22. Move Together
Chapter 22
Move Together
M y feet refused to still. I paced the length of my apartment, thinking about what I had planned to do if Luca Fausti hadn’t released Rocco when he had. I would have jumped on his back like a spider monkey while screeching like a banshee! The sight of it had stopped me cold for a second though.
Maybe the way his father was almost strangling him was the way “situations” were handled in their family, but it gave me a glimpse into Rocco’s life, and it made me so sad.
Did anyone care about his flesh enough to step between him and another monster? What about his well-being? Even deeper—his feelings? His heart?
It made me hurt down to the core of who I was. And I vowed then and there, in that breath, that if no one else would or could stand up for him, I would. I’d stand between a bullet and him. He deserved that—someone who loved him enough to sacrifice their life for him, like he’d sacrificed for his family his entire life. I yearned to make Rocco Fausti’s life so good, it would almost break his heart, the amount of love in it.
But I knew something had been wrong when Rocco left for the meeting. I’d felt it as he left. I’d suggested baking cookies with Juliette while the game Romeo had brought over started to rage so I could concentrate on my feelings and have an excuse to bring something to the castello . It was worth noting, though, that without all the rules that surround this family, Rocco’s close family were a fun bunch. But without him, nothing seemed fun to me. He should have been enjoying his family, instead of getting slammed up against a glass wall. I shivered when I thought about him going through it. The thought of him not being in my life…
My feet seemed to move even faster. I was taking turns so sharp, I wondered if I was going to leave tread marks.
Scarlett had looked at me with understanding—even though I’d said I’d wanted to bring the cookies to the castello for everyone there to enjoy, she knew I’d felt something, and Brando, without a word, walked us.
Brando looked at me like he was seeing me for the first time, and when our eyes met, he nodded at me.
One simple nod, and I knew exactly what he was telling me.
He approved of me for his brother.
It sent a warm rush through my chest that seemed to send my heart into the pit of my stomach.
There was a lot about this family I still had to learn about and understand. I remembered what Nonna had said, the warning, but my heart was already invested—fully, whether it would kill me one day or not. I already knew I didn’t give a shit about the politics of the family, but only one part of it—Rocco Fausti. I was here for him.
I’d pass this fucking test of time for him.
The end.
When he finally entered the apartment, I stopped short. We stared at each other from across the room, Scarlett and Brando slipping out without a word, Brando shutting the door behind them with a soft click .
Rocco stood on one side of the room. I stood on the other.
A beat.
Then .
We went for each other, for totally different reasons.
My hands came up to touch his throat, but he wrapped his massive hands around my wrists, pushing me back until my back hit the sofa. His face was serious. As serious as I’d ever seen it. Below his flesh, I felt the trembling of his bones.
I had only just met this man, but it was as if he were my home, and I’d been inside of his heart forever. He could be frightening when he looked like this, but…I wasn’t afraid of him.
I stuck my chin up. “You’re mad,” I said, stating the obvious.
“Mad does not even come close to what I am.” He rolled his lips.
“He was hurting you!”
“If he would have—” He was too pissed to even finish. He shook his head. “I would have killed my own father.”
“I—” All the fight left me, and I went forward, my forehead hitting below his chest. “I’m sorry,” I whispered. “I couldn’t stand to see it.”
“Look at me, Amora.”
My eyes rose to meet his.
“Never apologize to me. You are forgiven without having to say the words to me— per sempre . That is your right alone.”
I looked away from him. “Are you okay?”
He released my wrists and picked me up, carrying me to the sofa. He positioned me on top of him. I had a knee on each side of him, and my legs were spread, and even though it wasn’t the time… I started to ache. He was right there .
Focus, Ari!
The look in his eyes was NOT helping!
“You missed me,” he whispered.
“Yeah,” I whispered back, moving from his eyes to his lips, but…his lips were succulent and needed to be sucked on.
I was in trouble. Deep. Deep. Deep trouble.
