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17
New York City, 2000
Got your woman. We just landed in NYC.
That’s all the text message from Hugo said, but it was enough. She was coming. She was close. I could practically feel her. Romina was safe in her bedroom, watching a rented movie about a princess and a unicorn that Lola and Vincenzo brought earlier when they stopped to visit. She was being spoiled by everyone. While Hugo and Cat were out of the country, I had to be on top of the business and help Gino manage our gigs, so Muse offered to take Romina during the day. From what I could tell, they’d been toy shopping six times in four days and my neat and classy penthouse was very rapidly turning into a big playground. I didn’t care one bit, as long as she was happy because I was a little worried. Romina was used to running free, being outside a lot, and a penthouse in the sky was not the most kid-friendly home, but she loved it. Every night she came into my bedroom, and we looked at the city skyline together and she adored the flickering lights that apparently in her opinion were prettier than fireflies. The only thing she was missing was her mom and she asked about Salva constantly, but today I was going to fix that too.
I poured myself a drink – nothing strong, just a glass of red wine – sat in the leather chair in my foyer, and waited by the entry. Forty-seven minutes and forty-nine seconds, that’s the exact time I had to wait before Hugo walked his intimidating figure through the door. My eyes went straight behind him to Salvatrice. My woman.
I emptied the glass of wine in one gulp and got up my feet with my hands in my pockets.
“Thank you, Mustafa. I’ve got it from here.” He didn’t say anything, but his face was telling me that he’d rather stay and talk to me about something. No, not now. “Goodbye.”
Of course, Catherinelle couldn’t take a hint.
“Roman, maybe we should stay.” She looked furtively at Salva. “And then we could all talk.”
“Cat, I love you, I do, but I don’t have patience for this right now. Go home, you must be tired.”
“Roman,” she said worriedly and I rolled my eyes. This was ridiculous.
“I’m not going to fucking kill her if that’s what you’re worried about.” I looked straight into Salvatrice’s eyes and she flinched. “Romina’s in the house.” It was a joke, but my face was impassive.
Hugo stepped in and took his wife’s hand.
“Let’s go, princess. They can handle it.” And finally, they left, but I could see Catherinelle was not pleased.
The moment the door was closed, and Salvatrice and I were the only ones left in the room, a profound silence washed over us. The tension was thick like molasses and it was palpable, almost making it hard for me to move. I just sat there, my exterior frozen, but inside I was battling my own urges because I wanted to kiss her so hard, I was afraid I might hurt her. I needed a few more moments to get a hold of myself, but she decided to not give them to me.
“Roman…” Her voice, the pain in her eyes, everything awakened a chain reaction in my chest.
I leaped forward to get close to her, but the anger behind my need was still present and valid, so I pushed her violently against the wall behind her. I didn’t hurt her, but I could smell the fear on her. A long time ago Salvatrice ran away from me because she was scared I might hurt her, and now I was showing her she was right all along.
“How dare you?” The words were pushed through my clenched teeth.
“Listen to me, Roman. Give me a second to…”
My fist smashed into the wall right next to her head with such force one of the decorative wood panels cracked.
“I’m done wasting my moments on you. You fucked me over, Salvatrice. You fucked me again, only this time it wasn’t just me, wasn’t it? You left your daughter. I’m going to ask you again – How. Could. You?”
“Do you think I wanted to? I…it’s not…I just…” She tried to say something, but her chest was going up and down, and it seemed like the shortness of breath was holding her back. This time, the poor, sick Salvatrice act didn’t elicit any pity from me.
“I don’t care if you wanted it or not, Salvatrice. What kind of ghastly, heartless, draconian woman just lets her kid get into a plane, knowing you had no intention to go…”
I wanted to hurt her with my words. I wanted her to feel the same rancid pain that nested in my heart.
I stopped when I heard Romina running in the background.
“Mama, you’re here!”
Salvatrice squeezed her eyes and two tears slid down her face.
“Go to your daughter, Salvatrice. She missed you.”
She rushed to wipe away her tears and then eased away from me, falling down on her knees in front of Romina.
“Hey, baby. Come here, give me a hug.”
