Page 126 of Promised to the Don of Naples
"Brava."
He kissed me, long, with salt on both our faces—mine from tears, his from sweat.
I didn't cry for Tonio in front of Luca, I didn't cry for the nonna in front of Luca.
I cried later, in the bathroom of the yacht, with the door locked.
LUCA MORETTI
The yacht left Mergellina at nine at night.
Valentina, the nonna with a bandage on her temple, Matteo carrying a suitcase for the first time in seven years, four Moretti soldiers. Raffaele stayed in Posillipo.
The crossing was silent.
I held Valentina's hand the whole time. She rested her head on my shoulder. Matteo, in the front seat of the yacht, looked at me once, lowered his head, and went back to looking at the sea.
In Capri, at the Marina Grande, Donna Pia was waiting.
The nonna got off first, leaning on Matteo.
I jumped onto the stone and held out my hand to Valentina.
"Two weeks," I said.
"Two."
"Lo prometto."
"I know."
She let go of my hand slowly. She went off walking with the nonna up the narrow street toward the pink house, Matteo at her side.
Before she disappeared around the bend, she turned.
I waved. She waved.
I went back to the yacht. On the way back to Mergellina, I stayed alone on the deck. A cigarette lit for the first time in four years—not a cigar, a cigarette, from the pack the captain offered me without asking. Vesuvius appearing on the other side of the bay, dark, against a moonless sky.
Bella mia. I promised you two weeks, but I'm going to kill your father sooner than I promised.
I put the cigarette out on the railing and threw it into the sea.
CHAPTER 39
"I didn't know how much I missed him. I knew the moment he walked into the house."
VALENTINAMORETTI
The nonna had coffee with me in the lemon garden.
It was the fifth morning in Capri. The pink house on the Via Tragara was open in a way I'd never seen—windows flung wide, terrace doors with no curtains, pots of basil and geranium in every corner.
It no longer looked like the house where Matteo had been a prisoner for two months; it looked like a summer house.
Donna Pia brought the black coffee on the blue ceramic tray, fresh cornetto and local honey.
Matteo looked at me after the nonna went up to rest.