“You are in deep trouble,” he repeated, his entire posture going rigid, as if he was ready to go to war for me.
My eyes flew up to his. I must have said that out loud!
Sighing, I ran my hand over his throat, demanding that my touch be the last touch his skin remembered. He closed his eyes for a second before he slowly opened them. He looked high.
“I am,” I said, being honest. “I am in deep trouble, Rocco Fausti. Whatever this is between us…it’s too powerful for me to even understand. I just know…when you’re too far away, I feel like I might lose my mind.”
He stared at me, then shook his head, setting his palm against my cheek. I closed my eyes to his warmth. His pull. “You are a lethal woman to me, Aria Amora Bella, without holding a weapon in your hand. You could tear the roaring heart out of my chest, but do not waste your time. All you would have to do is walk away from me.”
My eyes slowly opened to his. “Is this normal?” I whispered. “To feel…so much this soon?”
“ Questa è la nostra normalità ,” he said.
This is our normal.
I leaned into his strength and sighed. “Will you talk to me? About what happened?”
He went into some detail about the rules of his family, and how Francesco would challenge him in the future for the title of King of the Fausti famiglia . Rosaria’s death had caused some…concern. Then he said his father was gifting us the private use of the island. Come Monday, it would only be the two of us. And even though Rocco Fausti was too honorable of a man to lie, I felt like he was omitting something from me. Problem was, I didn’t have all the right questions to ask yet.
“You didn’t ask me,” I whispered.
His eyes narrowed.
“You didn’t ask me for my stipulations for staying on this island with you all alone, Rocco Fausti. You are a dangerous man, you know.”
He gave me a serious look and nodded. So, that was his asking technique— got it .
“There are no rules,” I said. “Except for the one we’ve already established. Only you.” I touched his heart. “Only me.” I pointed to myself.
He gazed into my eyes, like he was attempting to gauge all that no rules entailed. For a man who lived by them, I knew this was going to be a challenge for him. Then his face relaxed, and I almost jumped off his lap, but I decided to hold my ground. I cocked my head to the side, probably looking like a German Shepard, trying to read the mischievous glint in his eyes.
“No rules, ah?”
Okay.
That tone paired with the look made the butterflies in my stomach flitter in fear and excitement. I felt breathless. Achy. Anxious. My hands curled around the collar of his expensive suit jacket. I didn’t know where to release the sudden energy. He wanted to go slow with the physical side of our relationship. I could tell. And I would respect that— for now .
“No rules.” I confirmed with a solid nod. “Except for?—”
He cut me off by kissing me, then lifted me up, throwing me over his shoulder. I beat against his back, laughing all the way to the bedroom.
The ending tone to that night seemed to carry the mood for the remainder of the week—when Rocco’s family and the Fausti guests were still around. We were spending all our time with his family, even though we were both eager to have the island to ourselves. The longing was in every other breath, in the lingering touches and intense eye contact— you, me, and the island , the promise stated. That was all we needed. The thought alone made my heart beat erratically and my breath tremble out.
It felt like I couldn’t catch my breath anyway.
If it wasn’t his touch causing me to feel breathless, it was all the things we were doing with his family. There were beach days, dinners in town, the women getting together to cook meals fit for our men, while it also gave us time to connect and grow closer.
“Add chili peppers to that list!” Juliette said, pointing at the paper in front of me.
“Chili peppers,” I mumbled, writing down stinkin’ chili peppers , like that would somehow offend the mean pepper picker.
Scarlett read the list over my shoulder and exploded with laughter. Maggie Beautiful, which Margherita had instructed me to call her, wanted to know what’s so funny, honey …
Scarlett looked down at me and quirked up an eyebrow.
“Go ahead.” I sighed.
Scarlett squeezed my shoulder and told the kitchen of women what had happened between me and the mean pepper picker.
Maggie Beautiful narrowed her eyes, tapping her tooth with nails that were the same color as the chili peppers. “Let’s go get these peppers,” she said. “We’ll be the judge of how spicy they are.”
