Chapter Seven
Lindsay
ONE OF CIRO’S men sends me a message early in the morning telling me that Ciro would like to have dinner with me.
Or maybe I’m projecting. Maybe the idea that he would like to have dinner with me is a bit of a strong sentiment.
But he has invited me to dinner. He reminds me that I have access to his grandmother’s wardrobe, and I find myself giddy at the prospect of going through it again.
The man is an anomaly. One that I can’t quite put my finger on. Or maybe it’s my reaction to him that feels like an anomaly.
I’m attracted to him; I can’t deny it. But I can’t say that I especially…like it.
I’m also beginning to enjoy this life more than I should. The cashmere clothing in the closet, the lack of concern over where my food is coming from, or whether or not my bills are being paid.
I’ve taken to lounging around the grounds; the pool outside is beautiful, and there are lounge chairs all around it, beautiful flora planted all around, and sometimes when I lie there, I forget that I’m Lindsay.
From Alaska. From nothing and nowhere. A waitress in Rome scrapping as hard as she can to live out a dream that probably isn’t going to pan out, because who in the world becomes a famous fashion designer? Not all that many people.
I want to, but is it even a likely outcome, even with how hard I’ve worked? No.
And so I let myself just float in space. I let myself begin to bond with the little life inside of me, whose movements I’m starting to feel occasionally.
It’s sobering and sad, and sometimes I’m afraid I’m losing touch with what I was trying to do with Ciro. Convincing him that we can’t keep the baby.
We. I’ve never been included in this conversation. It’s him. I’m having a hard time remembering what’s real. That’s the problem.
Because here it’s like time doesn’t exist. Here it’s like everything just feels slow and easy, like there isn’t a war going on outside for my life, for the baby’s life.
Ciro’s chef makes incredible fruit smoothies, and honestly, I could lie by the pool for the rest of my life and drink those, and feel like everything is in order, and I am a whole new person besides.
I’ve also made good use of the library. I never read novels.
I just don’t have the time. I’m always cramming for tests, reading to get information.
But here I’ve been reading for fun. It’s so strange; it expands my mind, shows me pieces of myself that I didn’t understand before.
I love mysteries. I like romance too, though I find myself increasingly restless when I read the love scenes. Especially when I see Ciro after.
He’s strong and powerful, beautiful. And just the kind of difficult man that you see featured in books like that. A hard mountain of a male that a woman just needs to fling herself on again and again until he begins to soften.
But I can’t imagine him softening.
And to what end, even?
I don’t know the answer to that question.
But he wants to have dinner with me. Which almost feels like a kindness.
Though in his world, I’m not quite sure what constitutes a kindness.
I make my way to his grandmother’s bedroom, and then I go into the closet, and I find myself absolutely spoiled for choice.
There are so many beautiful dresses. I love the signature pink and gold that Liliana Estrada used.
I’m so inspired by the cleverness of the design.
The simplicity that’s so timeless. But I also know that I’m going to have to pick a gown that is loose around the stomach.
I find one with a more flowing design, one designed to fall away from the stomach, and I slip that on, zipping up the back, and admiring myself in the mirror.
With the way that the panels of fabric fall, you almost can’t tell that I’m pregnant.
For a moment, I can just pretend. That I’m a woman who met this man by chance, perhaps on the street in Rome.
That we talked, and flirted and then he spirited me off to his vacation home.
I laugh. Yes. What a great thing to romanticize. My Mafia kidnap and forced impregnation.
I make my way down to the dining room, and find it empty.
“He’s on the terrace,” says Pietro, the chef, who clearly heard me come into the room.
“Oh. Thank you.”
“I trust dinner will be to your liking?”
“Everything has been to my liking.”
And I am still turning over how true that is as I walk out to the stunning terrace that overlooks the dense jungle below.
“Oh,” I say, looking at the spread of fresh fruit on the table, and what looks like a lovely steamed fish and rice.
“This looks amazing.”
He inclines his head, and stands, pulling my chair out for me, and I think for a moment it says strange things about the world that a man raised to do crime has demonstrated more chivalry to me than any other man I’ve come across.
“Thank you,” I say.
“Of course. And how was your day?”
“Civility! How nice. It was lovely. Thank you. How was your attempt to dismantle all that is evil in the world?”
“I can’t say that it was very eventful.”
“Well, that is too bad.”
“It will come together. Right now, things are just moving more slowly than I would like.”
“What is your ultimate goal?”
“My ultimate goal is to get the most major crime families to sign a treaty. To try to make alliances. To go legitimate.”
“And is that likely?”
“I don’t know if it’s likely or not, but it is what has to happen. And anyone who opposes it cannot be allowed to remain. But I do have hope.”
“Oh.”
“My goal is not only the safety of our child, but of all the children that are trapped in these systems. And children like you,” he says.
I look at him, squinting. “What do you mean?”
“It’s all part of the same ecosystem. Your parents might be the very bottom of this chain of drugs, but they are still part of it. Families like mine help fuel and create this crisis. Families like yours are victimized by it, and then step into it to try to manipulate it. Make it pay for itself.”
“I don’t really blame large crime syndicates for my parents dealing drugs in the middle of nowhere.
I mean, maybe I could, but the way that I see it so much of it is about poverty.
Desperation. When I’m feeling charitable, I can understand why they are the way they are.
They never felt like they had any hope. And if you don’t have hope, you might as well live fast in the hopes that you die young. ”
“But they had you.”
“I was never enough of a motivation for them. So I became enough of one for myself. I didn’t want to live that way.
I didn’t want to be hopeless. That is your biggest enemy.
