Chapter 23
TWENTY-THREE
Eliza
I wake before him.
He's on his back with one arm behind his head, deeply asleep. In sleep his face loses the tension it has when he’s awake. He looks as if he doesn’t have a care in the world.
I've been watching for a while now.
His eye opens.
"Still doing it," he says.
"I'm not doing anything."
"You're watching me sleep."
"You're not asleep."
"I was."
"Then go back to sleep."
He doesn't go back to sleep. He rolls onto his side to face me and his hand comes to my face. His thumb moves lightly across my cheekbone.
"What are you thinking?" he asks.
“Nothing." I say. "Just how nice this is. You?”
“The same.”
I doubt he was thinking this is nice. The word isn’t in his vocabulary. But it’s too early in the day to pick a fight with a man who gets an itchy palm when he senses he’s about to lose.
We lie there for a while. His hand moves from my face to my hair and back and neither of us is in any particular hurry to be anywhere.
“I want to invite my mother to come and stay.”
"Why"
I look at him. “We need to catch up and she’ll want to meet you."
“Why?”
Is he being deliberately obtuse.
“Because you’re fucking her daughter..”
For a brief moment, Adriano looks alarmed. “You’re not going to tell her that are you?”
“I might,” I say just to fuck with him. Then I let him off the hook. “Of course I won’t tell her that. I’ll tell her you’re my boyfriend.”
He screws up his nose at that. “What will you say I do?”
”I'll tell her you're in business.” It’s true. He owns many businesses. It’s just some of them are less legal than others. "She's a lawyer's wife. She'll understand that business covers a multitude."
Something in his expression does the thing. “Ok. What else will she want to know about me?”
"Your intentions.” I look at him. “She’ll want to know what they are.”
“I think she can probably work those out for herself."
“And she’ll want to know if you’re good to me.”
“And you’ll tell her yes, of course.”
‘Maybe. Depends on whether you are good to me.”
He looks at me for a long moment. Then he moves closer until I feel his erection pressing against my side. I roll over onto my back, making space for him between my legs. What follows is the sort of slow, gentle lovemaking I’ve become accustomed to waking up to in the mornings.
Afterwards we lie tangled in the morning light and his hand moves slowly up and down my arm and I stare at the ceiling and think about nothing in particular.
"Paolo wants us to come to his daughter's christening," Adriano says out of the blue.
I turn my head to look at him. "He has a daughter?"
"She was born before the beach holiday he hated so much."
"Is he asking you to be godfather?"
"Yes."
"Are you?"
"Apparently I don't have a choice." He says it in the tone of a man who was informed rather than asked. "Paolo presented it as a fait accompli."
"That's very Paolo."
"Yes."
"What's the baby's name?"
A pause. "Adriana."
I stare at him. "He named her after you?"
"His wife named her. Paolo claims he had nothing to do with it."
"Do you believe him?"
"No."
I laugh so hard it hurts at the thought of Paolo looking at a precious baby girl and deciding to name it after the arrogant prick lying in bed next to me.
"He wants you there," Adriano says. "He was specific about that."
Something warm moves through my chest. "I like Paolo."
"He knows. He mentions it frequently."
"You don't like that he mentions it."
"I don't like that he mentions it quite so often."
I laugh again and settle back against his shoulder.
"We could go to Sydney," I say. "After everything settles."
He looks at me. "Sydney."
"I've never been anywhere on purpose. I'd like to try it."
He's quiet for a moment. "All right."
"All right?"
"After we deal with the Vettis."
I consider this. "Is that soon?"
"Soon enough."
"I'll need a real passport," I say.
He looks at me. "You have one."
"Eleanor Marconi isn't real."
"No." He pauses to consider
"We'll sort that out."
I think about my actual name on an actual passport. About what that means after three years of being someone else. About what it means that he said we'll sort it out as if it's the simplest thing in the world.
Maybe it is.
His hand keeps moving on my arm.
"Adriano," I say.
"Mm."
I turn onto my side to face him.
"I'm done with running. I'm here because I want to be here and I want you to know that."
He looks at me for a long moment.
"I know," he says.
"I know you know. I wanted to say it out loud." I look at him. "Your turn."
Something in his expression shifts.
"You know," he says.
"I want to hear it."
"I looked for you for three years," he says. "I stopped asking myself why a long time ago." He holds my gaze. "You're it, for me, Eliza. I love you.”
I put my hand on his face.
He turns into it slightly the way he does when he thinks I'm not paying attention and I am always paying attention.
"Good," I say. "Because I love you too."
He puts his hand over mine. The light moves across the ceiling. The house is quiet around us and outside the gate is unlocked but I won’t run.
I'm exactly where I belong.