“Maggie Beautiful.” There was a warning tone to Scarlett’s voice, but when we left, she was the first one out the door.
This was like my very own women gangster squad. Maggie Beautiful grabbed my arm and Scarlett’s, then I grabbed Carmen’s and Scarlett grabbed Juliette’s. Mia grabbed Mari’s arm, who was Mac’s wife, and another line built behind us. The men escorting us into town didn’t look so sure. Occasionally, one of us would catch a glimpse of the worry on a man’s face and we’d explode with laughter, making the rest of us laugh.
I loved these women!
The smile fell from my face when we rolled up to Peppina’s stall, and a group of women worked behind the counter with her. It was like she had grown an army of mean pepper pickers to watch her back. When she noticed us, her eyes grew hot. She pursed her red lips and put her hands on her hips.
“You ruined my peppers,” she snapped at me.
“I didn’t ruin anything,” I snapped back.
“You came here and caused my stall to be almost destroyed. ”
“Did not.”
“You are a child!”
“Yeah, well, at least I don’t sell rotten peppers to people!”
It seemed like her entire group gasped.
Carmen leaned in close to me. “You’ve gone and done it now, chickadee. You basically pecked an eye out.”
“Say that to my face.” Peppina leaned in closer to me, daring me to say it again, but closer to her face for some reason.
I leaned in some, opened my mouth to repeat my words, but a chili pepper seemed to rise from the bin and smack her in the forehead. Surprised, she blinked. Surprised myself, I looked to my right, and Maggie Beautiful had a taunting smile on her face. I wasn’t sure how it happened, but chill peppers just started flying in all different directions. I got smacked in the mouth with one. The intensity of the flying peppers reminded me of La Tomatina , the tomato throwing festival in Spain, but the peppers were holding their own, in terms of not exploding.
The soldiers who were watching over us were trying to stop it, creating a wall, an invisible line between them and us, waving their hands.
“Ah! Ah! Ah! Signora!”
“Signora!”
“Per favore! Signora!”
“Mamma mia! Signora!”
The other soldiers were attempting to pick the peppers off the street, setting them back in the bins, but it seemed like they were only reloading ammo for the war.
I was so caught up in my target, Peppina, since I was her main target, too, that I thought I’d started to float when my feet were suddenly dangling above the ground. Rocco. All our men. They were lifting us in the air, about to turn in the opposite direction, going back to the castello .
Rocco got caught in the crossfire, his temple taking a direct hit. I felt him still, like he had no idea how to respond to a pepper smacking him .
“I have been hit,” he said. “By a pepper.”
In the moment, I was too caught up in catching my breath to speak, but the sight of him and what he’d said had stuck. It would come back to me later.
Luca strode in, spoke to Peppina, making a motion to her bins—the peppers had hardly been bruised—and we left. Not before I noticed one of the men set money down on her stall.
At the castello , the women all met in the kitchen, and when we looked at each other, we all started screeching with laughter. We weren’t laughing over the actual pepper fight. We were laughing at the looks on the men’s faces when they charged in to get us. These men were so serious, so their clueless reactions were a delight.
The entire time we prepared dinner, one of us would start laughing out of the blue, probably thinking about one of the men getting whacked with a pepper. That was when Rocco’s face and his, “I have been hit. By a pepper,” came back to me and I laughed so hard, I couldn’t catch my breath.
I had to be thankful, though—at least it wasn’t a candelabra. The peppers might have stung, but that thing…I was lucky I didn’t die.
After the pepper fight, it seemed like the men wanted to get us away from that area of the island and take us to a more secluded spot. We took boats further out to a private beach away from Aria Island. Another small island called Sirena Island. The restaurant delivered fresh seafood straight from the sea to the bobbing boats. There was a covered area where its patrons could sit on a bench under an awning while gazing out at endless miles of sea. Dolphins were plentiful. and they frolicked in the water like they were showing off.
