Chapter 12
Enzo
Chaos welcomed me the minute I stepped inside the house. I’d raced home after Guilia had called in a panic. Shouting echoed in the distance, from the direction of the kitchen. Riccardo, the butler, stood frozen, silver tray in hand, not daring to enter near the frantic noise.
The cook and her staff burst through the double doors. “Enzo, control her. Per favore!”
“What’s going on?” I dumped my briefcase by the door.
“Gemma’s lost it! è pazza!” Giovanna bobbed her pinched fingers in true Italian outrage, revealing the remnants of spinach and ricotta stuffed pasta in her palm.
“Coffee beans! In my marinara! After simmering all morning! And she took a pizza cutter to my tortellinis! ” Her face reddened further. “All of them! Ruined!”
Giulia puffed out a breath and tore off her hairnet. “She snapped all the pasta packets in our pantry.”
Another cook patted Giovanna’s shoulder in comfort. “She emptied an entire jar of pepper into the pasta water.”
Gemma aggravated these Italian women in the worst way… attacking their pride and joy. Food.
I barged through the swinging doors and made straight for the kitchen, the sting of pepper hitting my nostrils, stinging my eyes. The stench of scorched coffee and acrid tomato sauce choked the air, a bizarre and offensive assault.
Carina stood rigid as a statue, gun raised. Not a flicker of warmth touched her eyes. My own eyes watered, a burning sensation at the back of my throat.
Plate in her hand, Gemma lifted her chin, defiance sparking in her gaze.
A dozen broken plates littered the floor, a mosaic of ceramic shards, pasta strings, and empty pasta packets.
Coffee beans strewed the counter. The pot on the stove bubbled, on the verge of boiling over.
One staff member cowered against the wall, another scrambled for cover.
“Go ahead, Carina. Shoot me!” She challenged, her voice tight, her dark hair a wild tangle.
My gut somersaulted, a cold fist clenching my heart. “Carina,” my tone was warning enough.
Carina’s gaze widened. “Get her out of here, or so help me, I will shoot her.”
I grabbed Gemma by the elbow and guided her into the foyer. Her fingers were white around the plate’s edge, clenched like a vise. “What is the matter with you?”
“Please, Enzo.” Her voice cracked, a raw ache resonating deep in my chest. “My father’s in the hospital. I have to see him. Please. You have to take me to him.”
“Don’t you dare, Enzo.” Carina burst through the doors. “Not after that display.”
I peered over my shoulder and gnashed my teeth. A sudden itch flared beneath the starched collar of my shirt, and I fought the urge to tear it off. “Carina!”
I couldn’t meet Gemma’s tear-streaked eyes. My gaze stayed locked on Carina, her expression unyielding.
My mother remained deadpan, folding her arms over her chest. “I mean it, Enzo. She goes nowhere.”
The tie around my neck felt like a noose.
“Enzo,” Gemma whispered, her soft fingers lacing through mine, shooting warmth through my palm. “Please, you can’t be this heartless. Not after everything… not after helping me with Lupo and Fico.”
“What does she mean?” Carina retorted, her mouth flapping open in horror.
I slashed a hand toward my mother to cease her yapping. “Leave us.”
Carina rolled her eyes, tarried a moment longer, then stormed away.
Gemma blinked, the action slow and exhausted.
I pried the plate from her tense fingers—they resisted at first, then yielded with a slight tremor.
The cold porcelain dug into my palm, a biting difference from the feverish clamminess of her skin.
I set it on the hallway table with a tiny clink of glass meeting glass.
“Come on, Gemma. Go to your room, rest.”
She whacked my hand away. “I don’t need sleep. I need to see my father.”
I grumbled low. “No.” Not for her sake, but for her father’s, too. If our enemies spotted us, or worse, learned my wife’s relative resided in the hospital, they’d use this to their advantage. They might harm Gino to get closer to Gemma. We had to keep our distance. “We’re not going.”
She tilted her chin and huffed a mock laugh. “And here I thought I’m a prisoner. You’re the real prisoner here, Enzo. You’re trapped under your mother’s foot and don’t even know it.”
Blatant bravado or her speaking the truth? Either way, fury coiled in my gut. My eyes strained as I leaned closer, voice low and deadly. “You don’t know a darn thing, little wife.”
She didn’t back down, but her dainty nostrils flared, and her eyes dilated, hinting at her fear. “A real man would do what’s right, not follow his mother’s command like her lapdog.”
A single tear escaped the corner of her eye and raced over the curve of her cheek. I swallowed, flexing my jaw, pushing down any show of pity and focusing on my anger.
