22. Vivi
VIVI
Sunlight is streaming through the windows. It’s so bright, aggravating the headache that just won’t quit.
I’ve had it for, well…I don’t actually know how long.
My recent memories are a blur. A hazy trip in and out of consciousness.
Sometimes when I wake up, I’m alone. Other times, I hear voices, can feel the heat of another body nearby, a source of comfort that’s just out of reach.
I haven’t been able to eat.
I do have a vague memory of the doctor explaining that the fluids they’re pumping into me are keeping me hydrated, and of nurses wiping cooling cloths over my skin.
The cramping in my stomach has finally faded enough that I can sit up in bed without vomiting. But that only lasts a minute before I have to retreat under the covers and go back to sleep.
The doctor said rest would help me feel better, but it hasn’t helped me remember what happened.
The last clear memory I have is of being in Giovanni’s club—and having that humiliating conversation with Francesca.
Thinking about it makes me cringe. I burrow down into the blankets, bury my head. Drift back to sleep.
Hours go by—maybe days—and I’m unsettled in bed and lost in my own mind. I’m twisting and turning, my clothes bunching up around my waist, when a tiny voice tugs me awake.
A little girl is snuggled next to me on the bed. She’s a child, no more than three, playing with a doll as she babbles at the ceiling.
I want to curl onto my side to get a better view, but my body hurts too much. I have to settle for shifting on the pillow, catching glimpses of her features in my peripheral vision.
Mahogany hair, caramel eyes. Smudges of dirt on tiny fingers. Bare feet and chunky legs kicking out from an equally dirty dress. Her giggles and chatter are soft, sweet. Whatever conversation she’s having with her doll, it’s obvious they’re best friends.
I twist, desperate to get a better view, but my body won’t cooperate.
I groan. The little girl doesn’t turn, doesn’t notice me.
Doesn’t seem to hear me. She just keeps talking with her doll.
Presses her lips to its cheek. There’s a break in the run-on sentences, and I pick out a word, clear as day: mamma.
She says it quietly, wistfully, and I don’t know if I’m imagining her or if she’s really here. My brain has been so foggy since the party at the club. I had too much champagne, not enough food, and I’ve been feeling so awful…
And then there’s that conversation I had with Francesca. Crap. I can’t believe I said all those things to her. That I asked her what I needed to do to get pregnant, to conceive a baby. Giovanni’s baby.
It’s so humiliating. And if replaying it on a mental loop hasn’t been bad enough, apparently my brain has decided to torture me with hallucinations of a child. A squeezable little girl who drops one more kiss on her doll’s cheek, rolls off the mattress, and careens straight into my husband’s arms.
He’s standing at the end of the bed and scoops her up in a huge hug, dirt and doll and all. Her grubby fingers grab his face, and he chuckles, the skin around his eyes creasing with adoration.
They whisper and giggle and share secrets that are too quiet for me to hear, and an ache opens up in my chest that’s more painful than the one in my stomach.
First it was the voice calling my name.
Now, my brain is tormenting me with delusions of a child and a fictional version of my husband.
I close my eyes on another groan. Force my lungs to work despite the vise around my chest. Hold a breath, slowly release it as I count down. Five, four, three…
I get to one, open my eyes.
The vision of Giovanni and the child is gone. There’s no one here. I’m alone in the room. The sun has been eaten by clouds, the sky outside overcast and ominous. Wind careening around the outside of the villa.
A storm is brewing.
“It was just a dream, Viviana. You were having a dream.”
I close my eyes, desperate to go back to that place. That vision of sunlight and warmth and love.
The next time I open my eyes, Giovanni is asleep in a chair next to my bed. His arms are propped on the mattress, creating a pillow for his head, his face turned in my direction. It’s dark outside. Quiet. I can’t even hear the waves.
The storm must’ve come and gone.
My husband groans something in his sleep, a deep groove forming between his brows. I turn toward him, relieved I can move more easily. I am feeling a lot better, actually—and a little bit brave. I touch Giovanni’s cheek, whisper his name.
When he doesn’t react, I shift closer. Let myself really look at him.
His expression is fierce even when he’s asleep. Forehead tugged down, brow furrowed. Intense, as always.
Intense, and beautiful. His long dark eyelashes fan across sharply angled cheeks. His lips are parted slightly, accentuating how full they are. I stare at them, wondering what they’d feel like against mine. Soft and tempting? Hard and punishing?
The longer I stare, the more curious I get. The more I want to trace them with my tongue, learn what he tastes like.
I bite the inside of my cheek, use the pain as distraction. Drag my attention to the angular lines of his jaw. His facial hair is thicker than before, looking full and soft and sprinkled with flecks of gray.
I don’t realize I’ve reached for him until I feel the gentle prickle beneath my fingertips. I freeze, my hand curled around his jaw. He doesn’t move.
