by Bethany-Kris
It wasn’t like Calisto minded.
Emma fidgeted, twisting her fingers together as she watched her husband go. Her restless actions screamed of her nervousness, even if her expression was a blank slate. It bothered him in a way he couldn’t explain that Emma didn’t want to be near him, no matter her reasons.
“Well, I should—”
“Wait,” Calisto said, stopping her before she could make an excuse to leave him.
“Sì?”
Her jade gaze met his, unashamed. She stared at him like it didn’t bother her a bit that he was here, like maybe it didn’t hurt her. She didn’t seem like she was embarrassed at his presence or knowing that he had spent hours learning what her body looked like when she was wearing nothing but her skin. He wondered how well she remembered what it felt like to be wrapped up in him.
For the first time in months, Calisto felt better. Like maybe he could breathe again. He wondered all over again why he had been avoiding this woman when his only reasons for doing so were purely selfish.
Doing what you did with her the first time was selfish, too, his mind taunted.
Calisto pushed his inner thoughts away. “How are you doing?”
Emma lifted a single manicured brow high. “Fine, Cal.”
“Just fine?”
“Affonso treats me well, if that’s what you’re asking.”
“It was.”
Emma smiled. “And it wasn’t at the same time, right?”
“Something like that.”
“Don’t worry about me,” she told him.
The words slipped from Calisto’s lips before he could stop them. “I don’t seem to have much of a choice on the matter. I tried not to, but it didn’t do me much good.”
Emma didn’t bat a lash. “That’s a problem you’ll have to deal with, isn’t it?”
Damn.
Her words had sliced right through his tough-as-steel exterior, and cut him deep. Calisto supposed, after everything that happened and all that he did, he didn’t deserve much else from Emma. She owed him nothing.
“I guess it is,” Calisto finally said.
“Have a good evening, Cal. Thanks for coming.”
Emma hadn’t even smiled when she said it. She just walked away, in the same direction that Affonso had gone earlier, without even looking over her shoulder.
Strangely, Calisto was grateful.
Emma’s resentment and rejection were easier to swallow than her kindness. He could take the girl’s anger and her distance. He’d earned those things when he forced her from her life, let her get too close, and then handed her off like she meant nothing to him. Her attention and kindness was a different matter altogether. They didn’t belong to him now that Emma was married.
They hadn’t belonged to him before.
She was just making it clear.
“Does everyone have a glass of wine or champagne ready?” Affonso asked, his voice traveling over the crowd of gathering guests.
Confirmative murmurs echoed back, answering Affonso’s question. Two servers handed out red wine in crystal glasses to the few people who didn’t have a drink in hand. Calisto happened to be one of them. He accepted the glass offered, but set it aside the moment the server turned around.
He didn’t want to drink tonight.
Calisto stayed at the back of the room, secluded in his own little corner. That was usually his way with functions like these, when the men of la famiglia and their wives were invited. It was better to observe the people than to mingle with them. He preferred to have his position and status recognized, and not have his kindness mistaken for weakness.
Trust was a beautiful myth in Cosa Nostra.
At the front of the room, Affonso held his hand out in Emma’s direction, waiting for her to take it with her own. She did, smiling falsely as her gaze turned to a spot on the wall where an elaborate painting of the New York skyline rested below a spotlight.
The heavy feeling was back on Calisto’s shoulders, pressing down into his stomach and making him wish the floor would open up. Something was off—something he wouldn’t like.
Cynthia settled in beside her cousin as Affonso raised his glass high. “Hey, Cal.”
“Cynthia,” he said, bumping her with his shoulder.
“You’re all alone.”
“Yep.”
“Didn’t bring a date?”
Calisto scoffed. “I don’t have time for women.”
They cause too many problems.
“Sure you don’t.” Cynthia eyed the glass of wine on the table beside Calisto. “Can I have that if you’re going not going to drink it?”
Calisto shrugged. “Go for it. Don’t let Affonso see it.”
“Daddy is too focused on his news tonight.”
“And Emma, it seems,” Calisto noted.
Cynthia didn’t seem to notice the hint of bitterness in Calisto’s words. “Her, too.”
She plucked up the glass and took a large gulp of red wine, earning quiet laughter from Calisto.
“Hey, slow down.”
“Not my first time drinking, Cal.”
“I would rather pretend it was,” he told her. “You’re only sixteen.”
“Almost seventeen.”
“For my sake, can you lie a little?”
Cynthia grinned wickedly. “Do you really want me to?”
“No,” he admitted.
“Didn’t think so.”
Affonso’s droning drawl brought Calisto back to the present. He gave his attention to his uncle, wishing this night could be over already. He tried not to focus on Emma at Affonso’s side, and instead listened to the words his uncle was saying.
“We were waiting a bit before sharing this news. We wanted everything to be good, healthy, and no sadness to share,” Affonso said.
Calisto’s brow furrowed. “He’s making quite a show, isn’t he?”
“I heard them talking a couple of weeks ago in his office,” Cynthia said.
“About what?”