It had been a long and sun-filled day. Rocco had gone swimming with me, sat on the beach to dry with me, ate seafood with me—we shared, feeding each other—and guzzled birra . The cold hops seemed to be the perfect antidote to the overwhelming heat.
I’d never had a day like that one before—one that had felt so complete.
It was like I was still floating weightless in the water. “Monday Again” serenaded us quietly from the box speakers attached to the restaurant. My hair was crusted over with salt from the water, my skin tingling from the sun but feeling so soft as a warm breeze sighed over us, and I closed my eyes to the glare, resting my head against Rocco’s chest. His voice was in my ear as he spoke to his brothers at the table. My hand was on his thigh, and one of his arms was around me protectively as my fingertips stroked his skin.
We had slipped into such an easy rhythm, a rhythm that felt so natural, like we’d had it forever, yet each touch felt so new and exhilarating. It was the kind of thing that even the most secure of hearts fear the ending of even before it truly begins—that was how good it was.
Conversation and laughter completely died at the table.
My eyes slowly opened.
Romeo stared at Rocco, and Rocco stared at him. I looked between them, trying to figure out what had happened. Seemed like maybe Romeo had flung a nut at Juliette’s open mouth for her to catch, but it somehow hit Rocco on the forehead instead.
I squeezed Rocco’s arm, and his eyes glanced down to mine. He sighed, looking up. A second after, he opened his mouth. It seemed like Romeo wanted to look to the left, to the right, wanting confirmation from everyone else at the table that aliens hadn’t invaded his brother’s mind and forced him to open his mouth. But he went with it. He flung the nut, and Rocco’s mouth snapped shut over it.
Immediately, I started clapping. “Good catch, Fausti!”
He grinned at me and then kissed me on the forehead. “Another birra ,” he said, nodding to my empty bottle. Situating me in a different spot, he rose to grab it. As he passed Romeo’s table, he squeezed his shoulder. But there was hesitation there before he made contact. I watched him walk away, his powerful shoulders rolling. That slight bit of…fun... had unnerved him a bit.
My heart broke for him all over again.
Romeo watched him for a second before his eyes met mine. What I saw there surprised me. Tears ran down his face, and he shook his head, rising from the table and going in the water. Maybe to disguise them?
Juliette squeezed my shoulder. “Rocco always looks at Scarlett and Brando with longing,” she whispered. “Or he did, before you came along. It’s…so heartwarming to see that he hasn’t looked at them once. Only at you.” She sighed. “He’s not a machine formed to keep this family in line, but a living, breathing part of it, even if he’s still getting used to feeling . He can be king, the head lion of this family, and still be the romantic man with his woman he’s always craved to be. Luca has found his way, and he’s an even more legendary leader because of it.” She squeezed again. “Keep doing what you’re doing, Ari. It’s working.”
When Rocco returned to the table, I held him so close, I hoped to melt into his bloodstream. He held me back the same way, like he was trying to do the same. The word “love” hadn’t been uttered between us, but it almost seemed…unnecessary.
One day, though, the word would be spoken, if for no other reason to free it from my chest and deliver it to his.
Maybe Rocco’s family had seen something new coming to life in him, but after that day, they all looked at me in a new light. I was being accepted into their fold, and since they meant a great deal to Rocco, they meant a great deal to me too. Besides, they were all found family. Nonna always grieved for the tight-knitted family she had left behind in Italy when she’d immigrated to America. She’d said it was one of the things she regretted most that I didn’t get to experience. After Nonno died, it was only the two of us, and especially during the holidays, I noticed how blue she could get, even if she tried to hide it for my sake.
There wasn’t a shortage of people in Rocco’s family, and out of all of them, Romeo seemed to enjoy organized get togethers the most. The day before the family was set to leave for the mainland, he had organized a football game—or soccer game. The men were all talking smack to each other, especially when Scarlett and Brando’s son, Mariano, joined the walk to the field. Mariano had been a pro football player for Italy.