Feeling reckless, I stroke his cheek. Drag my nails lightly through the hair. Marvel when he sighs, relaxing under my hand.
A millisecond of time that arrests my pulse, then sets it racing.
Giovanni sinks his head deeper against his arms, his long body visibly relaxing as I caress his cheeks, his jaw, his neck. Light strokes that make my skin tingle and my spine melt.
He is a large man, about a foot and a half taller than me, and seeing him curled over my tiny bed only accentuates his size.
I don’t know when he fell asleep, but he’s still wearing a dress shirt.
I let my attention wander, tracing the long lines of his back, lingering on his heavy muscles and broad shoulders.
Obvious power that can’t be concealed by clothes.
His arms rest lax on the bed, but it’s impossible to miss how strong they are.
How capable of carrying me like I weigh nothing…
A hazy memory darts through my brain, a vague sensation of what it felt like to be cradled in his arms, protected by his solid body.
An unfamiliar awareness coalesces beneath my skin, makes me coast my nails down the thick column of his neck to the hollow at the base of his throat.
I dip a finger there, marvel at how smooth he feels despite every part of him being so incredibly hard, unforgiving.
His pulse kicks visibly beneath his skin.
A hint of vulnerability in a man so impenetrable.
“You’re awake, passerotta.”
I jump, startled to find Giovanni watching me from beneath heavy eyelids.
“So are you.” I draw my hand away, but Giovanni covers it with one of his. He presses my palm against his cheek.
His gaze intensifies as he wakes fully, scrutinizing me. “How are you feeling, Viviana? How is your stomach? Are you in any pain?”
“I, uh…” I blink, thrown off guard by his sudden concern. “I feel okay… Tired, I guess.”
“Meno male. Thank God.” Giovanni drops a kiss to the top of my head before launching upright. “I’m going to get the doctor.” He vanishes into the hallway but is back an instant later. He points at me, expression dark. “No moving. Don’t you dare get out of that bed without the doctor’s say-so.”
He leaves, silence follows, broken a few minutes later when a man I vaguely recognize comes into the room.
He introduces himself as Doctor Santi and asks me a series of questions while listening to my chest and recording some vitals.
A pair of female nurses join us, disconnecting all the wires and tubes from my body and holding me steady as I make my way to the bathroom on unsteady legs.
I try to ask them what’s wrong with me, but they don’t understand me, and I can’t make out anything they’re saying.
After a quick and humiliating bath where they hover to make sure I’m not going to drown while I scrub myself down, the two women help me put on fresh clothes and slide me back under the covers.
The process takes roughly thirty minutes, and I’m completely wiped out by the end of it. And unbelievably grateful to whichever magical member of Giovanni’s staff changed the sheets while I was getting cleaned up.
Giovanni returns as the doctor finishes writing his notes. My husband gives me a quick but thorough once-over before escorting the doctor into the hall for a private conversation. I can’t hear anything they discuss; my husband returns alone.
“Well?” I look at him expectantly. “What did the doctor say? Did he explain what’s wrong with me?”
Giovanni stops at the end of the bed, responds with a question of his own. “Do you remember anything about what happened?”
“About—?” I push into a sitting position. It takes more energy than it should. Everything about this feels wrong. From Giovanni’s solicitous behavior, to the sweet kiss he gave me, to the way I ache from head to toe. Anxiety spikes. “Giovanni—how long have I been in bed?”
He checks his watch, his expression oddly blank. “Six days, twenty hours, and thirty-two minutes.”
“You remember down to the minute?”
“I remember to the second, passerotta mia. The moment is seared into my brain.” His eyes flash with an emotion that is hot, unexpected, and gone a second later.
“But clearly not in yours. You got sick at the club. You collapsed, vomited, we had to rush you back in here in the helicopter. Any of that strike a bell?”
Oh, crap. It does.
I flush as more details about the party come back rapid-fire. The dress, the shoes, the looks everyone was giving me. Talking with Dana. Drinking too much, saying too much to Francesca. Feeling really, really sick. Falling face-first on the floor, humiliating myself…
I cover my hands, hide from my husband’s intense stare. “Yes. I remember. I’m so sorry, Giovanni. So sorry for ruining your party.”
Cool fingers wrap around my wrists, gently pulling my hands off my face. “You have nothing to apologize for, Vivi.” Giovanni uses my nickname so casually, so unexpectedly, it provokes a shiver. “You didn’t do anything wrong. You were poisoned.”
I shiver harder. “Poisoned?”
“Sì. With arsenic. The test results confirmed it.”
His statement knocks the wind out of me. I collapse against the pillows. “Someone poisoned me? That’s why I threw up everywhere?”
Giovanni nods, dissecting me with his eyes. “Do you know who is trying to kill you, bella?”