“Thanks.”
He holds out his hand to me. “Let’s go.”
Aiden takes me off the trail deep into the forest. Everything out here is so beautiful. I wish I had thought to bring my camera and take pictures. No one will believe that I was on a private island all weekend.
We get to a river and use the rocks to hop across to the other side. I go first, stepping onto a rock, wobbling as I try to catch my balance, I jump to the next rock. Aiden jumps onto the same rocks, staying behind me just in case I slip and fall; he’ll be able to catch me.
“I can’t believe you used to do this all the time when you were younger.” I only have three more rocks to jump on. Then I will have made it to the other side. Concentrating on the rock in front of me, I make the jump, almost slipping because the rock is slippery from the water. I catch myself by bending my knees and putting my arms out.
“Don’t fall,” he tells me. He grabs my arm, holding on to me till he knows for sure I won’t slip. In the end, I find my balance and jump to the last rock. He carries on telling me a story about when he was younger. “This was like freedom for me, coming out here whenever I could. I stumbled upon this place one night when I was lost and just wandering in the forest.”
Reaching the other side, we walk up a hill, and I can hear the ocean waves. Stepping out of the forest, I walk up the hill and look over the edge.
“Once I found this place, I started to come out here all the time, using it as my place to get away.” He comes up behind me, wrapping his arms around me.
The waves crash against the rocks down below, and the wind blows my hair everywhere. “Why would you need to get away?”
He sighs. “When I turned twelve, my father started to prepare me to take over the family business one day. Being homeschooled and being trained to take over the family business at the same time sometimes became too overwhelming for me.” I turned around in his arms to face him. “My mother tried to get him to pull back on my training, but my father wouldn’t have it. He told her that I needed to know everything so that the family legacy could keep going.”
Understanding washes over me as I listen to him tell me how he became the man he is today. I feel that he was too young for his father to put all that weight on him, since at his age, running a company would be the furthest thing from his mind.
“He should have let you decide on your own if you wanted to jump into the family business. You might not have wanted to do that as a career.”
“You don’t understand; I had no choice.” He shakes his head. “It’s always been like this in my family for many generations. A boy learns to become a man at the age of twelve. No longer doing childish things, he has to take up his responsibilities. Learn the family business so that the Delfino’s can continue to keep up our reputation and success. It’s just the way it is in my family, and when I have kids, I will have to do the same thing to them.” Aiden peers up at the sky. I can hear the distant sound of the helicopter heading towards the island. “Our ride is almost here. Let’s head back, and we can finish this conversation later. I want to show you Italy.”
“MAKE A WISH?”
Aiden holds out a silver quarter to me. There’s so much I could wish for, but there’s only one thing that comes to the forefront of my mind. I slide the quarter out of his hand and close my eyes. I make my wish in my head, then toss the coin in the air. Both of us watch it land in the famous Trevi Fountain.
“Mm, what did you wish for?” He drops his chin onto my shoulder and wraps his arms around me.
I listen to the waterfall and watch other people throw in their coins. “If I tell you, then it won’t come true.”
“I bet I can make it come true.” He squeezes my hips and kisses me on my neck. I bend over, laughing from the touch of his lips on my neck in an area I didn’t know was sensitive. I put my arms out and push him away from me.
“Stop, stop, that tickles.”
Once more, he reaches for me, kissing me on my neck, then tickling my sides. I break away from him and run while he chases after me. We probably looked like fools, playing around by the fountain with me running around laughing and screaming as I try to escape.
“Okay, I’ll stop,” he says with his hands in the air, surrendering. I stop, but stay in the ready-set-go position just in case he is lying and attacks me right when he gets his hands on me. He keeps his hands up and walks towards me, laughing. “I pinky promise.”
I hold up my pinky and wave it at him, asking him to place his pinky on mine. He drops his hands and bunches up his face. “Come on, you have to do it if you mean it, and you can’t break the promise once you’ve made it.”
“You can’t be serious,” he groans.
I don’t say anything. I keep my pinky up, waiting for him to seal the deal. Scowling, he wraps his finger around mine. I bite my lower lip to keep myself from laughing. He rolls his eyes and wraps me back up in his arms. “Let’s get out of here. I want to show you something.”
“Where are we going?”
“You will find out soon. Just come with me,” he tells me.
His guards make way for us to get through the thick crowd. We turn down an aisle that doesn’t have too many people. I begin to lag behind when I come across a flower shop that has red roses out front. Ever since our first date, when Aiden introduced me to them, I have come to love them so much that I want one if I come across them.
I slow down my pace, letting go of Aiden’s hand. When he feels my hand slip out of his, he stops and tells his guards to wait. He reaches for my hand and follows the direction of my gaze. Once he sees what I am looking at, he chuckles and tells his guards to follow us. We make it to the store, and I go up to grab one of the roses, but Aiden reaches over me, grabbing five more before paying for them.
“You just couldn’t pass them up, could you?” he asks, taking my hand as we follow behind his guards.
