Total pages in book: 58
Estimated words: 56365 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 282(@200wpm)___ 225(@250wpm)___ 188(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 56365 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 282(@200wpm)___ 225(@250wpm)___ 188(@300wpm)
Maria, as usual, looks glamorous in her fashionable pantsuit with her hair tied up in a bun. It’s like she’s dressed for a verbal spar. She walks straight to the curtains and pulls them open, filling the room with sunlight.
“Should I start packing?” I ask hesitantly.
She frowns, gesturing at the window-side table and chairs. “Let’s sit and talk.”
“What is there to talk about? I’m lucky Mafia men aren’t barging in here and beating me up.”
“No Moretti man would ever do something like that to a woman,” she says in disgust. “I fear your recent experience has given you an utterly warped view of who and what we truly are.”
“Okay …”
We sit together in the sunlight, which feels blinding after three days of isolation. Maria folds her hands, looking at me with stern mother-bear energy. I hope to have that same aura if I ever have kids. “First, I have to know. Is my son aware of who you are? Is he aware you’re not from our world?”
I hesitate. Can I throw him under the bus?
“Let me put it plainly,” she goes on. “Are you tricking my son?”
“No,” I hiss. “It’s …” A scam, a deal, a transaction, but all that feels wrong somehow. “He knows, Maria.”
She nods. “Very well. That’s good.”
“Good?”
“If you were duping him, I’d be forced to kick you out.”
“You’re not going to kick me out anyway?”
“If this life has taught me anything, it’s that things are always more complicated than they seem,” she says. “Salvatore, however, might not take the same view. Let’s be grateful he’s so busy with his current deal.”
“You’re telling me, if I were having this conversation with him, it would all be over?”
Maria gives a short, quick nod.
“So, why aren’t you telling me to pack my bags?”
Maria sighs and looks out the window. “Things are more complicated than you know.”
“They seem pretty complicated to me already.”
“I’m going to tell you something I’ve never told anyone,” she replies. “Even Dario …”
I lean forward, my curiosity puncturing the dark cloud that has moved over me. “Okay …”
“I was born into one of the poorest situations you can imagine. Living in a home like this would’ve seemed absurd to me as a girl. I was the only child of a prostitute who later died of a drug overdose.” When I open my mouth to speak—to tell her I’m sorry—she goes on as if she needs to get this over with. “Salvatore and I met when I was begging on the street. He saw something in me, he said, something I didn’t see in myself until much, much later. We fell in love.”
When her voice fills with genuine emotion, a streak of light penetrates the gray that has fallen over me. “He told me we could never be together if I didn’t seem like I came from a wealthy Family … so we invented one. We pretended.” She smiles faintly. “We acted, you might say. I learned how to speak like these people speak. I learned how to move in these circles, all so Salvatore and I could be together.”
“But even so—”
“Even so, if he knew the truth, there’s a very real chance he would force you and Dario to end this. Yes.”
“So he’s a hypocrite?” I mutter.
“He’s my husband. Speak about him with respect.”
“Sorry, but surely you can see my point.”
“He’s a complicated man. He has a special place in his heart for me. That doesn’t necessarily extend to anyone else.”
“So, why are you telling me this?”
“Because …” She reaches across the table and takes my hand. “I want you to know that you’re not alone. I’ve been where you are.”
“You watched Salvatore kick a man to death in front of you?”
It’s like her hand loses all warmth in a flash. “No, I’ve been shielded from that side of this life. Yet I know what it’s like to try to exist as two people simultaneously.”
“It’s not the same, though,” I tell Maria. “This is a scam.”
She flinches, and I almost stop, but she told me the truth. I decide to do the same. “Dario hired me and paid me because Salvatore wants him to get married so badly. Salvatore has been hounding him about it, but it’s the last thing he wants. Marriage was never something he was interested in. The plan was to get divorced after the wedding. None of this was supposed to be real.”
She doesn’t let my hand go as the silence stretches between us. “Supposed to be, you said. Has something changed? Because let me tell you, my son has changed. You’ve changed him. Perhaps this is all supposed to be a play, but he’s never been very good at lying to me. He has real feelings for you.”
“You don’t know that,” I murmur, though there’s this warm feeling in me praying it’s true, even if I shouldn’t be.