The first duty of love is to listen.
—Paul Tillich
BASTIANO ROMANO
Days Missing: 13
It wasn’t a conscious decision to tell Ariana about Elsa and Everett. Like the trust we’d built, like the feelings we shared, like the way I’d come to rely on her, it just happened. One day, I hated her. The next, I couldn’t live without her.
Her arms were the therapy I’d chosen, the hospital I wished to heal in. I came home each night exhausted. I left each morning revived. Like magic.
She traced Everett’s name on my ribcage, toying with the tattoo as we laid in bed.
“He’s my son.”
Her fingers on my tattoo froze, pressing down hard on my skin. I didn’t even think she realized it.
“You have a son?”
“I’m not in the habit of tattooing random names on my flesh.”
Her cheeks reddened. “I figured it was maybe a place or… a girl. An ex-girlfriend, maybe? Like how Jamie and Parker are both boy and girl names.”
“I do have an ex. Her name is Elsa, and if I had her name tattooed on my body, I’d burn it off with acid.”
I wasn’t kidding. I would. And then I’d have to talk myself down from dumping her in the vat of acid, too.
“Is Elsa Everett’s mother?”
“Yes. An unfortunate egg donor.”
She propped her chin on my chest and stared into my eyes. Her eyes took their time studying me before she accused, “You hate her.”
“Understatement.”
“How did it happen?”
“Everett?” I pulled Ariana’s body up, so she was half on top of me, her face close to mine.
“Yes, but also Elsa. People don’t go from love to hate.”
“Have you seen the divorce stats in this country?”
She winced. “You were married?”
“No, but I almost proposed.”
“Tell me about it.”
“I met Elsa in college. I was doing my master’s at Wharton, and she was in all of my classes. The smartest girl in the program, but if you looked at her now, you wouldn’t know it.”
“So, you met in college and fell in love. Why?”
“She was the exact opposite of New York. No glitz. No glamour. She had the pretty face and the complete utter lack of makeup, the cowboy boots, and the Daisy Dukes. The wicked humor, the wit, and the intellect. She made me feel like I wasn’t living in the world I’d been born in. She was easy to love.”
And it had all been a lie.
Ari pressed a kiss to my jaw. “You were running away from this world.”
“Yeah. And I ran straight into a trap. I’ve played it over and over in my mind, and I can’t see me getting her that wrong unless it was a trap. She was almost too perfect. Too easy to love. I caught her with a five-million-dollar check in her hand on the night I was going to propose to her. My dad had paid her to leave me.”
“So, you hate her, and you hate him.”
My head shook. “I don’t hate him. I think he helped me dodge a bullet, but our relationship has never recovered. I call him Gio. I haven’t called him Dad in eight years.”
“When it happened…”
“Exactly. I wish we could repair our relationship, but it’s probably too fractured. I don’t hate him, but I do hate her. She’s the worst of this world, packaged into one fucked up, belligerent redhead.”
“So, your dad paid her off. Where does Everett come into this?”
“About six months after we broke up, she showed up on my doorstep super pregnant. The dates worked out. We’d been having sex up until the day we broke up, and I’m an asshole, but I’m not a neglect-innocent-kids asshole. I let her stay in my penthouse. I wasn’t about to get back together with her, but I let her stay in the room that is now Tessie’s. We had a nursery built into my room. I could have made it work. Everett was born. I fell in love with him. We lived like this for years, and then one day, she vanished. Everett was five at the time, and she took him with her. I hired investigators, had Romano men scouring the city for him, did everything I could to find him.”
“What happened?”
“She called me from an Alabama number a couple months later. She told me Everett wasn’t mine. That she’d paid for a sperm donation as soon as we’d broken up so she could trick me, I’d be tied to her through him. She’d chosen a donor that looked like me just so she could fool me into believing he’s mine. The dates lined up, and Everett fucking looks like me, so I never questioned it. After she hung up, I grabbed some hair from Everett’s comb, had it tested, and she was right. We weren’t a match. But it didn’t matter. He loves me. I love him. I raised him. Everett is my son.”
Ariana looked shocked, like the information was too much for her to take in. “And now? He lives in Alabama?”
“She’s been leveraging money from me. I pay for her mortgage, her house insurance, her car insurance, her health insurance, her car payments, her groceries, her staff, everything. She gets a six-figure allowance each month, and she always wants more.”
“Why? Why are you paying her? Why not get Everett back?”
“It’s too dangerous. We’re at war with the Andretti family. I know I’ve never talked about what my family does, but I’m sure you’ve heard whispers around the bar. The Andretti family… they’re worse than us. Alabama is their territory. The Romano soldiers have been sworn to secrecy. Everett is our best kept secret. If the Andretti family know he’s living in their territory, it can mean death for him, and by stepping foot in Andretti territory to get him, I’m risking the chance they get to him first. Any dirty cop or politician down there may be on their payroll, so I’ve sent my own investigators to find blackmail on Elsa.”
“Have you found it?”
“No. I call her names, I call her stupid, but she’s not. She graduated top of our class at Wharton. She’s good at covering her tracks, especially when it comes to finances. I don’t know what she spends the money I give her on. Maybe shoes. Maybe more cars. Maybe Birkin bags and Herve Leger dresses she loves to wear. Or maybe something I could use against her. But if that’s the lead I have, it’ll go nowhere because of how good she is at covering her tracks. Probably the only thing she’s used her degree for.”
“And Everett?”
“He’s not happy down there. I’m not saying this because I’m biased. He wants to be up here. He wants to be home. Elsa is always gone, and they don’t really have a relationship.”
“That’s awful. And lonely.”
“And sometimes, I feel like it’ll never be okay. One of the last things Vincent said to me was that it wouldn’t always be like this, but I can’t bring myself to believe him.”
She shifted so she was completely over me now. “Then believe in yourself. If there’s anyone who can get Everett back, it’s you. I’ve never met anyone as capable.”
I mulled over her words before returning the kiss she pressed to my lips. Hungry. Greedy for me. Everything about us defied logic. I’d been burned too many times. It made no sense to want her, but I did, and so I took her. At least for tonight.
I took her body like it was mine, and she let me, and when we were done, she begged, “Tell me a secret.” Her voice was a whisper, soft and raspy in my ear, a plea just for me.
“This—here, with you—is the happiest I’ve ever been.”