Page 133 of The Unraveling of Julia

“I didn’t know that.” Fiamma moaned. “I didn’t remember him, Idon’tremember him.”

“I really thinkhedid it.”

“You do?” Fiamma looked up, her eyes unmistakably hopeful. “Why?”

“Look at the photo, in context.” Julia gestured to the photos and passports from the go-bag. “He must’ve abused her, and then, when he started abusing you, she left with you. She took pictures of her injuries and yours, for evidence. She bought a villa in the middle of Tuscany and hid you both away. She changed your name and hers. She kept your passports in case he found you and you both had to run. She did everything she could to keep you safe. That’s why she kept you inside. That’s why you couldn’t go to school.”

“No, no, this can’t be, no.” Fiamma’s hand went to her cheek, her fingers trembling. “But why the cell? Why that?”

“For protection? Maybe when she heard he was in town or was looking for you?” Julia puzzled it out, considering what Fiamma had just said. “Maybe he was a powerful man with a lot of money. Maybe he hired investigators to findher, just likeshedid to findyou. Just likeIdid, to findher and you.”

“Oh no.” Fiamma’s glistening eyes flew open. “I had it wrong? I hadherwrong, all this time? How could I?”

“You can’t fault yourself. You couldn’t have known.”

“Why didn’t she tell me about him? Why didn’t she say why she was putting me down there?” Tears filled Fiamma’s eyes. “She could have explained everything, I would have understood.”

“It’s not the kind of thing you tell a child, is it?” Julia kept her tone gentle. “If I were in her position, I wouldn’t tell you, either. I would just protect you.”

“I suppose.” Fiamma nodded, wiping her eyes. “It was a terrible decision, but she must have been so desperate, so frightened.”

“Yes, and she wanted to keep you alive.”

“I wish I had known, I wish I had understood it. I never gave her the chance to explain it when I got old enough to understand. I so wish I had, while she was still alive.”

Julia watched guilt and regret wash over Fiamma. “I’m sorry.”

“When she wasn’t putting me down there, we were happy. She read to me, she taught me to read, and to draw and paint. We played with the dogs and the ducks. We picked grapes and pressed flowers in books. She loved me, she was loving to me.” Fiamma smiled sadly, at the memories. “She could be so much fun, so delightful really, but then she would put me down there, I couldn’t understand why. I thought she was crazy, trulycrazy.”

“Who knows what that means, Fiamma?” Julia asked, speaking from the heart. “We throw that word around all the time. I do, too, it comes too easily, but who says what’s crazy and what’s not? Who says what’s normal and what’s not? I’ve experienced so much here, I’ve changed, and what I think is real or crazy or normal has changed, too. It’s grown, it’sexpanded.” Julia realized the truth of her words. “I don’t know if she was crazy when you lived here, all I know is that she loved you enough to keep you safe. She imprisoned herself, too. Foryou. Is that a mother’s love? You tell me.”

Fiamma’s eyes filled with tears.

Julia had another thought. “Are you and your mother so different? You let me go because you wanted me to have a better life. Shekeptyou because she wanted you to have a better life. You’re mother and daughter, just as you and I are mother and daughter. We’re the same and different, both at once.”

Fiamma picked up the photo of a young Rossi, and a sudden sweetness softened her smile. “Mamma?” she whispered, a tear rolling down her cheek.

“Yes,” Julia said, trying not to cry.

Mamma.

73

Julia couldn’t sleep, tossing and turning all night. She’d called the hospital to check on Gianluca, but his condition was still critical, which worried her sick. She could only pray he survived and that the authorities arrested whoever had tried to kill him. She wondered if they were watching her right now, through the cameras in the ceiling, which the police had decided to leave in for the time being.

She’d been processing everything that happened, and the fact that the conspiracy and Mike’s killer would be brought to justice gave her a grim satisfaction. It wouldn’t bring Mike back, and she knew she’d mourn and miss him forever. She would settle for putting Hoodie and the rest of them behind bars.

Julia tried to quiet her mind, but the thoughts kept coming. She still couldn’t believe she’d found her birth mother, and Fiamma turned out to be a lovely person. Julia took comfort in knowing why Fiamma had relinquished her, a truly unselfish act that enabled her to find her wonderful adoptive mother. She felt gratified that Fiamma knew the whole, if complex, truth and hoped that eased her pain. She and Fiamma both wanted to continue getting to know one another, and Julia couldn’t have been happier.

The bedroom began to lighten, and she realized it was almost dawn. On impulse, she threw off the coverlet and left the room, padding downstairs in her Eagles T-shirt. She went through the kitchen to the back door, unlocked it, and stepped outside, taking a deep breath. The air smelled fresh and sweet, and she felt drawn to see first light over the vineyard.

Julia walked through the wet grass in her bare feet and headed down. It was a cool, foggy morning, and a bluish gray mist enrobed the vineyard and obscured the cypress trees and hills on its horizon. The fog shrouded the details of the vines, weed, and underbrush. Birds burst from the thicket, calling and flapping their wings. Bees and insects buzzed around. A flurry of gnats swirled on a windy whirlpool.

Julia found a flat rock and sat down, breathing in. The sky was a massive expanse aglow with a transparent cerulean hue, growing infinitesimally brighter and warmer as the sun rose behind the hills, burning away the fog and washing heaven in gold, as if a painting were coming to life before her eyes.

Julia spotted patches of clarity here and there as the fog evaporated over the cypress trees, then the hilltops, and in time vivid colors began to announce themselves in the tangled vineyard, the yellows and whites of the wildflowers, the bright green of the younger vines, the darker browns of the tree limbs, and the rich black of the bark.

Suddenly the trees at the horizon became more and more clear against the brightening sky, and in the next moment the sun rose like a white orb emanating light and warmth everywhere.

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