“Emma said it was still too early, and she didn’t want it to end like the last one did.”
“What?” Calisto asked. “You’re not making any sense.”
“The baby,” Cynthia clarified.
Calisto’s heart stopped for a split second. “The baby?”
“That’s what I said. She didn’t want to tell people yet because she was scared it might happen again.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Didn’t you know?” Cynthia asked.
Calisto shook his head. Why couldn’t his younger cousin just spit whatever the fuck it was out? “No, tell me.”
“I thought for sure that Daddy told you, Cal.”
“Obviously not.”
“Emma miscarried like three weeks after the wedding. She didn’t want to tell people this time until she was further along.”
Calisto’s tongue was too thick to speak. He did the math in his head quickly. Emma would have been very early in her pregnancy if she miscarried only three weeks after her wedding. She likely would have just found out she was pregnant only days before miscarrying. Knowing a woman only had so many days in her cycle meant that conception would have been far more likely to occur closer to the wedding date …
Or just before.
That night in Emma’s penthouse, Calisto had used a condom the first time. The morning after, twice, he hadn’t used anything. He didn’t want to confirm what it might mean.
Jesus Christ.
Why hadn’t she told him?
Affonso was still speaking. “My beautiful wife is two months along in her pregnancy. We wanted to share this news with our family and friends first. Our first child is due in … Emma, sweetheart?”
“Early February,” Emma finished for her husband.
Calisto felt sick.
He snatched the glass from Cynthia, ignored her pout, and downed what was left of it in one go. The bitter sweetness of the alcohol did nothing to soothe his sudden frayed nerves, or the an
ger bubbling just below his surface. Calisto needed something far stronger to make the hell that was his life seem even a little bit better.
Fuck this whole night.
Fuck it.
Emma
It had taken Emma a very short amount of time to learn exactly what Affonso Donati wanted in a wife. She quickly figured out the easiest way to placate the man, the best way to distract him, and the right way to please him.
Sometimes, it didn’t even have to be sexual.
A smile when he said her name would suffice. Her undivided attention when he was speaking. Her presence at his side when he was showing off for others.
As long as Affonso believed that he had Emma eating out of his palm, spoiled and pretty, then he was a happy man who was unlikely to turn on her. At least, that’s how it seemed. Emma had also learned that when it came to her new husband, what appeared on the surface was very different from intentions hiding below his charming smile and warm hand.
His cold eyes said it all.
Affonso always watched her. Emma couldn’t escape from it, no matter how hard she tried. In a room full of people, it was even worse. Affonso rarely left her side, his hand permanently attached to her lower back or his fingers intertwined with hers, grounding her to the floor.
Emma had slowly been trying to learn her new home and New York. But even when she stepped outside of the Donati home to do the simplest things—like her nails or a bit of shopping—her enforcer was waiting. Affonso’s number would light up her phone.
Be a good girl, he would say.
That was all.
Her husband had a set of rules that he expected Emma to follow at all times. She couldn’t sleep in past nine in the morning. She couldn’t come downstairs to greet him or be seen unless her hair and face were done and ready for the day. Her clothes were approved by him daily, and her cash was limited to credit cards that were closely monitored. She wasn’t allowed to drive herself around; she had a driver to do all that business. Affonso preferred her soft-spoken, smiling, and silent when he was speaking.
He never raised a hand to her. He treated her with respect in front of others. He was never nasty in an obvious way, and he didn’t speak badly of her or her position as his wife.
The control still suffocated Emma like Affonso had put his hands around her throat and was squeezing the very life out of her. It was almost like she couldn’t blink without his permission.
Emma vividly remembered the first time it became apparent to her just how much influence Affonso really had in her day-to-day life. She had gone shopping shortly after the wedding, right before Michelle and Cynthia were to be sent back to boarding school. She had hoped to soften her new step-daughters, and invited them out with her.
The girls had no women in their lives to help them with certain things. Their grandmothers were off playing the old, bitchy mob wives to their husbands, and too busy to pay their visiting granddaughters any mind. Michelle and Cynthia had no one to talk to about boys, clothes, what was on their minds, or even the boring things, like their favorite television shows.
No adult females, anyway.
After taking the girls to one of their favorite shops for clothes, Cynthia wanted to stop at a lingerie shop. Emma hadn’t seen the problem in going. She took the then fourteen-year-old Michelle and the sixteen-year-old Cynthia in to pick out whatever it was they needed. Emma picked up a few things herself.
By the time she got home with the girls, Affonso was waiting. He’d apparently gotten notifications for each and every purchase she had made with her shiny, black credit card. He wasn’t mad, exactly, but he didn’t approve, either. After agreeing that the girls hadn’t purchased anything that was above their age groups, he sent them upstairs.
Affonso then went through Emma’s purchases. One by one. And he made her model them one at a time until he was satisfied.
It was degrading on a whole new level for Emma. Sleeping with Affonso was one thing. She was his wife, and the best she could do was grit her teeth, do what he asked in the bedroom, and go on with her day. If she did that, then he left her alone.
