Chapter 26
Our lives went back to normal, or so it seemed. Norah, if it was even her, crawled back into whatever hole she lived in. The little gifts stopped coming.
Thor himself said everything was fine, and I trusted him.
Our house had been finished after so many delays and headaches, but we were still in the apartment while we waited for the furniture to be delivered so we could move. We weren’t taking anything from the apartment except our personal belongings.
There was too much to do and too little free time.
With our hectic lives, Thor and I were taking things little by little.
Pietra was getting married, so we flew to Tuscany in my parents’ jet for the wedding. Nonno Peppe lent them the vineyard so the wedding could be held there.
I was so happy for my girl.
Everyone was in the main house, friends and relatives, Nathan’s parents.
Castellammare and Vicenti gathered for another grand celebration.
It would be an intimate ceremony for those closest to the couple, but no less glamorous and lavish than the bride and groom deserved.
We arrived one day early. At almost eight months, I was about to burst. I rested the whole afternoon, and that night, after dinner, I left my men to join my girls in the room where Pietra was staying.
“I’m so glad you could come.” I hugged Josie, missing her to death.
“Pietra getting married? I wouldn’t miss that miracle for anything in the world,” she said.
“It’s good to see you again,” I said as I pulled back.
“Same here.” She touched my belly. “And how is auntie’s little baby girl?”
I attempted a little pout.
“Fattening me up.”
“Silly. You look great!”
I looked… Josie seemed… Well, she was beautiful.
“We’re killing it, right?”
“Right.”
“I’m here, cows,” Pietra cleared her throat.
We turned to Pietra, who was staring at us with a fake pout the size of the world. I pinched her cheek as I passed her, earning a rude remark, then lowered my butt into the comfortable armchair, slid my hand over my belly, and left it there.
Josie took the other armchair.
“We’ve barely had time to talk,” she began.
“Guilty,” I surrendered with a sigh. “I was so tired from the trip that when I arrived, I went straight to the bedroom to shower and sleep. Lucca was out cold too. Thor had to wake him up, otherwise he wouldn’t sleep tonight.”
“Baby awake, no fun for Mommy and Daddy,” Pietra joked.
“Sex during pregnancy is very good for you, my dears.”
“Sex is good in any situation,” Pietra said with a malicious little laugh, then cried out. “Which reminds me that it’s been AN ENTIRE WEEK since I gave it up. I don’t know why I agreed to Nathan’s stupid deal. I think my hymen has even grown back.”
“Give the man the illusion of a wedding night,” Josie joked.
“What are you implying, clown? I’m very tight, just so you know.”
“For a log, I have no doubt,” Josie teased.
“Bitch. Pompoir works miracles.” Pietra winked.
I laughed, shaking my head.
“Pom… what?”
“Pompoir, Josie. It’s a technique to train the kitty. When you set yours free, I’ll teach you some tricks that leave any hard cock begging.”
Josie blushed violently, but said nothing.
“Calm down, Pietra,” I cut in. “Tomorrow you’ll be able to break the bed.”
“How are you, Ella?” Josie asked, changing the subject.
“Tired most of the time.” I pointed to my huge belly. “This is more weight than I can carry. I don’t remember getting this swollen in the other pregnancy.”
“I told you, she’s thirty months pregnant,” Pietra mocked.
“Your ass, cow.”
One of the maids knocked and entered carrying a tray of ricciarelli cookies.
“I can’t eat anything else,” Pietra complained.
“You don’t want any?”
“Thank you. I’m full,” Josie said, with an uncomfortable smile when I pushed the sacred tray toward her at the same time I bit into the sweet.
“Me too, but I won’t refuse a bite.”
“Today is not the day the hallelujah trumpets will sound,” Pietra said with theatrics.
“That’s reserved for tomorrow when you say yes in front of the priest,” I shot back while sucking powdered sugar off my fingers.
Pietra opened a bottle of wine and served us, but Josie refused and chose the little bottle of water, and I mirrored her, while Pietra filled her glass almost to the rim.
