23. Giovanni
— ? —
Giovanni
I’ve been planning this for days, waiting for the right moment, hoping that when it comes, I’ll find the words.
The drive takes us out of Milan and into the countryside, past vineyards and farmland, through small towns I’ve known since childhood. Cielo sits beside me in the passenger seat, watching the scenery pass with an expression I can’t quite read.
“Are you going to tell me where we’re going?”
“No.”
“That’s not concerning at all.”
“Trust me.”
“Famous last words.”
But she doesn’t demand answers, which I take as a good sign. Five years ago, she would have pressed until I broke. Now she’s willing to wait, to see where this road leads.
I hope it leads where I want it to.
* * *
The gallery is smaller than I remembered.
It sits on a quiet street in a town I once passed through by accident, its windows displaying a rotation of local artwork that changes with the seasons. When I bought it three years ago, I told myself it was an investment. A property with potential. Nothing to do with the woman I’d lost.
That was a lie, of course. Everything I’ve done since Sicily has been about Cielo, in one way or another.
I park across the street and turn off the engine, and Cielo stares at the building with her brow furrowed.
“This is-” She stops, recognition dawning. “Giovanni, is this-”
“The gallery where we met. Yes.”
“But it was - you-” She’s struggling to process, her eyes moving between me and the building. “This is where I was standing when you first saw me. I was trying to escape my aunt’s charity event, and I ducked in here because the door was open, and you-”
“I followed you inside. And found you arguing with the security guard about the Caravaggio.”
“The lighting was wrong. It was casting shadows on half the composition.”
“I know. You were very passionate about it.”
She laughs, but there’s something thick in her voice. “Why are we here?”
“Because I need to tell you something.” I take a breath, reaching for words I’ve rehearsed a hundred times. “I bought this gallery, Cielo. Three years ago. After I’d been searching for you for two years and starting to lose hope that I’d ever find you.”
“You bought it?”
“I kept thinking - if I fixed enough of what I broke. If I made enough gestures. If I did enough things right. Maybe you’d come back.
Maybe you’d show up here, at the place where everything started, and I could-” I break off, frustrated with my own inability to articulate this.
“I don’t know what I was thinking. It was stupid. Sentimental. Not like me at all.”
“It sounds exactly like you,” she says quietly.
“Does it?”
“The Giovanni I married was always doing things like this. Grand gestures. Impossible surprises.” She reaches across the console and takes my hand. “I’d forgotten. After everything - I’d forgotten that part of you existed.”
“It never stopped existing. I just didn’t have anyone to show it to.”
We sit in silence for a moment, looking at the gallery, at the place where our whole story began.
“There’s more,” I say finally. “In the back. Something else I wanted to show you.”
* * *
The stables behind the gallery are new - I had them built a year ago, when the hope had faded to something more like ritual than expectation.
There are two horses inside: a beautiful bay mare and a smaller pony with patient eyes.
Cielo stops dead in the doorway.
“Giovanni.”
“Her name is Luna. The mare. I remembered you said once that you’d always wanted to learn to ride, and I told you it was too dangerous, that horses were unpredictable and I didn’t want you getting hurt.
” I move to stand beside her, watching the horses watch us.
“I was wrong about that. About a lot of things.”
“You bought me a horse.”
“I bought you freedom. That’s what horses mean to you, isn’t it? That’s why you wanted one. Because where you grew up, in your aunt’s house with all those rules and restrictions - you couldn’t have anything that felt free.”
Her eyes are bright with tears. “I told you that years ago. On our second date.”
“I remember everything you’ve ever told me.”
“The pony?”
“For Gio. When he’s old enough to learn.
” I turn to face her fully. “I understand now, Cielo. Keeping you safe was never supposed to mean keeping you caged. In Sicily, I kept telling myself the walls and guards were enough, even while I left you there alone. All I did was make you feel trapped. I’m not going to make that mistake again. ”
“Giovanni-”
“I’m not asking you to forgive me. I’m not asking you to forget what happened or pretend the last five years didn’t hurt. I’m just asking you to let me try. To let me show you that I can be different. That I can be the husband you deserve instead of the one I was.”
She’s quiet for a long moment, and I can see her processing - the gallery, the horses, all of it. The weight of what I’m offering and what it means.
“You really thought I’d come back here,” she says finally. “To the gallery. After everything.”
“I hoped. That’s all I had left for a while. Just hope and stubbornness.”
“Those seem like very you qualities.”
“They’re the only ones that got me through.”
She reaches up and touches my face, her fingers tracing the lines that five years have carved there.
“I’m here now,” she says. “That has to count for something.”
“It counts for everything.”
I kiss her because I can’t not kiss her, because she’s standing in front of me with tears on her cheeks and hope in her eyes, and I’ve spent five years dreaming of exactly this.
“Come on,” I say when we finally break apart. “Let’s go introduce you to your horse.”
* * *
We’re driving back to Milan when Beppe calls.
I answer on the car’s speaker, expecting a routine check-in, but his voice is tight in a way that immediately puts me on alert.
“Boss. We’ve got a situation.”
“What kind of situation?”
“The contact we’ve been watching - the one who’s been feeding information to the Falcone network. He just made a call. We intercepted it.”
“And?”
“Ludovica knows you’ve been closing in. She knows you have the manifest, the testimony, all of it.” Beppe pauses. “The call said she’s ‘done waiting.’ That she’s ‘going to take what matters most.’”
The words hit me like ice water.
“When was this call?”
“Twenty minutes ago.”
“Get everyone back to the house. Now. Full security.”
I end the call and press harder on the accelerator, my hands tight on the wheel.
“Giovanni?” Cielo’s voice is sharp with fear. “What’s happening?”
“Ludovica.” The name tastes like poison. “She’s making a move.”
“A move for what?”
But I’m already calling Rino, already praying that we’re not too late.
Take what matters most.
Gio. She’s going after Gio.