For a moment, he didn’t move. He simply stood there, assessing me. His stormy features dimmed some and when he said, “Take your clothes off,” he said it evenly.
My stomach clenched at his false calm. But he was my husband. This was his right.
I did as he asked, and once I was nude, I turned towards the bed, but he grasped my hand and tugged me in the opposite direction. I blinked in confusion as he turned on the bathroom light, took off his jacket and reached into the large cubicle to lift the lever. Hot water billowed out of the showerhead until steam swirled around us. He adjusted the temperature, held out his hand and with zero hesitation, I took it.
He walked me in and under the spray. The sigh that left me was one of pure bliss.
I didn’t even notice he had undressed until he slipped in behind me. That sigh of bliss turned into a heavenly moan when he lifted his hands and began to massage the knots out of my neck and shoulders. I fell back into him and although my knees wobbled, he held me up, washing me with a tenderness and care I didn’t know he had in him.
Afterwards, he dressed me before he dressed himself and sat me down between his outspread knees. He brushed my hair and kissed my neck as my eyes wearily fell closed. I yawned when he pulled back the sheets and helped me in. My head hit the pillow and I muttered sleepily. “Tor?”
The mattress shifted when he took his place beside me. “Yeah?”
I was half asleep when I slurred, “I really do love you. You love me too, don’t you?”
Right then, I fell to slumber so I wasn’t really sure I heard him respond, but I could have sworn I dreamt him say, “‘Til death and beyond.”
Of course, it was all a dream.
Irrespective, I fell asleep smiling.
Chapter20
How do you do it?
Ettore
It wasearly afternoon and I already wanted to strangle the disrespectful fuck that was my younger brother.
As was the norm, Sundays were reserved for family and when my pops put on a spread, he didn’t need to call us over. We smelled the invitation from down the street. Soon after we arrived, I saw mama’s navy blue, white speckled enamel pot sitting in the center of the table, and I could already taste what was inside.
When the entire family was seated, Giada opened the pots and I immediately began salivating. My mother’s rabbit ragu sat to one side of the big pot of polenta, and on the other was something I didn’t recognize. Whatever it was smelled great though.
While Vittoria loaded up plates for the boys, I watched her closely as she leant down and asked them each what they wanted. It caused an unexpected emotion to wash over me. Satisfaction. She fell into her role of stepmother fairly easily which spoke highly of her considering my kids were not always on their best behavior. I had to cut ‘em some slack though. They’d been through things other kids their age couldn’t possibly understand, and Vittoria’s own losses resonated with theirs.
I watched my wife and her gentle curves move effortlessly around the family table and part of me grew impatient wondering what the hell was taking so long. She was young, I was amorous and we weren’t using birth control, yet every month she got her courses.
My gaze fell to her stomach with a longing I thought had long passed.
The desire to see her pregnant was a needy one. I wanted her to swell with part of me. I wanted a son with my wife’s expressive eyes or a daughter with her soft heart. But more than anything, I craved another child to dote on.
Hers. Mine.
Ours.
While she provided for the kids, it was my job to provide for her. I took her plate and began to fill it. And I felt his eyes on me from across the table. When I glanced up at him coolly, Daniele simply looked down as I held my wife’s plate, shook his head slowly then lifted his hand and mimed a whipping motion.
My jaw tightened at the implication that I was pussy whipped. I would refrain from pouring a ladle of steaming hot sauce into his lap, if only because I could see my father’s health waning and another fight between siblings was not going to improve his disposition.
Daniele was still young and he had time to make mistakes. What he didn’t understand was, I had already made them and guilt ate away at me every day since the unexpected loss of my beloved Amara. In the years since she passed, I noticed things about myself. Things I didn’t do. Things I should’ve done. While Amara held down the home base, I worked outside of it. Oftentimes, I came home late. Some nights, I didn’t come home at all. Asserting myself into the role, becoming head of this house, it took time and effort and I neglected things. People.
I had no idea Amara was struggling mentally. Like most mothers, she hid it well. But now, as I lowered Vittoria’s plate as she took her seat, she smiled at me, widely, openly and full of love.
The critical thoughts that attacked me came at the most inconvenient times.
Maybe if you came home earlier…
Maybe if you spent more time with her…