But to be paraded in front of him like he owned her, for his amusement and pleasure, was something entirely different from having sex with the man. It made her feel far dirtier than even sucking his cock did.
It made her feel like a toy.
His toy.
“Where have you gone?” Affonso asked.
Emma fell out of her thoughts with a fake smile. “Right here with you.”
“You were staring at the clock, Emma.”
“Checking the time. I’m getting tired.”
Affonso’s palm rested against her flat stomach with a gentle touch as he murmured, “You can go up to bed, if you’d like.”
She wished his touch didn’t feel as heavy as it did. Like it was a weight resting on her stomach, reminding her of the duty and promises she had been given when he married her.
A child.
That’s what Affonso wanted.
A boy, specifically.
The pregnancy did little but make Emma anxious and sick all at the same time. She hadn’t wanted the dinner tonight, or the announcement. Affonso, without her agreement, decided to go ahead and tell his family and friends of the upcoming birth.
It was too soon.
Emma was sure of it.
After what happened the last time …
She stopped her thoughts by biting on her inner cheek, refusing to go there again. This was not the place or time for her to cry. Affonso hated emotions—he despised an emotional woman even more. It would do her no good to become overwhelmed at a party that was supposed to be a happy occasion for Affonso and her.
“Your eyes are even tired,” Affonso murmured, reaching up to stroke her cheek with two fingers. “I can see it. Go up to bed, hmm?”
Emma did all she could do not to cringe and move away from the man’s hand. She didn’t like it when he touched her as if he cared, or with any affection. None of it was real. Affonso’s fondness only went as far as her ability to behave and put on a good show.
She wasn’t stupid.
The eyes were watching. People were surveying their quiet exchange at the front of the room, gauging the husband doting on his newly pregnant, and very young wife. Somehow, Emma managed another smile for Affonso.
It took everything she had to do it.
“I think I will,” she said quietly.
“They’ll all be gone soon enough. Get my child some rest, sweetheart.”
Emma responded with a nod, but she couldn’t get out of the room fast enough once Affonso turned his back to her.
Emma’s favorite room in the large, three-level Donati home was her own personal walk-in closet. Affonso had his own, located on the opposite side from hers that connected to their master bedroom. He rarely, if ever, entered her space. The marble floors, white walls, large mirrors, and pale leather furniture reminded her of the penthouse she had been forced to leave behind in Las Vegas when she married Affonso.
She could sit on the oversized, white leather stool, let her bare feet hit the cold marble, close her eyes, and pretend that she was somewhere else for the moment. When she opened her eyes back up and stared into the vanity mirror lit up with bright lights, all she could see staring back in the reflection was herself.
There was no Emma Donati there.
No mob boss’s wife.
No purchased bride.
Just Emma.
Emmy.
Bending down, Emma undid the clasp on the ankle of her kitten heels. After the spell she’d had four months ago shortly after the wedding, Affonso had demanded she put away the high heels if she became pregnant again. He did approve of the kitten heels, thankfully. She had been wearing a pair of her favorite Dolce & Gabbana heels when the white noise started to rush in her ears, everything went fuzzy in the corners of her vision, and she lost her breath with the first pain.
Then, after she had hit the floor in the middle of the kitch
en, she felt the wetness on her wool dress. Red had smeared between her fingertips when she felt between her thighs to find where the blood was coming from.
Emma remembered very little after that.
She’d lost the baby. The doctors hadn’t given her a clear explanation as to why the pregnancy terminated itself, or what might be wrong. They simply said it was more frequent than most people knew for first pregnancies to end in miscarriage. The fact that she had been in the very early weeks of the pregnancy meant she would heal fast and probably conceive again without issue.
Emma was terrified it was going to happen again.
She remembered sitting on the toilet two weeks after her wedding and staring at the test in her hand. Two pinks lines had brightened a window almost immediately, confirming what she had believed for almost a week before she had gained up enough courage to take a pregnancy test. Her fingers had trembled as she did the math in her head, knowing that at that point, she had already been a week late for her period.
There was no possible way Affonso could have been the father.
So she hid it from him.
A week later, she took another test and brought it down to show her husband over breakfast. Affonso had been excited, joyful even. He’d tried to spoil her relentlessly for the week that followed, but Emma took his actions with a grain of salt and faked her own interest.
When she miscarried, Affonso barely looked twice at her. He didn’t say a word when she explained what the doctors said she should do, and how long the bleeding might last. It wasn’t until her husband thought she was back to normal that he came back to their bed at night, demanding and taking.
Emma participated, but barely.
She just wanted it to be over.
Unlike with her first pregnancy, Emma tried not to acknowledge this one as much as she could. She made a special effort not to touch her stomach or think about the little life inside her. It might seem cold to someone on the outside looking in, but Emma didn’t know how to treat the pregnancy any differently.
She was attached to the first. She wanted the baby because it had been nothing more than an innocent by-product of a single night and the morning after with someone who had made her feel alive. With someone who had cared.