She swiped at the lone tear and raced upstairs, leaving me drowning in her words, in her pain.
◆◆◆
Several hours later, we sat at the table eating our meals.
“The maid told me there are no plates left.” Carina scoffed, nudging at her vegetables. “We’ll have to order more thanks to her . The cook remade tonight’s meal, too.”
The silver cutlery clattered from my hands, shattering the strained silence. “Enough, Carina.” What did my mother expect? For Gemma to go down without a fight?
The maid rushed in. “ Mi scusi , signore.” She wrung her hands, her gaze darting to her feet. “Gemma refuses to come down to eat.”
I always made sure she joined us for dinner every night, even if it meant dragging her down here myself. But tonight, she needed space.
“Fine by me.” Carina jabbed at her vegetables with vigorous force. “Let her starve.”
I banged my first on the solid wood, shaking the utensils on the table. “Can you blame the woman?”
“Enzo’s right.” Lucio tossed down his napkin and shot our mother a pointed glare. “What if her father’s in a critical state? If he dies, she’ll tear down this entire villa.”
I waved the maid away, impatience simmering beneath my calm surface. Her father, dying? If so, forget the risks. She had to see him and say her final goodbyes. Or the same regrets haunting me would haunt her.
I still remember the weight of my school bag digging into my shoulders as I walked home that dark day.
The scent of roses filled the air, stemming from the numerous bouquets delivered with condolence cards attached.
Tearful maids ushered me away from my screaming mother, shielding me from the truth: my father was dead.
Worse, he took his own life all because his mistress rejected him.
We had last seen him months before, Lucio and I peeking through the blinds on the upstairs window, the cold metal pinched between my fingers.
Mamma clutched at his arm in the driveway, begging him to stay.
He didn’t. Instead, he dragged his suitcase to the car, shaking off mamma’s desperate attempts to stop him.
The news of his death hit me with the fact I never got a chance to say goodbye.
My last conversation with him wasn’t exactly a conversation, but a screaming, kicking rant, blaming him for my mother’s tears.
He left us to pursue another woman, and when Elisabetta rejected him, he didn’t value us good enough to live for.
We weren’t even second best. He probably deserved death… because he sure hadn’t deserved us.
“I don’t care if her father breathes his last breath.” Carina pounded the bottom of her knife into the table, her face flushed. “She doesn’t leave here. Am I clear?”
Clear as the bond between Gemma and her father.
I’d watched them that night at the restaurant, the way they laughed at each other’s jokes, the soft glint in Gino’s eye when she showed off recipes on her phone, convincing him to try quinoa because it was full of healthy minerals.
Even though they lived in separate countries, they were involved in each other’s daily lives.
Lucio said Gino had begged and pleaded with him in the wine cellar, offering to take Gemma’s place for Carina’s revenge. Now that was a true father, a true parent. And here I sat, deliberately keeping them apart. My appetite vanished. I pushed back from the table and left the dining hall.
Hours crawled by as I lay in bed, arms behind my head, staring at the ceiling. Guilt gnawed at me, a tight knot in my stomach. Midnight chimed, yet the mansion remained silent. Sleep wouldn’t come. Enough was enough.
My phone became a makeshift torch, its beam slicing through the dark, empty hallway toward Gemma’s door. The handle turned with a faint click; the door cracking open to reveal the room bathed in gentle lamplight.
She lay on her side, hugging her pillow, her wide gaze fixed on nothingness. She looked small, broken.
My fists clenched by my sides, fighting the tidal wave of despair.
“Gemma,” I lowered to my knees and tucked a soft strand behind her ear.
Soft . No, too meager for the satin ribbon between my fingers.
I grew addicted to the sleek texture. “Gemma?” Not a single blink.
Mute. “Get up, we’re going to your father. ”
At last, she blinked from her trance. “Are you serious?”
I almost grinned, glad to see life spark in her whisky-colored eyes. “Have I ever lied to you?”
She hopped out of the bed and almost stumbled when reaching for her shoes.
I captured her arm and hushed her with a finger. “Quiet. I don’t want to wake anyone.”
“Your mother doesn’t know?” She yanked her elbow free. “You expect us to sneak out?”
No one would prevent me from driving her to the hospital. “Even though I’d hate to wake anyone this late, get one thing straight. I’m not my mother’s lapdog. I don’t care if we have to barge through her on the way out. We will see your father tonight.”
She threw on a jacket and shoes, and we left the premises with no hassle.
My gaze darted to the rearview mirror the entire fifteen minute drive, on guard for any De Luca scums.