Chapter 19 #2
"You look like shit," he observed, studying my face.
"Thanks. You're a real morale boost."
"I'm honest. There's a difference." He settled into a chair and accepted the coffee I offered. "How's Valentina?"
"Sick. Exhausted. Handling it better than I am."
"And you?"
I was quiet for a moment. "I don't know how to be a father, Dom. I keep reading these books, and they all assume you had normal parents who modeled normal behavior. But my father—" I stopped, scrubbed a hand over my face. "What if I damage them the way he damaged me?"
"You won't."
"How do you know?"
"Because you're worried about it." Domenico leaned forward.
"Marco never questioned whether he was a good father.
Your father never wondered if his methods were right.
But you're sitting here at two p.m. reading parenting books and spiraling about whether you'll be good enough. That's the difference."
The words settled something inside me.
"Besides," Domenico added, "you've got Valentina. Sofia. Me. You're not doing this alone. And those kids are going to be so loved they won't know what to do with it."
"You're really okay with this? Being their padrino?"
"You promised me that, remember?" He grinned. "And yeah, I'm more than okay with it. Someone needs to teach them how to hotwire cars and pick locks when they're older."
The joke landed differently now. But I let it go—Dom meant well, and maybe some skills were worth having regardless of how they were acquired.
"They're not even born yet, and you're already planning their criminal education?"
"Never too early." His expression softened. "But seriously, Alessio—you're going to be a great father. You're going to love them fiercely and protect them completely and teach them to be better than we were. That's all anyone can do."
After he left, I felt lighter. Not completely unburdened, but less alone in it.
That night, I found Valentina in the nursery we'd started setting up in the safe house's spare room.
She stood in the middle of the empty space, one hand on her small bump, staring at blank walls.
"What are you thinking about?" I asked, wrapping my arms around her from behind.
"Paint colors. Cribs. Where everything should go." She leaned back against my chest. "Trying to make it feel real."
"Doesn't feel real yet?"
"Sometimes. Then the morning sickness hits, and it feels very real." She turned in my arms. "Are we really doing this? Building a nursery in an FBI safe house while preparing to testify against my father?"
"We really are."
"It's insane."
"Completely." I kissed her forehead. "But we're good at insane."
She smiled despite everything. "We really are."
We stood like that for a while, imagining the space filled with cribs and changing tables and all the chaos of twin infants.
"I want them to be safe," Valentina whispered. "That's all I want. For them to grow up without fear, without violence, without any of the darkness we survived."
"They will be." I rested my hand over hers on her stomach. "I promise. Whatever it takes."
"Even if it means testifying? Reliving everything?"
"Even then." I held her tighter. "We end this threat completely. Then we give them the life they deserve."
She nodded against my chest, and I felt her belief in my promise.
By the end of those two weeks after the arrest, Valentina's morning sickness had settled into a predictable routine.
6:47 a.m. Every morning. You could set a clock by it.
I'd learned to wake at 6:45, have ginger tea ready, and a cool cloth prepared. She'd stumble to the bathroom, and I'd follow, holding back her hair, rubbing gentle circles on her back.
"This is so glamorous," she muttered one morning, slumped against me.
"Very." I pressed the cloth to her forehead. "But you're beautiful even like this."
"Liar."
"Honest." I helped her stand and guided her back to bed. "Most beautiful woman I've ever seen."
She managed a weak smile. "You're just saying that because I'm carrying your children."
"I'm saying it because it's true."
I settled her back in bed, made sure she had water and crackers within reach. Her eyes were already drifting closed again—the first trimester exhaustion hitting hard.
"Love you," she mumbled.
"Love you too, principessa. Both of you."
"Both of them, too," she corrected sleepily. "Don't forget there are two."
"Never. All three of you."
She smiled and fell back asleep.
I stood in the doorway watching her rest, one hand protectively over the lives growing inside her, and felt the weight of responsibility settle deeper.
Three people now. Three people I'd die to protect. Keep them all safe. Make sure our children never know the darkness their parents had survived.
The fear was overwhelming.
But so was the determination.
Whatever it took. However long it took. I'd keep them safe.
All of them.
That was my new blood oath. Not to criminal empires or family honor. To the woman I loved and the children we'd created.
And unlike the oath to Marco, this one I'd never break.