“Is getting married hungover a good idea?” Josie probed.
Pietra paused with the glass at her mouth, then took a big swallow.
“We’ll find out.”
I gave her a look.
Pietra lowered the glass and huffed. “I’m nervous.”
“Don’t say you weren’t warned later,” I said, then abandoned the tray.
“Are you in the new house yet?”
“Not yet, Josie. But we intend to do it before Pietra and Nathan come back from their honeymoon. I want to be in the new house when the baby is born.”
Pietra and Nathan would live in the apartment where we were living.
They would have gone to Thor’s apartment, if the space had truly been his.
The thing was, my beloved husband had lied.
Mr. Omero, who was no fool, had known how to make a good deal with a desperate man in love.
He had, in fact, rented the apartment to Thor.
So, shortly after we reconciled, Mr. Omero returned to the building.
“… we’ll stay there until we find land where we can build our house,” Pietra was saying. “It’s not like the brat needs the apartment right now.”
“And, Dio willing, he’ll only need it when I die,” I grumbled.
“Accept it, darling, Lucca is going to fuck a lot in that apartment.”
I flipped her off.
Minutes later, we heard the sound of guitar and voices…
Were they singing? We ran to the window—I walked, really.
I squeezed myself into a little space between the girls at the window and looked down, sighing the next minute.
It was Nathan and the guys and my uncles.
Thor wasn’t there. He must be with Lucca, I thought.
We stayed there, enjoying ourselves between giggles and so much cuteness, watching the groom serenade his beloved.
They played and sang badly as hell, but it was beautiful.
At the end, Pietra shouted what she had saids of love to Nathan, and he returned them, sweet, passionate words and small insinuations that reached the heart before fading into the night.
I said good night to them and withdrew to my room.
Thor was in bed, reading a book. I brushed my teeth, returned to the bedroom, checked Lucca sleeping in the crib, and then lay down. Thor abandoned the book.
“Did you have fun?” he said, his damp lips tracing my shoulder.
“A lot. Josie is different. Did you notice?”
“It must be for the same reason Eric looks like shit.”
“I don’t like it. I don’t like seeing my girl so sad. She tries to hide it, but I know it’s hard for her to watch us getting married. First me, and now Pietra.”
“If she’d pull her head out of her ass…”
“Thor! I can’t believe you said that.”
“Am I lying? Josie has Eric’s balls in her hand, Ella. He messed up and paid for his mistakes. He’s waiting for her. She’s the one who needs to pull her head out of her ass and decide what she wants.”
“Yeah, you’re right.”
Thor kissed me. I was giving in, melting all over, when I remembered. I grabbed the sides of his head and pulled him back while pouting.
“Hey, you owe me a serenade.”
“What?”
“Nathan was sweet.” My fingers disappeared into his hair. “After today, I could fall in love with him, if I weren’t already in love with you.”
“Madly,” he said, possessive, smiling, kissing my neck, his big, hot hand tracing my thigh up to the top, rubbing that sensitive spot.
“Yes,” I sighed. “Madly in love.”
Thor nibbled my ear and kissed the skin beneath it.
I shivered all over.
“What are you doing?”
“Courting my woman.”
And that was what he did for the next half hour, slowly and deliciously.
Pietra’s wedding was beautiful, truly very emotional. There was a special magic that made me think of my own wedding, and I became a weepy little thing.
A year of so much love and so much complicity.
After stirring up the dance floor with my two men and stuffing myself with the delicious little bites, I approached the table where Josie was sitting alone.
“Tired?”
“Dead, but happy.” I relaxed in the chair. “Try walking around with this belly and still keeping up with an almost three-year-old boy. I swear, I don’t know what he takes to have so much energy when I’m dying after ten minutes of dancing.”
“You’re pregnant, Ella. It’s normal,” she said, distant.
“Yes…” I looked more closely. “And you, didn’t you want to dance?”
“I’m fine here. I like watching.”
I frowned at the oddness, but kept it to myself.
“Have you decided if you’ll stay longer?”
“No.”
