Epilogue Raffa #2
“You would have done what Leo did for Elizabeth,” I concluded, because John Stone might have anglicized his name and put on a suit to make money for other men, but he had been born Mariano Giovanni Pietra and raised as a camorrista.
Any man with a heart like ours would burn down the world for the woman he loved, consequences be damned.
“I would do it still,” he agreed. “And I would do it for my girls too. This doesn’t just help Gemma. Guinevere will be happy to see the back of the man who tried to kill you, even if he did not want to, but she will be happier still that it means Gemma is only a short train ride away.”
Guinevere would never ride a damn train again as far as I was concerned. It was only one of the reasons one of her wedding presents waited outside in the garage, a gleaming red Ferrari 458 Speciale I knew she would love.
“Does it solve your problem with the Pietra clan and Leo?” John asked.
I hesitated before nodding. “It would. I would send Carmine with you too. He knows the area well, and he can oversee Leo.”
“You don’t trust him.”
“Would you?” I demanded. “He colluded to kill my soon-to-be wife. If he had not had the good luck to earn the love of a Stone woman, he would be in the ground with the worms.”
John nodded as if he understood and even agreed with that sentiment.
“I will watch him closely,” he promised. “I have as much of an investment in his success as he does, because of Gemma.”
“You think he is good enough for her?” I asked, successfully keeping the scoff from my tone.
John’s grin was sharklike. “No more than you are for Guinevere. Unfortunately, they did not put it to a vote before they went and lost their hearts to made men.”
“Thank God for that,” I said dryly, and was surprised when John chuckled.
“You’ll take care of her,” he said, leaning back and opening his posture up to me deliberately. “The only reason I am okay with any of this is the way you look at her.”
“And how is that?” I asked, even though I knew.
“You look at her like she is your private church, something holy and safe and entirely yours. Like you will spend the rest of your life worshipping her. Sometimes, when you say her name, it’s like a prayer.
” He shook his head ruefully. “I do not need to ask if a man like you believes in God, yet that’s the way you look at her?
No, Raffa, I have no doubt you live for her and you would die for her.
A father would be greedy to ask for more. ”
I did not say a word, because he was right.
There was nothing in this world I loved so much as my Guinevere. But it felt good to hear it and know that he trusted me with one of his most precious gifts.
“Grazie mille,” I said quietly, standing up to offer my hand. “I am grateful that you raised such an incredible woman, and I am grateful that you are willing to do this for her, for all of us.”
He clasped my hand strongly, squeezing tight and pumping it up and down a few times before he leaned over our hands to clap me on the shoulder.
“Anytime,” he said.
I nodded, my voice stuck behind the lump in my throat, because something about the look in his eyes and the gesture hinted that one day, he might do anything for me too.
After being raised by a man like Aldo and then mentored by one like Tonio, it felt almost painfully good to be in the presence of a man like John.
“Sorry, are we interrupting?” Carmine asked as he swanned into the room with a bottle of prosecco and a handful of glasses. “Good. Raffa is about to marry a woman who is entirely too good for him, and we must have a toast to his good luck.”
John and I both laughed, dropping our hands to gather near the desk with Ludo, Renzo bringing up the rear with Martina on his arm.
Since she had been shot, he had not left her side for anything.
When Guinevere asked if they were finally dating, Martina had tried to prevaricate, but Renzo had leaned over to kiss her silent at the dinner table.
Guinevere had started a round of applause.
“I am happy to toast to my own good luck,” I allowed, accepting a glass of fizzing sparkling wine.
“Did you ever think this day would come?” Martina asked with a wink.
“No,” I said honestly, even a little hoarse. “No, I did not.”
“Well, we did,” she insisted. “You deserve the best, boss.”
I might have argued, but Guinevere was the best, so instead I raised my glass to my best friends and my future father-in-law and said, “To family, old and new.”
John bit back his smile but joined the others when they echoed my sentiment.
I stood before an arbor of cedar boughs that perfumed the air with their pungent, earth-sweet scent, waiting for my bride to walk down the aisle Ludo had shoveled in the snow and laid with black rock. It had been Guinevere’s idea to walk on the dark stone.
“We walked through hell together,” she said. “I want this to symbolize that.”
Our families sat on rustic wooden benches, bundled up in furs and opulent coats to stave off the winter chill, their breaths clouding the air as they waited for the last addition to our party.
Mamma wept softly next to Stacci, already overcome with happiness, and all the kids sat very patiently in their finery except for baby Nico, who had fallen asleep in his father’s arms. The only one missing was Zacheo, who was our ring bearer, walking down the aisle as the string quartet played Pavarotti.
Delfina stood at my side in a black suit as my attendant, and Gemma had already walked down the aisle with Elizabeth as Guinevere’s bridesmaid. Gemma watched Leo where he sat in the second row as if he was a midnight eclipse, something profound and magical she could not break from.
The music swelled through the speakers, and a moment later Guinevere appeared through the open terrace doors.
My heart arrested at the sight of her.
Her long, thick hair was a big, soft corona of curls around her face and down her back, beneath such a sheer veil it seemed woven from the cloud of her breath in the cold.
I could still see through to those luminous dark eyes, large and fringed in heavy lashes, filled with love so tangible it was as if her gaze had fingers to reach through my chest, to hold my heart and force it to restart painfully.
She looked ethereal, Proserpina in her white froth of a gown, only lace webbing over her arms and the points of her fingers, a sluice of unblemished silk over her upturned breasts and the slight curves of her hips.
Innocence personified but for the slash of crushed-berry red painted on her full mouth, a tantalizing hint of the huntress she could be if the need arose.
John walked her down the aisle, but no one existed for me but her.
La mia stella cadente.
La mia cerbiatta e la mia cacciatrice.
My Vera.
When John placed her hand in mine, I felt as if the earth moved, tectonic plates sliding irrevocably into place.
“Hi,” she said with that sweet, shy smile that had first enchanted me so many months ago.
“Ciao bella,” I echoed, giving in to the urge to tug her indecently close, pressing our bodies together, hips to thighs. “I missed you.”
Her features softened behind the thin veil, mouth a generous moue. We had been apart for one night, but we both suffered from nightmares without the other in our bed.
“I missed you before I even knew your name,” she confessed.
Love filled my chest so full I found it difficult to draw breath.
“You once told me segui la tua stella,” she murmured, as if there was no audience to our union, “to follow my destiny. I started on the path to my fate, to my soul mate, the day I set foot in Italy, and I would not change a single hardship I have ever endured, because I know it led me to you. I know we earned this happily ever after.”
“‘E quindi uscimmo a riveder le stelle,’” I said, dipping to kiss her through the veil. The effort marked the sheer white with the blood red of her lipstick. “‘And so we emerged once more to see the stars.’”
The final line of Dante’s Inferno was inscribed on the inside of the thick gold band she slipped onto my finger minutes later, when we had finished exchanging our vows.
“What kind of happily ever after does a King Below warrant?” I quipped when Carmine, acting as our officiant, declared us husband and wife.
Guinevere’s grin was wild and wicked and free when she rose to the toes of her heels to bring her mouth close to mine and whisper, “A dark ever after with his huntress by his side.”