“After sending that assassin last night, she doesn’t want to stop.”
“Can’t you call the police or something?” Then I realize how dumb of a question that is.
“Why does she want to murder you so badly? Most people would regroup after failing once.”
“Ariana isn’t most people. She was raised to always go for what she wanted.”
“That’s not a bad thing.”
“Unless what she wants is to murder me.”
“How does she think that killing you will impact Lucia?”
“She doesn’t think that growing up without a father will hurt her, apparently.”
I don’t know what to say to that. Yeah, my dad may not be the best person in the world, but I still loved him. “I know what it’s like to grow up without one of your parents. Ariana is crazy.”
Iacopo doesn’t say anything. I regret talking about my mom. Besides the money, she’s sort of out of the picture. I think about Lucia being raised by a psycho bitch mother and never having Iacopo’s influence. I still remember what it was like to have Uncle Iacopo around when I was a little kid. He’s amazing with children. Ariana’s totally insane.
“When is the next time you get to have Lucia?”
“Next weekend.” His eyes are haunted.
“Is it even safe for her to live with her mother?”
“You don’t know the story.” Iacopo shook his head. “We married because it was the best thing for our families. We didn’t like each other. She’s always thought that she was too good for me.”
“But you had a baby.”
“Because she insisted. Her father was putting a lot of pressure on her to have an heir.”
“But you have Lucia.”
“We weren’t going to go through all that a second time. It was difficult enough to have one baby.”
“Why did you divorce when you had the kid?”
“Because Ariana hated living with me. She didn’t like my ‘rutting,’ as she called it. She couldn’t think about enduring more of it.”
Iacopo stops.
“There’s more to the story, isn’t there?”
“She’s addicted to cocaine.”
“Didn’t that hurt the baby?”
He laughs. There’s zero humor in it. “I kept her away from cocaine while she was pregnant. She wasn’t happy about it.”
“What happened after Lucia was born?”
“She refused to breastfeed. She wanted cocaine more than a healthy daughter.”
I’m trying to wrap my head around someone who loves white powder more than her actual baby. Lucia is really cute. I can’t really understand how anyone could choose cocaine over Lucia.
“The struggle over keeping her clean was part of the reason why we split. She said that I didn’t have any authority over her.”
“If her dad was so enthusiastic about you getting married, why would he let her divorce you?”