The field was an open stretch of land on the island that had been reserved for the game. All the men played, but I wasn’t even sure why they bothered. None of them could stand losing, and it seemed like the game went on and on, and by the time it was finished, they were drenched in sweat and fuming.
I was fanning myself for a reason other than the heat.
Rocco looked hot, physically , and my body was responding to the way his had been moving. He was using his shirt to wipe his face.
Mari, who I had fallen in love with—she was kooky in the best frigging way—nudged me. “You know what will cool these men off in no time?”
“What?” I breathed, still staring at the equivalent of an Italian god in my eyes.
Rocco Piero Fausti.
She laughed. “The cold hose!”
Did we really want to cool them off? Yeah, I decided, because it would only redirect the heat.
Toward us.
There was a long hose connected to a building—maybe restrooms? Even though this was an island surrounded by water, the grass could get dry in spots where there were no shading trees. The massive hose was a precaution taken in case of a fire threat.
Mari hip-bumped me. “Go get ’em.”
I didn’t think twice. I set the hose to aim, and Rocco gave me a narrow look before his eyebrows shot up. When Mari turned the nozzle and the water sprayed, I had to keep my feet firmly planted on the ground because the spray was stronger than I ever expected. The hose went wild on me, like a snake that refused to be wrangled, and I was spraying wildly, hitting all of them. I was basically on a ride with the hose, but I refused to drop it.
“ AHHH! ” I screamed, like I was holding a spraying gun. “ Say ’ello to my little friend! ”
Mari was laughing so hard from behind me, she started to wheeze. The men were coming at us, holding their hands in front of their faces, trying to counteract our intense spray attack. But it had worked. It took their minds from the heated game and onto something…cooler. Made sense. Water worked on animals too. Pisolino and the orange one-eyed tabby’s pissing match came to mind.
These men were going to think I was cuckoo, especially after the pepper stall incident, but I didn’t care. Some of them really needed to relax. I wasn’t truly concerned with all of them, though. Only one.
Rocco.
By the time I dropped the hose, he was dripping wet, an intense look on his face. I stuck my tongue out at him, and…ran. He gave me a head start, but not much. He was always a few steps behind me, my laughter lingering behind, probably causing that beast inside of his heart to push him harder. At the apartment, I went to grab for the door, but that was when he snatched me up and pressed me to his body. I’d worn a thin dress, and the water from his clothes seeped into mine, making me shiver.
“You run from me,” he breathed in my ear, “then prepare to be caught, and eaten.”
“Promise?” I stuck my ass against his hardness, and he growled at me.
He.
Growled.
At.
Me.
Yes! Yes! Yes! Effing YES!
He carried me up the stairs, taking them two at a time, and when the door closed, trapping the soft light in the room with us— it was that time in the evening when everything glows on an island, like neon—it seemed final.
We were locking the world out.
I needed it.
He did too.
His hands were in my hair, my mouth pressed to his, as he slow-walked me toward the bedroom. My hands came over his wrists, and when we parted, our eyes met. He was a mess—hair unruly, sweat and water dripping down his entire body, forming a puddle on the floor. My hair was sticking to me, my dress drenched, my feet in the puddle he was causing, and my heart—it was about to beat clear out of my chest to go for his. A touch I’d brave death to feel. My thumb stroked over his frantic pulse.
“No rules, Rocco Fausti,” I whispered. “Something moves us—” I swallowed hard “— we move with it. We move together. You. Me. Nothing between us but the sheets.”
“We could explore other courses. We do not have to rush.”
“No,” I breathed. “The next course is the only course. I am your course. That’s why I ran from you. I’m offering my heart up to your starved heart.” I lifted my chin, offering him my neck, the pulse beating frantically.
He made an animistic noise in his throat, like his control had snapped, and in the next second, he hauled me up in his arms, carrying me toward the bed.
Only the two of us existed in the world we created together—both of us holding both lock and key.