Chapter 29 #2
Margaret's expression softened. "Then this place is meant for you."
We talked about numbers, terms, and the transition timeline. Everything was reasonable, doable with the legitimate money I'd set aside over the years.
"When can you start?" Margaret asked.
Valentina looked at me, and I saw the hope, the excitement, the future we were building reflected in her eyes.
"Three months," I said. "Give us time to settle with the babies, finalize details."
"Perfect. I'll have my lawyer draw up the papers."
Outside, walking back to our car with the twins, Valentina squeezed my hand.
"We're really doing this. Buying a bookstore. Building a normal life."
"We really are."
"Bookstore owners." She smiled. "Former mob boss and mafia princess selling coffee and romance novels. The irony is perfect."
"As long as no one around here knows the 'former' parts."
"Our secret." She stopped and turned to face me on the quiet street. "Thank you. For giving me this. For choosing this life over everything else."
"Thank you for making it possible to choose." I kissed her forehead. "I love you."
"I love you too."
Ezio chose that moment to wake up screaming, immediately followed by Eva.
"And that's parenthood," Valentina laughed. "Can't even have a romantic moment without interruption."
"Wouldn't have it any other way."
That night, I woke to silence.
Complete, unusual silence.
I checked the clock: 3:17 a.m. The twins should have been awake by now, demanding their feeding with the punctuality of tiny dictators.
Panic spiked. I was out of bed and down the hall before conscious thought.
I found them both sleeping peacefully in their bassinets—Ezio on his back, Eva curled on her side, both breathing steadily. Completely fine.
They'd slept through.
For the first time since coming home from the NICU, they'd slept a full six-hour stretch.
I stood between their bassinets, one hand on each, just watching them breathe.
"They're okay," Valentina's voice came from the doorway. She moved to stand beside me, wrapped in a blanket, hair messy from sleep. "I already checked twice. They're just sleeping."
"They've never slept this long."
"I know. It's terrifying and wonderful simultaneously." She leaned against my side. "What do we do?"
"Wake them up for their feeding?"
"The pediatrician said to let them sleep if they're sleeping. That their bodies will tell them when they need to eat."
"So we just… stand here and watch them sleep?"
"Apparently." She looked up at me. "Welcome to parenthood. Where everything you think you know is wrong, and the most stressful thing is when nothing's wrong."
Despite the absurdity, I smiled.
We stood in the nursery together, watching our children sleep peacefully for the first time, and I felt it settle into my bones: we'd made it. Through Marco, through prison, through the impossible early weeks of twin parenthood. We'd survived everything.
And now, in this quiet moment at three a.m. with nothing demanding our attention, nothing threatening our peace—we could finally just be. Parents. Partners. People who'd chosen each other and built something real.
"I love you," I whispered.
"I love you too." She took my hand. "Come back to bed. Let's enjoy this miracle while it lasts."
"They'll be awake in twenty minutes."
"Then we have twenty minutes of peace. Let's not waste it standing in the nursery."
She was right.
I followed her back to our bedroom, and we crawled under the covers together.
Valentina settled against my chest, my arm around her shoulders, her hand over my heart.
"This is nice," she murmured. "Just us. Quiet. No one needs anything."
"It is." I kissed her hair. "Though I give it ten minutes before someone starts crying."
"Pessimist."
"Realist."
We lay in the darkness, comfortable and warm and together.
Two minutes later, Eva started crying.
Valentina started laughing. "Called it."
"I'll get her." I started to rise, but she pulled me back down.
"Wait. Just ten more seconds. Let me enjoy this—you home, them safe, us together. Just ten seconds of perfect before the chaos starts again."
I held her tighter. "Ten seconds of perfect. I can do that."
We counted silently, breathing together.
Then Eva's cry intensified, and reality crashed back.
"Okay," Valentina said, releasing me. "Crisis mode activated."
I went to Eva while Valentina checked on Ezio—who'd somehow slept through his sister's screaming.
"How does he do that?" I asked, lifting Eva.
"Selective hearing. Gets it from his father."
"I don't have selective hearing."
"You absolutely do. You can hear a pin drop three rooms away if it's a threat, but completely miss me asking you to grab diapers from upstairs."
She had a point.
Eva settled against my shoulder, and I walked her around the nursery, bouncing gently.
"Shh, sweet girl. Daddy's got you."
Valentina appeared beside me with Ezio—awake now, looking around with that serious expression.
"Our family," she said softly, looking at all four of us in the nursery mirror. "Together. Safe. Home."
"Home," I agreed.
And meant it in every possible way.
This was home. Not the penthouse fortress. Not the safe houses. Not witness protection.
This small ranch house with the hand-painted nursery and the porch that needed fixing, and the kitchen where we fumbled through making bottles at three a.m.
This was home because they were here.
My wife. My children. My family.
The family I'd chosen over everything else.
The family that had saved me from the darkness.
"Thank you," I whispered.
Valentina looked up. "For what?"
"For loving me. For giving me this. For showing me I could be more than what I was raised to be."
"You showed yourself that. I just believed in you until you could believe in yourself." She rose on her toes and kissed me softly. "And I'll keep believing. Every single day. Forever."
"Forever," I echoed.
Eva yawned. Ezio's eyes were already drooping.
We settled them back in their bassinets and watched them drift off again.
Then we walked back to our bedroom together, hand in hand.
Tomorrow would bring more chaos. More exhaustion. More beautiful, overwhelming, perfect normalcy.
But tonight, we had peace.
And that was more than enough.