33. Valentina
The first thing I do after Darragh leaves is to lock the door behind him. I need some time and space to recover from everything that just happened. To try to process it all.
But I don’t even know if such a thing is possible. My brain buzzes with static, a shapeless crackling that seems to inoculate me against analyzing what’s just happened in any sort of detail. Every once in a while, a vivid image breaks through the snapping haze, just for a fraction of a second. I see Darragh when he’s above me. When he’s inside me. I see the unravelling of his control, the way desire carves up his features. The way that desire turns to distant ice when he realizes why I slept with him tonight.
I see the chessboard smash. Again and again and again.
I handed him my virginity on a silver fucking platter.
And it didn’t mean a thing.
I’m already engaged. To him . The control I thought I was exerting over my own fate never even existed.
It was decided weeks ago. I had no say. I had no fucking idea.
Forget about asking me to marry him. He never even bothered to tell me. Not once over the past two weeks did Darragh try to see me or contact me. Not once did he let me know what he’d done.
Not even when he was thrusting deep inside me, not even when he was coming. Coating himself with my pleasure and my blood.
The place between my legs aches. My muscles clench involuntarily, trying to relieve that tension.
To squeeze out all the emptiness.
At least I can exert some tiny measure of control over what’s happening inside this room now that he is gone, so I try to focus on that. I return the chess board to its place on the table. There’s a big crack down one side of it now. I can’t fix that, but I can put all the pieces back.
So I do. Carefully. Slowly. Making sure every piece is in its proper place, precisely in the centres of their squares. When it’s finished, I let my gaze linger on the chessboard, wondering if I never should have touched it tonight at all.
He only plays for keeps.
My fingers are restless. My skin itches everywhere. Now that I’ve cleaned up the chess set, I need to move onto the next task. I can’t just stand here in this quagmire of anger and arousal and doubt. I’m almost frantic with the need to keep going now that I’ve started. To maintain my independent inertia in the vacuum of Darragh’s absence.
Refocusing that energy, I turn my attention towards myself. My appearance, specifically. I spend at least five minutes smoothing and inspecting my dress. Making sure none of the red stickiness coating my inner thighs is showing through the fabric, and that every zipper and hook is correctly fastened. Then, I try to fix up my hair as much as possible without a large mirror. Attempting to apply fresh lip gloss, however, proves impossible. My hand is shaking.
I keep on going. I wipe down the chair, but overall it looks like it fared alright. There’s no blood on it that I can see, nor any other fluids. I guess the condom helped with that.
I retrieve my purse and then finally locate my ripped panties. I hurl them into the garbage can by the desk. They land on top of Darragh’s tied-off condom. Jesus. Could it be any more obvious what happened here?
Luckily, the garbage can is lined with a small plastic bag. I tie the bag up so it’s ready for collection by the staff and no one will see what’s in it.
The entire time I’m busying myself with these little tasks, the small box Darragh pushed into my hand sits on the desk where I set it down after locking the door. It’s small. Black. Discreet and unobtrusive. And yet it’s got the presence of a blaring neon sign, sucking my gaze towards it over and over again.
I almost leave it there.
But at the last moment, right before I unlock the door, my hand goes towards the box instead of the doorknob I was aiming for. I pick it up and open it.
Lamplight catches, spins, and then refracts inside the most magnificent diamond I have ever seen. It’s massive, and so flawlessly cut it could probably make most jewellers cry at the mere sight. I think this shape of diamond – with one heavily rounded end and one sharply pointed one – is usually called a pear cut. But to me, it looks like a tear drop.
Tears were streaming down my face the first time we met.
And then again in his cottage.
He’s the only man I’ve ever sobbed in front of.
And he said it fucking shredded him.
The diamond isn’t pure white. It’s actually a stunning yellow, so vivid it nearly looks gold. This effect is only amplified by the warm, gleaming gold of the band beneath.
It’s absurdly beautiful. So extravagantly perfect I almost want to laugh.
Or throw it against the wall in a fit, just like Darragh did with the chess.
I don’t do either of those things. In the quiet hush of that locked library, where nobody can see, I put it on.
Even the fit is flawless. My throat snags painfully as I try to swallow.
How dare he?
How dare he do what he’s done and leave me here with a ring so achingly perfect it’s causing me physical pain?
I have to see him.
I don’t even know what I’m going to say. If I’m going to scream at him. Hug him. Throw the ring in his face. Tell him that if he goes to Ireland, he has to take me with him. Tell him to never come back.
I don’t even know how long he’s been gone since he left me. Twenty minutes? An hour?
He could be on a plane by now.
I rip the ring off my finger, put it back into the box, then stuff the box into my clutch.
And then I’m off like a shot, praying I don’t snap an ankle as I unlock and open the door and then sprint right through it. The other room and halls Darragh and I came through together swim past me in inky stripes.
My progress slows considerably when I reach the ballroom. There are many more people here now than there were before. Twisting masks and painted faces surround me, phantoms and jesters and queens.
It’s only then that I become aware of the fact that I left my mask behind.
Ignoring that niggling realization, I fight to keep moving, to battle against the currents of drinking, milling, waltzing people. My heart careens like a vehicle out of control.
I don’t know if my ribs are sufficient guardrails anymore.
“Excuse me!” I gasp as I come up against a knot of people. “Move, please! I have to get through!”
It might take years to cross this room.
But somehow, I finally make it. My legs shaking, body aching, I burst from the ballroom to the other doors and then hit the outside air.
I wrench my head back and forth, scanning the street, my lungs on fire.
He isn’t here. Of course he isn’t here.
“Valentina!”
I jolt as my name is called from a nearby car. The big, black SUV pulls over. The back window is open, and through it I see Papà’s face. His expression is so thunderous with fury that I wonder if he’s somehow already found out about what I did with Darragh tonight.