I looked across the table with pleading eyes.
“Stay, Josie. We’ve spent so much time away from each other. I would really, really like it if you stayed a few more days. There are so many things I’d like to talk about.”
She sighed, sounding tired.
“I’d like that too, Ella, but…”
“Take your time deciding,” I interrupted while quickly waving to the waiter as he handed me a nonalcoholic fruit cocktail. “But I won’t give up having you here to meet my little girl when she’s born.”
“Uhum.”
“Are you okay?”
Josie smiled, but it didn’t reach her eyes.
“Yes.”
“Are you sure?”
She nodded. I wasn’t convinced.
“Can you believe it?”
I followed her gaze, stopping on Pietra and Nathan wrapped in their own bubble as they danced. Sugar had a faster beat, but they were moving slowly.
Little laughs and lovestruck looks shared at the height of passion.
Small, delicate gestures that only two deeply in-love people understand. They read each other. Live each other. Complete each other. That translates into intimacy.
From here, I could feel their love inside my chest.
Love recognizes love and celebrates it.
Love. We were wrapped in the magical aura of that feeling. Intense, deep, delicate loves… I shifted my gaze to my friend… broken loves.
“I think the only thing more surprising than seeing her married is that I’m married,” I said, moving my attention to Thor talking to Nathan’s parents.
“In your crazy way, the two of you were destined to end up together.”
“Yeah, I think so.”
“Pietra too.”
“Maybe you are too, Josie,” I commented softly, looking at Eric sitting at another table with my son on his lap. “You only need to give yourself a chance.”
“I’m pregnant.”
I stopped the glass on its way to my mouth, turning my head in slow motion, my gaze widening toward her. Josie wasn’t looking at me. Her gaze was lost among the guests.
“What did you say?”
“I’m pregnant.”
“Repeat that.”
“I’m pregnant,” she said louder.
“Pregnant as in… pregnant?”
“Pregnant. A baby. Nine months, nausea, dizziness, and all that.”
I blinked. My brain had stopped working.
“Uh-oh… Does he know?”
“I found out today. I had the test with me, took it, and bingo. I didn’t tell you before about my suspicions because, well, there was the wedding and all this.” She gave a nervous laugh.
“Dio…”
“Yeah, I know.”
“Do you want to talk?”
“Later. Tomorrow. After, possibly.”
I nodded like an idiot.
“Okay.”
I looked at her for longer than should have been considered polite, even between friends. Josie was held herself still, contained. I understood her so well.
I reached for her hand across the table and squeezed it.
“It’s all right, darling.”
She nodded, breathing deep, still not looking at me.
I wanted to say more, call her to the main house, give her a quiet moment where she could let her guard down, give her a tight hug… Lucca crashed into my legs.
“Pee, mamma! Pee!” he shouted, squeezing his little legs together in a huge drama.
“Okay, let’s go.”
I looked at Josie, still a little stunned.
“I’ll be fine, Ella. Go take care of your boy. Want me to help?”
“No, it’s okay.”
And in the end, nothing was okay.
I took Lucca to the bathroom in the main house, and when we came out along the edge of the vineyard, my little lion got excited and ran toward it. I went after him, complaining, not wanting him to dirty the beautiful little suit I had had made for him by papà’s private tailor.
“Lucca, come back here right now.”
I caught up to him farther inside a row of vines, exploring something on the ground. Dirt, of course. I went to him, lamenting, and bent, taking his dirty little hand.
“It’s auntie’s wedding, my love. You can’t get all grubby. Tomorrow, mamma will let you play here until you’re all black with dirt, okay? Not today. Let’s go back to the party.”
Lucca wasn’t looking at me, but at something behind me.
A strange feeling surrounded me before I turned, and when I began to rotate, something—or rather, someone—closed in behind me, pressing a strong-smelling cloth over my nose and mouth.
Fear filled my bloodstream and made me want to flee.
I fought against my attacker, desperate, but I couldn’t fight off unconsciousness.
Black spots appeared and took me completely.
I only felt my limp body fall before darkness took me.