Page 145 of Promised to the Don of Naples
He came in carefully, the way a man does when he still remembers that this same man sent him to the south cellar months ago.
"Sit," I said. "The cellar is over, Matteo."
He looked at me.
"The suspicion is over." I rested my hands on the desk. "You're family now. Not because you're Valentina's brother, but because you threw yourself in front of my wife at Villa Salina. In front of a bullet, for my wife and my child."
Matteo's face changed.
"Child."
"She's pregnant."
Matteo closed his eyes. When he opened them, they were wet.
"Sorella," he murmured, more to himself. "Madonna, sorella."
"You threw yourself in front of her without knowing," I said. "That pays off any debt I ever thought you had. You're fratello in this house. Chiaro?"
He stood. He held out his hand, and I shook it—not as Don and prisoner. As brothers-in-law, almost as brothers.
When he left, I stayed alone in the study.
I looked at the bookshelf. The baptism photo was still turned against the wood, where I'd put it the night of Carlo's execution.
I picked it up.
My father in the center. Baby Raffaele in his lap. Carlo on the left, gray suit. Salvatore on the right, black suit.
The two godfathers. Both false. Both dead now, by my hands or by my wife's dagger.
I took a pair of scissors from my father's drawer and cut.
I took out Carlo and Salvatore. I left only my father and baby Raffaele. I cut the two traitors out of the photo of my family, and threw the pieces into the cold fireplace.
Then I put the cut photo back on the bookshelf. Facing out, this time.
VALENTINAMORETTI
The nonna came back from Capri in the afternoon.
I found her in the garden, on the stone bench near the great-grandfather's grapevine—the same spot where, months ago, Luca had almost kissed me and I'd turned my face away.
A whole life fits in a garden, sometimes.
I sat down beside her.
"Lucia loved this grapevine," she said.
"You used to bring her here?"
"Every summer, before Capri. In May, when the grapes were new." The nonna smiled at the corner of her mouth. "She and Luca's mother, Marta, would sit on this bench and drink limoncello while you children ran in the vineyard. You, Matteo, Luca, Raffaele."
I swallowed hard.
"I don't remember it."
"You were three, signora." The nonna put her hand on mine. "But you were here. Before everything, before the hatred. You were all here, together, when it was still possible."
