Chapter 6

ANNA

Lying in the darkness, I felt the bed dip as Dante climbed in beside me. Unsure whether I should speak or not, I lay perfectly still and waited as I replayed his words, ‘you were, you are and always will be, mia ragazza. I will never hurt you. Tell me you believe that'. When I had nodded my affirmation, it had been entirely genuine and his reference to me having always being his girl made it even easier.

Closing my eyes, my memories took me back to our childhood and growing up together. There had been a group of us, dozens of us much of the time, but within that larger group had been a smaller one; Aldo, Gino, me, Dante and a few of his brothers. Girls had seemed few in number, and those who were there enjoyed playing dress up and pretending their dolls were babies. Some of them preferred to spend time with their mothers, helping and emulating them, but not me. Perhaps because I had a brother and not a sister, I preferred the company of the boys and the games they played. Football, climbing trees, driving old cars around the estate and shooting when we were old enough and allowed to. I had been raised here on the estate, we had a house here and when my mother had gotten sick, she had received the best care money could buy. When she died, I buried my grief in my friendships, sometimes pushing boundaries. Aldo would try to guide me, but he was bereft following the loss of our mother and despite his best efforts he wasn't always around, especially not as he began to be drawn into the business.

The one who was always there was Dante. He was older than me but younger than Aldo and we enjoyed the same things, shared a sense of humour and growing up together meant that I trusted him implicitly. We were teenagers when things changed. Gino asked me out on a date, not something I would ever have agreed to. We were not friends in our own right but by association and mutual friends, plus I didn't view him as anything beyond that so turned him down flat. He quickly moved on to another girl with connections to the family and eventually ended up marrying her.

Rolling onto my side, my back facing Dante, a deep shudder shook my whole body.

"Hey." One word in a familiar voice that reassured and lit something within me in a split second.

The sensation of Dante's arms wrapping around me felt like home and along with my trip down memory lane caused me to remember that this is how my life should have been. I couldn't even blame Aldo for how things had turned out, but it hadn't helped. However, the tears that sprung to my eyes were the biggest surprise, that, and the feeling of an obvious erection pressing against me, no matter how Dante attempted to adjust himself.

"Let me hold you," Dante said, his body moving closer to mine, the heat from it scorching me through the pyjamas I wore.

"Thank you." My words were stammered as I attempted to disguise my upset.

"What is wrong, Anna? Talk to me, please." Dante Caputo didn't beg but there was no mistaking the pleading in his voice.

"Sorry, I was just thinking about us, about you calling me mia ragazza and that I wished I had never had to leave here."

"Ssh, you're safe, you're here, you're home again," he told me as he kissed the top of my head and then loosened his grip enough that I could roll over and face him. "You are so beautiful, Anna." His forehead came to rest against mine while one hand came up to cup my chin, stroking across the skin there. "I missed you, more than you could know . . . not just this last year, but before then. When things changed, when I had to grow up and move into the business."

"It's okay, the business was your birthright and something you always wanted. You don't ever need to apologise for that."

"You were what I always wanted too. We made a plan, you and I, always you and I, but business took over and you went to school, made friends and things changed . . ." His voice trailed off and I knew what came next. "Then Gino and Aldo . . ."

"Ssh," it was my turn to try and silence him now. "It's in the past."

"I don't want us to be in the past, Anna. You are mine, it's still you and me, forever."

"Dante . . ." I wanted what he was suggesting, meaning any other words or protests I might have been planning died on my lips.

"You were going to have your adventures while I learned my role in the business and then you were supposed to come back to me, unless you had gone straight and joined the police or become a public prosecutor."

We both laughed as I moved closer, desperate for what felt like a life changing moment to become just that.

"Are you mocking my childhood career aspirations?"

"Never. In fact, you would have been amazing in either of those roles had it not been for the family you were born into."

I nodded. He was right. As much as I had harboured a desire to be a kickass lawyer, prosecuting the bad guys or the police officer catching them, it could never have been, not in this world that was my home. I went to school, did fashion design of all things, something that could never be drawn into this world and a little over a year ago, I came back, for a wedding of all things, but also ready to pledge myself to Dante, except it all went wrong.

"Where are you?" he asked, drawing my attention back to him and the present.

"It doesn't matter."

A groan of disbelief vibrated in his throat.

I wasn't having this conversation, not now. Not ever. "I'm back now, perhaps not as we planned or imagined, but I am back."

"Yes, you are." He leaned in, preparing to kiss me.

"Dante, I need to take this slowly."

"Of course . . . is it because of Amina's father, did he hurt you? Who is he?"

"Dante." I repeated his name, a little more firmly now. "I can't talk about this with you."

"One day you will need to, Anna, you have to know that."

I was stupid if I ever thought he wasn't going to ask about him, and even more stupid had I ever imagined he wouldn't want answers, but I had none for him, none he would want to hear. Perhaps none he'd believe. "We might have to agree to disagree on that."

He growled, sounding more frustrated than angry. "Why is he not around? How did he allow you to dance in that place?"

"He's dead." Technically that wasn't a lie, he was dead to me and that was all that mattered.

"I'm sorry–"

I didn't need platitudes or sympathy so I cut him off. "Don't be. I'm not. The man was a pig and deserved everything that came to him, I'm only sorry his end wasn't at my hands."

A hand came to rest on my cheek, his fingers sliding through my hair until he cupped the back of my head then landed the sweetest, gentlest and briefest of kisses to the tip of my nose. "That explains why he's not around and preventing you from working in that club!" Now he sounded angry.

"You don't get to judge how I made enough money to keep a roof over my own and my daughter's head."

"Stop!" His voice wasn't raised but was firm. "I am not judging you, mia ragazza, never. I am judging myself for allowing anyone to have ever hurt you, and you working in that damned place meant I found you again. It brought you back, you and Amina, and you won't ever need to do anything you don't want to in order to keep a roof over yours or her head again because my roof is your roof."

"Dante, I will need you to tell me what you did to Aldo . . . where he is . . . I need to give my brother a fitting goodbye, a burial."

"Goodnight, Anna."

Clearly these were not questions he was ready to answer, but his reluctance to discuss what he had done to my brother and where he was, and his abrupt replies wouldn't stop me from continuing to ask.