perhaps I would reserve that date as a day of silence. It was not a day to celebrate but to mourn all that had been lost. Perhaps Rosaria’s mouth should be stitched up in honor of her vicious truth. I made a grunting noise that came from a hollow area in my chest. If it were only that simple. I did not believe needle and thread was strong enough to quiet her.
A shadow passed in front of the door—a quick, cold wind, there and then gone. It was my wife, though she did not stop. She crept around her gilded prison, scheming for a way out and allowing all the rage she usually inflicted upon the world to build up inside of her.
She did not care that our first grandson was not with us because of her. She only cared about his position in the family. She made that clear when she asked my father if Michelangelo’s place with extended family would move him up the line to rule someday. Rosaria always planned for the future, and even from her deathbed, the control she craved as much as love would be her companion, reminding her that she was about to lose all control.
Control would be her last kiss goodbye.
One of those barbs she had inserted inside of me long ago tugged. It was a painful ache. If something should happen to her, she would sing to me until I followed, damning us both to an eternity together.
Running a hand through my hair, I stood from my desk, grabbing my glass and a new bottle of whiskey before I went to the master suite. I had entered purgatory, my office, and went directly to hell. The room was entirely red from the blazing fireplace, its flames only licking higher and hotter, reacting to the open balcony door.
Rosaria was standing outside, facing away from me.
She blended with the darkness, but the outline of red from the fire, the smoke giving her definition as it clung to her, and her perfume gave her away. I set the bottle and glass down on a table next to the lounge chair. I opened the bottle, but before I could pour the liquid into the crystal, it was snatched out of my hand.
“You smell like the daughter of a whore!” she shouted at me.
I sighed. “I did not realize so many of those existed in the world.”
Her imprisonment in the gilded cage was going to her mind. She had been successful in breaking our son’s heart, but she was paying the price for it. Woe to Rosaria that she was. She did the crime, but she refused to pay the fine.
“Do not patronize me, Rocco Fausti.”
“Was not.”
Her eyes narrowed, and then she smiled. “How much of that whiskey did you drink?”
“Enough,” I said. “Enough to kill me if you poisoned it.”
She ticked her mouth. “What would I be without you, king?” She cocked her head to the side. “Do you take me as stupida ?”
“Not once in my life,” I said.
She laughed, and it seemed to hiss as the wood being consumed by the fire did. “Of course. You are an intelligent man. You would not dare doubt me.”
Her eyes were wide and frantic. Her hands were balled into fists. She spoke to me in a normal tone, but it was as if the last bolt that held the rage down was beginning to slip.
“I have demands,” she said. “If Luca will not give them to me, you will soon enough.”
My eyes dropped to meet hers.
“Matteo and his daughter of a whore will raise Michelangelo, just as help would. This was why I wanted to have more help with yours. Luca put an end to that, but look where it has gotten them! All but Marzio has grown attachments to you.” She waved a hand. “This will not happen with Michelangelo. He will depend on those two for basic needs. He will not be coddled or treated as if the sun will stop shining if he does not smile. Perhaps I will not be here to see the day Michelangelo rules, but I will put the plan into motion.”
“Go on,” I said, allowing her the chance to release what had been pent up inside of her.
“I will be free,” she said, “or I will cause a war that will make the one with the Nemours seem as though boys were at the hands of toy soldiers playing make believe.”
She swayed before my eyelids drifted shut for a moment. “No,” I said, my voice firm, unwavering.
“To which demand?” She crossed her arms over her chest, her foot tapping.
“Both.”
Turning, she lifted her arm and flung the bottle full of whiskey at the wall. It shattered into hundreds of pieces, the liquid running toward the fire, causing balls of it to appear in the fireplace. Blood ran down my face from the ricochet of the glass. Perhaps pieces of the glass had embedded in my skin.
She started screeching at me, and I almost had the urge to cover my ears. The sharpness of it was piercing my eardrums, causing my heart to race. It was as if she was inside of my head, and her voice was a bell ringing inside of it.
“I am giving you one more chance, Rocco Fausti!” she screamed. “If you do not free me, allow me to leave on my own terms, I am leaving. This was not part of our arrangement. We came together in honor of the family, not to be separated by it. I am leaving and will go to the Russians if my demands are not met. I know who to speak to! It is not Luca Fausti. You will call him!” She shoved a phone at me, but I did not take it.
Why are you this way? The question was on the tip of my tongue, but I was not in the habit of asking questions I knew the answer to, even in the state I was in. Rosaria had proved over the years that Rosaria’s choices were her own. She made her own self happy, and damn the rest of the world if her needs were not met. This rage and defiance had been building up in her for years, but it took my father restricting her access to the world and our family for it to burst from her seams.
“No,” I said—simple and direct.
She screamed so loud I was not sure if one of our heads had exploded after. I was left with a ringing in my ears that made the bells seem tame. It rocked me on my feet. For a moment, I wondered if she had hit a note high enough to shatter glass. She could achieve this with her voice. Had done it before.
In front of the fireplace, the shards turned into small weapons, except for one piece, a chunk, which she snatched up, not even flinching when it cut her hand. Blood stained the glass as she held it up, coming toward my chest.
She was going to stab me in the heart.
I was going to allow her to.
At the last second, instead of impaling me with it, she made a slicing motion, diagonal, and cut me across the chest. Making another irrevocable mark on me. She had done it before, one night in Switzerland, but not to this extent. Perhaps what she had given me mixed with the whiskey had made my blood too thin. It poured from my chest, saturating my white shirt, turning it purple. My skin had torn as paper would, showcasing what was inside of me.
Flesh and bone.
I kept my eyes on hers. She took slow steps toward the door. I swayed a bit, allowing the blood to run freely, and the fire in my chest to warm me. It was the first time I felt something other than cold in much too long. I missed the feeling. Craved it. Prayed it consumed me.
Dropping the dagger, she ran, calling for my men to attend to me. I knew that, with the attention off her, she was leaving. A show of defiance to the Fausti family. If she left these premises, she would be personally challenging Luca Fausti. She would become a traitor to the family by reaching out to the Russians and Nemours, swapping information with them for the freedom she had demanded of me, which I had denied. Or perhaps she would have to answer for my death. My rich blood was spilling too quickly for my body to replenish.
I was just a man with a weary lion’s heart.
Either way, we were both dead.