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Chapter Thirty-One
-Noemi-
ONE WEEK LED TO SIXweeks, led to three months. Spring was on its way, and I was still stuck at the Calegaris. I knew I had free will, but I trusted Dante. When he left, he told me he’d come back for me as soon as everything was resolved. He didn’t say anything else. He didn’t tell me he loved me. He didn’t even kiss me goodbye.
It was of my own free will that I stayed at the Calegari home, waiting and worrying. Dante was dealing with the demons from our past and I was in his home being “guarded” by his stifling, over-protective younger brother.
“Dante will kill me if anything happens to you,” he said one night during dinner. “Whether it makes you mad or not, you stay here,” he shrugged as if I had no say in my own life.
“But the alarm system was installed weeks ago,” I protested.
“An alarm system is just one security measure, Noemi.”
“But if you add that to the goons you have driving me around and following me everywhere, I’ll be fine. I need some space, Gabriel. I need to breathe.”
“We have plenty of air here,” he said, his tone changing.
I tossed my fork down. “I’m an independent person, Gabriel. You can’t keep me locked up here if I want to leave.”
“Can’t I?” he mocked me.
The table got quiet. Lilly started to say something, but Gabriel waved his hand at her and she snapped her jaw shut.
“So, what?” I challenged him. “Am I a prisoner here now?”
“Do you need to be?” he said quietly.
There it was. The family resemblance. Dante used that tone daily. He lived with that deadly intense look on his face. Both were a part of him that I missed so much I nearly burst into tears. Gabriel didn’t use either very often. This was a side of him I had never seen before, but it seemed the Calegari traits ran true.
But I didn’t cower to Gabriel the way I submitted to Dante. Gabriel wasn’t Dante. There was no pull, no magic. No urge to please.
“No,” I answered with conviction. “But you can’t blame me for wanting to leave, Gabriel.”
He sat back in his chair. “I didn’t realize you were so unhappy here.”
“Of course, I’m unhappy here,” I lashed out. “I wake up everyday and everything I see around me reminds me of him. From the black coffee mugs in the cupboard to the columns of the back porch. I miss him so much, but I can’t get any peace because he’s everywhere around me. And do you know what’s worse? He’s out there, wherever the hell he is, and he has nothing of me. There’s nothing to keep him awake at night. Nothing choking the memories from him until he can hardly breathe.”
“Oh, Noemi,” Lilly gasped next to me.
I shook my head. “Don’t any of you get it? I love him, and being here, with all of you... I can’t do it, Gabriel. I can’t stay here much longer.”
Lilly rose from her chair and hugged me. She’d been such a comfort. I felt bad for the things I said, but they were all true.
“I understand,” Gabriel said, once again sounding just like Dante. “I just ask that you stay strong, Noemi. I know my brother. He’ll be back as soon as he can, and he’ll come for you. Just have faith in him. Don’t let him down now.”
“Dante loves you, too,” Lilly whispered to me. “He never shows it, but I know he does. I don’t know where he is or what he’s doing, but if he said he would come back, Noemi, then you have to believe him. Dante never lets anyone down.”
“I told you,carina,”Dante’s mother added. “My son is worth waiting for.”
I could only nod and let Lilly hug me some more. Dante’s family’s love was exhausting and comforting at the same time it was stifling and controlling. Just like the man himself.
“I need to make some calls. If you ladies will excuse me. Noemi, please remember what I said.”
With barely a glance in my direction, Gabriel left the table. I watched the doors swing behind him.
“I need some air. Excuse me,” I muttered, tossing my napkin down. I nearly ran out the side door, around the side of the house to the porch at the back.
I leaned against the column, sucking in air and thinking about that night, about our first kiss and about how Dante had pressed my body against the cold stone but all I could feel was the heat between us.