“Nope, you have me hooked on them, and now whenever I see a rose, I have to buy one.” I twirl the rose in my hand. “But I have a question.”
We cross over a bridge and walk down to the boats. A man waves his hands in the air for us to come to him, and we get in his boat.
“What’s all this?”
Aiden sits beside me and wraps his arm around my shoulder.
“I thought that since it’s nice outside, and you’ve told me that you have always wanted to see Italy, that we could take a tour. This will give you a chance to see everything,” he explains. “So, Enzo is going to take us to the restaurant we are eating at, and on the way, you can see Italy.”
I loved the idea of having the chance to see Italy. I didn’t think we would be able to go and see everything with us only being here for a short time. However, I wasn’t going to complain; the fact that I was able to fulfill one of my goals to travel here makes me happy.
“Thank you, this is wonderful.”
He tilts my head, kissing me softly on my lips. “You wanted to learn more about me, and I thought showing you where I came from would help you learn a lot.”
It was the best idea.
As we’re cruising along the water, I get to see why tourists love coming here. It’s one thing to see Italy on TV or postcards; it’s another to travel there and see it in person. This place is beautiful. I listen to Aiden as he points out different buildings, telling me the history and teaching me the culture.
“I can see why you loved living here so much. This place is like a breath of fresh air; I don’t know if I would want to move to America if I grew up here.” The boat stops in front of a restaurant. “So, is that the reason why you built the Colosseum and named it after your family? You wanted to have a piece of Italy in America?”
He helps me out, and we all go in, going straight to our table. “Exactly, my family is big on our culture and our history. We are proud of where we come from, and love to show it in any way that we can. It was actually my father’s wish before he died. He had the whole thing planned out, how he wanted it to look on
the outside and inside; it was his way of leaving our family’s mark in America.”
“Wait, so you weren’t the reason the building was built upside down?”
“No, my father wanted it that way. He thought it would be different from other restaurants, you know, make us stand out more,” he confessed, shrugging his shoulders. “I, on the other hand, thought that it would be better for it not to look like that, but he wouldn’t listen.”
“I think it looks great. Maybe your father knows what he’s talking about,” I tease.
He shakes his head at me while he laughs. “He would have loved to hear you say that to him if he were here.”
Smiling, I reach for his hand. I love seeing him be this free.
“You know something? You really should look into taking more vacations instead of overworking yourself. I like this calm, playful you.”
“I have an excuse now not to work so hard,” he smiles at me.
“We should look into doing this more often.”
He grabs his glass and reaches for my hand rubbing my knuckles. “I would have to agree.”
Looking in the mirror, I remove my makeup and change into something more comfortable to lounge around in. Aiden and I planned on staying up late to spend more time together before we have to fly home early in the morning.
In the middle of me changing clothes, I hear soft music being played down the hall from me. Pushing my head through my shirt, I peek down the hall, listening for the direction that the music is coming from, and then follow it. I come across a room that’s an office, but a library too. As I glide my hand over the books on the bookshelf, a couple of books catch my eyes—some I’ve read in college. I go up the spiral staircase and spot Aiden playing the piano. He doesn’t hear me as I walk up behind him.
I watch him as his fingers swiftly drift over the keys. I can’t tell what music he is playing, but he’s so engulfed in the medley that I hold off interrupting him and listen to him play as I look around the room.
There’s a picture sitting on the table, and I bend over to get a closer look. The picture is a close-up. In it, I see a woman holding a dozen roses, smiling, and looking up at the man with his hand around her waist. You can tell that she is head over heels in love with him. As for the man, he’s leaning against a stone wall with a cigar in his mouth. He isn’t as happy as she is. He’s wearing a blank expression. Both look to be young in the picture. However, you wouldn’t be able to tell that they are in love. She looks more interested in him then he is in her.
“Those are my parents.”
I look over and see that Aiden has stopped playing the piano. He closes the lid over the keys and turns around on the bench so he can face me.
I glance down at the picture, then back up at him. I can see the resemblance between his parents and him. Aiden has his father’s features, but you can still see his mother in him. He gets his eye color from her.
“I see it. You look like your father, but you have your mother’s eyes.” Taking the photo with me, I walk over and sit beside him on the bench.
“That’s what my mother used to tell me. She would say that the only thing I received from her was her eyes. It was something we would joke about between us.” He takes the photo from my hands and runs his fingers over the picture, only touching his mother, not his father.
I place my head on his shoulder and touch his knee.
“I see that she liked roses too. Is that why you give me roses?”
“It’s part of the reason. My father, when he met my mother, used to give them to her all the time. He told her that it was his way of showing her his love for her.” He puts the picture on top of the piano and gets up, going over to the window. He leans against it and looks over at me. “I give them to you because I thought you would like them, and since my father gave them to my mother. It wouldn’t hurt giving them to you because you are special to me. But the other reason why I give them to you is to show you how I feel. A rose can speak louder than my words. When I give you a rose, I am showing you myself.”
