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"I didn't ask you about you," Sergio says. "With everything you're putting on the line, I wanna know why she's fucking worth it."
"She's… She's real. There's something about her, something real I've never known with a woman before. Martina wasn't cold, you know that. But she was just my friend. No more, no less. There was never a spark there. No connection." I close my eyes for a second because it makes me feel guilty even admitting this out loud.
"You were good to her, bro," Timeo says from the back. I don't respond to him.
"Every woman I've met in our circle is beautiful and elegant. But all they want is money and power." And I don't need to tell my brothers what arranged marriages do to families. Martina married me so her family wouldn't disown her. I married her for the same reason—money and power.
“Dani’s a good mom. She’s… nurturing and selfless. She's intelligent, and hard-working. She's capable. She could be my companion, Sergio."
"She could come visit you in prison. I hear that on family day at MCI-Cedar Junction they serve apple juice and donut holes,” Timeo chirps over my shoulder.
I go on as if I didn't hear a word he said. "She's fucking curvy and sexy as hell. She's confident and authentic."
But I know what really drives me to her is something I can't quite put into words, not to them anyway. Dani’s life is such a contrast to mine, offering me a glimpse of normalcy. Like parent coffee day for Christ’s sake.
Dani gives me the only thing I thought I’d lost forever—a chance at redemption.
I killed her husband. I don't fucking care if it was an accident, the least I can do is provide for her. Provide for her daughter. And maybe a part of me is acting selfishly, but maybe a part of me isn't.
“I’m done, Sergio. I don't want a fuck toy. I don't want to use someone to advance my career or give me greater authority in our business. I want a fucking partner. I want a woman that doesn't get bent out of shape because our kid wakes up sick in the middle of the night or she gets stretch marks from bearing my child. I want something and someone normal and wholesome.”
"Who knew?" Timeo says, shaking his head. "He wants someone he can love. This fucking dipshit thinks he’s in a fucking Disney fairy princess story."
Timeo ducks his head just in time to miss the fist I throw at him.
He should talk. He’s been hot for Sergio’s wife’s baby sister Starla for years—a girl who’s as wholesome as Cheerios and apple pie and way too young for him to boot.
"You want to be Prince Charming?" Sergio says.
"No, man," I say, looking out the window again, because it isn't until I say it out loud that I realize the truth. "I want to be me. Ricco Montavio. Father to Marco. Husband. Brother. Normal. Me."
Sergio groans and comes to a stop at a red light. With a weariness in his shoulders, he slumps down in his seat and turns to face me. "You couldn't find this with anybody else in the fucking universe?"
I don't respond. Because I didn't tell him the real reason.
Sergio’s not done though.
"You know, providing for her won't bring him back. And from what I've heard, from what we've investigated? That asshole wasn't worth it."
"She deserves better, Serg."
"So, when are you gonna tell her?"
Tell her? Is he out of his fucking mind? I look at him. I look in the rearview mirror and Timeo looks back at me with the biggest shit-eating grin I’ve ever seen.
"You gotta tell her, Ricco.”
"No, I don't. You said it never happened. I wasn’t here." I clench my jaw and will the traffic light to change. "I’m here now."
The light turns green, and Sergio guns the engine.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
“COME WITH ME”
Dani
I text Ricco. No reply.
I go to my shop and look at my empty calendar. A few clients come in, likely spurred on by all the good reviews Ricco left on my site. I'm trying to focus on my work, but I'm distracted. I shoot him a text late in the afternoon.
Is everything okay?
No response. Have I ignored all the warning signs? What is it about him that I'm really into, anyway?
And then I remember the way he was with my daughter. I remember the way he sat cross-legged on the blanket on the grass, and how Marco climbed into his lap. How easily he snuggled in and how Ricco held him.
I remember how hot it was being with him at the club, and I know there's so much more to Ricco Montavio than meets the eye.
Three hours later, I'm about to close the shop early, well before I have to pick Emmy up from school. I hang my head because I'm tired and I'm discouraged. Standing at the reception desk, I’m pondering how for once in my life I’d felt as if I was getting somewhere only to have Ricco pull the rug out from under me with his dismissal and then… the door swings open.