But how the hell can he be mad about that now? When Darragh’s the one he’s bound me to?
“Get in.”
When I don’t obey immediately, Papà says something to the driver. The car door opens, and Papà comes barrelling out of it like a bullet.
He will physically pull me right off the street and into the car at this rate.
“I’m coming!” I shout as I walk towards him. He doesn’t slow his approach. Doesn’t stop until he’s got his meaty hand fastened around my upper arm. With his other hand, he yanks open the car door and then shoves me into the backseat.
I sprawl awkwardly, limbs akimbo. I quickly scoot to the other side of the backseat, fixing my skirt, because I know there’s nothing underneath.
But Papà barely notices the way I’m trying so desperately to keep my clothing together. He pulls out his phone, and without speaking a single word, shoves the screen in my face.
I squint at the image, trying to figure out what the hell I’m looking at.
No, it’s not an image. It’s a video. It looks like video footage from some kind of stationary camera – maybe a security cam – aimed out a window. There’s a tall building in view across the street, and a hot blue sky behind.
“I don’t-”
“ Watch .”
I shut my mouth and do it. Something is wrong.
And with the next scalding breath, I know exactly what it is.
The camera is a little lower than the roof of the building in view ahead. Which means you can’t see the centre of that rooftop.
You can’t see who’s on it.
Until they appear at the roof’s edge. One man dragging the other.
My feet tingle. My hands lose all feeling.
“Keep. Watching.”
But I don’t need to watch. I know how this scene unfolds. I’ve seen the violent tragedy of it with my own eyes once, and then countless times again in dreams.
Darragh’s dark red hair gleams. His body bends as he leans Dario back over the glass barrier.
And then, Dario gets flung.
Even though I know it’s coming, just like when it happened in front of me the first time, I can’t stop my accompanying gasp.
But it’s worse now. Because this time, instead of Dario just disappearing over the edge of the roof, I can actually see most of his fall before he’s out of frame.
I keep watching, just like Papà ordered me to. Keep watching as Darragh turns away from the edge of the roof.
And freezes.
That was when he first saw me. I’m not in the video, but Papà knows I was there.
Papà presses a button on the side of his phone with his thumb and the screen goes black. His driver takes a turn that sends me sliding in my seat. I didn’t even realize the car had started moving again.
“So,” Papà says with a vicious sort of calm. “He jumped?”
The lie, and every lie I’ve told since then, clog up my throat. I can’t speak.
I can’t even breath.
What if I choke again?
What if I choke, and he isn’t here to save me this time?
I take too long to reply.
Papà’s slap is swift and dizzying. Stars jump in my vision. I taste blood. Touching my cheek, I expect it to be swollen to twice its size already, but it isn’t.
“You lied to me,” Papa hisses into my face, shaking his phone.
“Where… Where did you get that?” I ask, my words slurring through my trembling lips.
“Don’t fucking speak to me unless you’re about to get down on your knees to beg forgiveness!” His bellow fills the car, my ears, my skull. The driver continues calmly on. “It doesn’t matter who sent it to me!”
He slides his phone into an inner pocket on his suit jacket.
The same sort of pocket Darragh pulled the ring from.
“The source material of this video has been dealt with,” he says, a little more calmly now. “The police case remains closed. The records show Dario jumped. Just like you fucking told us that he did.”
“I-”
“Shut up. Shut your mouth before you let another lie fall out of it, ragazza. ” He leans back against the leather, his eyes calculating, his jaw set. “I’m sick of dealing with your shit. It’s time I let your husband deal with it instead.”
Husband.
“You mean Darragh?”
And he actually laughs. A merciless shout of sound.
“Darragh? You think I’m going to let that Irish fuck have my daughter after what he did? He lied to me. Same as you. You’ve both betrayed our family.”
My stomach turns to stone.
“No, I have another match lined up for you now,” he goes on. “One of my capos in Montréal. His wife just died and now he wants another. And I want to shore up support around the port area as much as possible.”
“Darragh will never let this happen.”
It comes to me as an instantaneous thought. It shapes itself into a shaking whisper.
I know it’s true. Darragh already killed someone just for grabbing my arm and threatening me.
I can’t imagine what he’d do if someone else married me now.
He bought me a ring…
“ Darragh won’t let it happen?” Papà sounds like he’s in utter disbelief. Too shocked to even bother hitting me again. “You think I answer to him? He’s the one who will have to answer to me! He killed your previous fiancé, the only son of my ally, and then arranged for your marriage under false pretenses. He betrayed my trust and he-”
“He fucked me.”
A vein in Papà’s forehead pulses.
“We had sex.” I say again, my voice sounding oddly flat and calm. “I’m not a virgin. So you can’t just send me off to marry-”
Papà interrupts me with a question that bludgeons like a hammer.
“Are you pregnant?”
“What?!”
“Based on this video, you’ve obviously had contact with Darragh for more than a month, now. So answer the question. Are you fucking pregnant?”
“No. I don’t think that’s possible. I-”
“Then you will shut the fuck up about this. Now. I’m done with all your failed fucking engagements and your reckless fucking decisions. You are a liar, you are out of control, and you are Salvatore Di Mauro’s problem now. And if Sal cares about virginity, then you’d better find a way to fucking fake it for him, you understand me, Valentina?”
I understand. I understand everything all too clearly.
The walls are closing in.
My purse feels hot in my lap. Like Darragh’s ring might burn a hole right through it.
Just like my papà’s eyes feel like they could burn a hole right through my head. Incinerate skin, blood, and bone. Until there’s nothing left.
Those eyes don’t leave mine as he leans in one more time. He orders me to pack my bags so we can leave for Montréal.
Tonight.
* * *
Thank you for reading part one of Darragh and Valentina’s story.