Knowing the meaning behind him giving me roses makes it that much more special, because I see him. I see a beautiful man who is funny, sweet, and caring. He may have flaws and rough edges, but who doesn’t?
I think the rose represents him perfectly.
“I see you. I see all of you,” I state.
He stands there, staring at me. He doesn’t look too convinced that I am telling him the truth. “Then, we will be fine.”
I look back at the picture of his parents.
“Can you tell me what happened to them?”
He sighs, stuffing his hands in his pockets. “My mother died out of nowhere. One day, I went into the room to wake her up, and she wouldn’t wake up. I ran and told my father, and he made me stay with my nanny. My mother died from a heart attack.”
“Oh, I’m sorry you had to find her that way.”
“Yeah, no kid should find their parent dead in their bed. The nightmares you get whenever you go to sleep at night haunt you for a long time.”
“I can’t imagine if I had found my father,” I murmured.
“How did your father pass?” he asked.
I get up and walk around. I haven’t talked about how my dad died since he left us.
“My dad found out that he had stage four cancer my senior year of high school, but I didn’t know about it until after my graduation. He didn’t want me to know, because he knew it would make me lose focus on my grades. He told me that he promised that he would at least live to see me graduate, and he did.” I stand beside him. “What happened to your father?”
“My father’s case was a mystery, a case that never got solved. He was killed in a car accident. He had called me and told me that he was on his way home, and then I got off the phone with him. The police say that he was run off the road. They couldn’t find out if someone ran him off, or if he had seen an animal and tried to get out of the way, which led to him crashing into a tree.”
I gasp, placing my hand over my mouth. “Are you serious? That’s crazy.” I grab onto him and wrap my arms around his waist. “I am so sorry.”
He sighs, “It’s fine. We don’t live forever.”
I think of something else to change the subject. Talking about our parents’ deaths makes the aura in the room gloomy, which is one reason I’m not particularly eager to talk about death. It’s too sad of a subject to speak on.
“I didn’t know you can play.” I nod my head in the direction of the piano.
He looks over his shoulder to look at it, then turns back around, looking down at his hands.
“I have been playing since I was a kid. It helps me clear my head when I need to think or getaway.”
“Will you play for me?”
He kisses my forehead. “For you, yes. I’ll play something I think you may like; I used to play this before bed. Why don’t you go lay down on the couch?”
“Are you trying to put me to sleep?” I say as I get comfortable on the couch.
“Maybe.” He gives me a teasing smile.
He uncovers the piano and begins playing a slow medley. It’s a song that can most definitely put me to sleep in seconds. As he plays, I can feel myself drifting off, and I jerk myself awake a few times. I watch him as he allows the song to overtake him. He glances over to check on me every now and again, and then he goes back to the music. Sometime during the song, I actually fall asleep, and Aiden comes over and picks me up to carry me to my room.
“I can walk,” I whisper.
“No, I would rather carry you.” He steps into my room and tucks me in. “Go back to sleep. We leave in a couple of hours so we can head back.”
“Okay, goodnight.”
He gets up and walks to the door. “Goodnight.”
“I had such an amazing time with you this weekend.”
It’s nighttime when we return to Chicago. We had to leave earlier in the morning from Italy so that we could both be back for work.
“Same
here. We’ll have to do this again. I could always use a good excuse to get away from work,” he tells me.
I laugh as we get in the car.
“I think we could possibly add in some more trips.”
Aiden wanted me to go back with him to his place, but I told him that I need to go home, and that we can get together sometime later this week when he isn’t too busy. But as we turn on my street where my house is, I see smoke going up in the air. Two police cars speed by us, stopping in front of a house at the end of the street, which makes me nervous because my house is the second home at the end of the street.
I roll down the window and stick my head out to get a better look at whose house they’ve stopped in front of. As we get closer, I see a fire truck and an ambulance on the street. People are coming out of their homes, trying to find out what is going on. The guard driving me home slows down the car as we get closer.
“What’s going on? Why are we slowing down?” Aiden asks.
“Sir, there seems to be a house on fire where Miss. Davis lives,” the driver replies.
We drive around cars that have stopped on the street and slowly pull up to my house. I cry out in shock upon seeing that my house, the one at the end of the street, is on fire.
“My house,” I yell, grabbing the door handle.
HOPPING OUT OF THE CAR, I race up to my house. Aiden calls out to me, telling me to wait, but I don’t listen as I rush over to the people gathering on the sidewalk. When I look up at my home, tears begin to roll down my face. My whole house is on fire; there’s not an inch of it that isn’t touched by flames. I look around, frantic, until someone grabs my shoulders, turning me around.
“Edith, you’re here.”
Nancy wraps her arms around me, holding me as I cry. All my things were in that house, including stuff that my father gave me or reminded me of him. It’s all gone. I have nothing of his anymore. Opening my eyes, I watch the flames dance as they spread all over my home.
Roses Are Red (Edith's Fatal Love Trilogy Book 1) Page 8