The lack of hope. If you don’t think you can change things, then you simply won’t, and in my opinion the entire system is set up to make you feel that way.
Oh, they don’t want people to be like my parents, wasting away in their addiction, but I do believe that they want people to feel disempowered.
So that they’ll continue to work jobs that eat at their souls, continue to prop up the economy. ”
“Are you a socialist?”
I shake my head. “I’m actively working to participate in capitalism, so I don’t suppose.
But I also recognize where the system fails people.
Anyway, that’s on a good day. On a bad day I just think they’re selfish and lazy, and they gave in to that selfishness, that laziness, rather than raise me. And I hate them for it.”
“Is today a good day or a bad day?”
“It’s a good day. But that’s mainly because I’ve been lounging by the pool in paradise reading a romance novel, and I find that has put me in a better mood than usual.”
I feel something heavy settle over my shoulders. This isn’t reality. And I have to remember that.
This isn’t my life.
This is just a detour. Just a pit stop until I get back to my regular life. Until I get back to the struggle of trying to make something out of very little.
“Do you have even one good memory of your childhood?”
I don’t know why I ask him that. I don’t wait for him to respond.
“I do,” I say. “It’s getting up early on Saturday morning and watching cartoons.
With the house dark and quiet, and no one bothering me.
My parents always slept in really late. So it was like this sacred time.
Sometimes we had cereal, and I would make myself a bowl, and sit there, watching just silly things.
But I think I like the commercials best.”
“Commercials?”
“Yes. Because they were like little blips in two different worlds. Different lives. People with two-story houses that had these large lawns. People who were glamorous, people who were regular, kids with lots of toys, and grocery stores filled with food. It was just a look at all these normal things that everybody takes for granted. I couldn’t buy any of them.
But it was like window shopping on my living room floor.
It gave me things to think about. Things to hope for.
To idolize and aspire to. Like I said, everybody needs hope.
And if I got some of mine from seeing an athlete on a cereal commercial, then… I don’t know, it worked for me.”
It’s sobering, maybe, that my nicest memory is me by myself. Imagining, dreaming. Being given all the space to imagine what I could be if I could just get away.
“My favorite ones were the Christmas commercials,” I say. “Toys and different houses all decorated. Happy families sitting around tables full of food. We never did Christmas.”
“Neither did we,” he says.
“I didn’t want to either. Not with my parents. Because I knew they would only ruin it. Is that terrible? I knew it wouldn’t be like it was in those ads. Or like it was in a cartoon Christmas special. Because they weren’t those parents. They just never could be.”
“I never thought about it. But yes, I suppose you’re right. A Merry Christmas would never have been possible with my father.”
He laughs then, and the sound is strange. Deep and rusty. Like something unused, and I cling to it. I’ve forgotten my own game. I’ve forgotten the reason that I started talking to him in the first place.
I just want to talk to him. The sun is sinking low in the sky, and the golden light is exceptionally flattering on his beautiful face. I notice that the tattoo on the right side of his neck is a snake. Slithering down beneath his shirt collar.
“What is that?” I ask.
“What?”
I lean in, and without thinking, I touch his neck, right on the black scales. The contact jolts through my body like electricity. And I draw away.
“Sorry. I… It’s a really interesting tattoo.”
“You probably don’t want to know the meaning behind them.”
“I’m curious.”
“The snake is a reminder. A reminder not to trust anyone. Not too dearly.”
“Oh.”
“Anyone can betray you. It’s a good reminder.”
“You have a loyal band of men.”
He laughs. “I test them. Routinely. Because I trust no one. Blind trust only benefits those who wish to take advantage of it.”
“Well, I suppose that’s true.”
He’s quiet for a moment. “My happiest memory is from when Vittoria was a toddler. She was a cheerful baby. She was the cutest child. Genuinely happy. Watching her, it made me wonder if there was ever a time in my childhood when I was…carefree. When I didn’t know.
I loved taking care of her. But of course my father discouraged it.
That was not the sort of work he wanted his son doing. ”
“Oh.”
“She is the bright spot in my life.”
“I hope she’s safe.”
“I want more than her safety. I don’t want her to be trapped in this same cycle. Over and over again. Powerful men taking women and bringing them into this life. My mother died because of that.”
“I’m very sorry about your mother. You must’ve loved her very much.”
He looks away. “A mother is important. Oftentimes she is the only softness a child can have. At least, she was the only softness that I had.” He looks at me meaningfully. “Mothers are very important.”
He says so now. And yet he’s acted until this moment as if he didn’t need me. Of course, I’ve made it clear I don’t think I can be a mother.
The silence stretches between us. I ache when I look at him, and I can’t explain why.
I’m really starting to think it has something to do with the connection we share because of the baby.
Because the baby is part of him and part of me, and it seems like maybe that’s getting things twisted up inside of me.
Making me feel things for him. Physical things, and almost more frightening, these deep emotional waves that make me want to hold him.
Protect him. Like he isn’t this big, terrifying man.
“You don’t deserve to have to live like this, gangster,” I say.
His eyes meet mine, and there’s something strange there. Confused. Like he doesn’t understand the sentiment. Like he doesn’t understand what I feel for him. Or maybe he just never had anyone feel bad for him before.
“You don’t deserve to live in hiding. And now it is part of my mission that you will be free.”
I’m touched by this. Maybe I shouldn’t be. But I am. By him showing that he cares, even a little bit, about the life that I want to build for myself. About everything that I’ve worked so hard to create.
“Thank you.”
He inclines his head. We finish our dinner in silence, but I can’t stop sneaking glances at him.
I fear that this man has taken me captive in more ways than one.