“She wants to wait on the test for another two days. I’m not going to raise a brat.”
“You’ve said on no less than three occasions, what Rosie wants, Rosie will get. No better way of raising a brat than that.” The little shit laughs.
Damn, I might have said it more than a few times. “It’s been five damn years. Her birthday is tomorrow. She deserves a little spoiling.” I try to defend myself.
“Hey, it’s your funeral when she’s sixteen and running wild.”
Fuck, that’s the last thing I want. It’s one of the nightmares I’ve woken up from over the last few weeks. “We’ll see about that,” I promise him. “It’s just Dominic and Regina over for dinner tonight.”
“Sounds good. It can get a little loud with everyone there. I get it’s exactly how you want your home. I’m not used to it.” He admits.
“It’s what I figured out already,” I assure him.
“So, if it’s a boy, Christy is down with what his life will be like?”
I shrug. “We hadn’t really discussed that part of it. I told her a long time ago if we had a boy, this would be his life. Shit, I wonder if that’s what is messing with her.”
“Still? I thought it was all hot makeup sex, her going down on you in public, and wine nights on the back deck interspersed with puppies and cotton candy?” He has his mother’s sense of humor because he sure as hell didn’t get it from me.
Fucking Dominic told him about the club thing, which even a few days later blows my mind. I would never have thought Christy had it in her. I’m sure she didn’t think she did either. Damn it, I’m getting hard again just thinking about it. Trying like hell to get my body under control, I shake my head.
“I don’t even know. Everything is fine until someone mentions the wedding only three damn days away. When I bought the pregnancy test you would have thought it was cyanide I was handing her.” I run a hand through my hair because it’s that or smack the steering wheel.
“Any other time, she’s so fucking happy she’s glowing. Tells me a dozen times a day she loves me. If it weren’t crystal-fucking clear she’s as confused by her fear as I am, I’d put my damn hands around her beautiful neck and squeeze.”
“Hm.”
Stopping for a red light, I glance at him. “What?”
“I would have thought you’d have forgiven her by now. It sounded like you did. I guess you haven’t.” He points at the light. “It’s green, Pop.”
It’s another second before it gets through to me. I focus on the road. “I’ve forgiven her.” Yet even as I say the words, they are hollow. “I want to forgive her.”
“And maybe that’s why she’s still anxious.” He tilts his head to look at me. “There will be no escape but death this time around. I can imagine being tied to someone for the rest of your life who hasn’t let go of their bitterness toward her would be scary. What if you never do?”
The question hangs over me as I drive. Christ, I want to forgive her. I really fucking do. A few times, I thought I had managed to. Then I woke up in the middle of the night, and she wasn’t in bed. Until I found her rocking Rosie back to sleep, I was soaked in fear. Or there was the moment when I brought up her tracker to check her location, and she wasn’t where she said she was going to be. In the time it took Joseph to answer and tell me that Christy was buying me a wedding present, and it was supposed to be a surprise, a thousand shitty things came to mind.
It didn’t matter I had either Joseph or Vito with her, and it was rare for her to be away from me for longer than an hour. I still brought up her location on her tracker a dozen times a day. She didn’t know I’d had the dentist give her a filling that was actually a tracker and that when Rosie got her shots, one of them was a tracker. I don’t plan on eve
r telling her either. When Valdez suggested them to Dominic several years ago I agreed they were necessary, then spent the rest of the day wishing like hell I’d had one on Christy before she took off.
Before we get out of the car, I stop Luca. “Can you please do your best to be nice to her? At least until after the wedding.”
“Pop, I’m hurt. I’m always nice to beautiful women.” He puts a hand to his chest, and those brown eyes are wide with fake hurt.
Definitely got that shit from his mother.
As promised, Luca is nice to Christy. Rosie climbs into his lap. It takes the threat of her puppies sleeping in their kennels and not her room at bedtime to get her off his lap. Cora takes her up to put her in bed before we go into dinner. Relief fills me seeing my family together, finally looking happy and at ease with each other.
We’re finishing up dessert when Luca’s phone rings. He answers it, and doesn’t need to listen for long. “I need to take this upstairs.”
I nod. His number two needs to be replaced. Meeting Dominic’s eyes, it’s clear he agrees with me. Tomorrow we’ll talk about it.
“I feel so bad you guys can’t take a honeymoon because we’ll be in Greece.” Regina sighs as she sips the last of her wine.
“Don’t worry about it. Dominic covered for me while I was in Vegas, it’s my turn to watch over his business while you’re gone. Then he gets to do it again for me because we’re taking our honeymoon when you get back.” I assure her.
“What? We’re taking a honeymoon?” Christy’s eyes are wide.