Page 17 of Tito
“Wonder what?” he asked.
“If O ever told the truth? I feel like I’m lost all the time now. What I thought had been true for twenty years had been a lie. Then just as I face that lie, I’m told that it is the truth?”
“Baby, you don’t know that yet.” He took my hand with both of his.
“He’s right,” Zia said. “O could have created those documents in case you ever had questions?”
“There’s other signs here though,” I told them both. “Like our coloring. It matches Olivia better than our parents. And likeJulianna confirmed, she had been at the doctors the day O took me. That could be the reason she left her behind. Then that picture!”
Tito wrapped an arm around me. “Valen, please try to calm down. I know this has upset you but you cannot change the past. You can’t alter what others have done. And no matter what the real truth is, you have me. You have my whole family now. We will help you to get through it. To be happy. No matter who your mom was.”
I gazed into his eyes then I burst into tears.
He looked surprised then grabbed me up into a hug “I’m sorry! What did I say? I’m so sorry!”
I tried to speak through my crying, “Y-you are the…” I sobbed a little more. “...the best man I h-have ever met! Oh, my God, you are so sweet!” I braced his face and peppered his cheeks with kisses.
“Si, that’s my boy!” Zia laughed.
Chapter Seven:Strange And Serious
Tito
We looked for Uncle Stephano all over the house. He wasn’t in his study, or with Rocky. I told Valencia that the one person who would know where he would be at all times was our butler, Max. She confessed to me that she had seen Max a few times and he seemed…a bit odd. That yes, she knew he was an English butler but something about him was spooky, yet she couldn’t pinpoint what it was. She said she hoped I wouldn’t be upset with her saying that.
I wasn’t, Max was odd and eccentric, a little strange and serious.
However, Max had been with Stephano since he was really young. A butler that had been inherited from my mother’s father and family. I explained to Valencia how he never seemed to change. He was formal and serious at all times. Day and night. He never ever broke character, so to speak. As kids, the Descalia boys, Rocky and me, all tried every trick in the book to make him jump out of character. Nothing ever worked.
We headed back to the kitchen to see if my mother knew where Max was. She wasn’t there.
I turned to Valencia and shrugged. “It is kinda weird that we can’t find all three of them.”
“Do they take naps?” she asked.
I laughed. “Not that I ever knew of. I mean they aren’tthatold.” I paused. “Come to think of it though, Max should be old. I mean Uncle Stephano is almost sixty and he claims Max raised him? Funny, how that never dawned on me before.”
“Some people just age better?” she suggested then she paused. “Your uncle doesn’t look sixty though. More like forty, but maybe I’m not a good judge of that?”
“Italians age better?” I joked. “Like look at me, I got a baby face.” I grinned at her.
She smiled at me. “You are a cutie for sure.”
“Ciao, Tito, Valen,” my mother greeted us as she arrived. “Lunch is in the dining room.”
I leaned in to kiss her cheek. “Grazie, Mama. We will go eat. Uncle Stephano in there?”
“No, I didn’t see him. You never found him earlier?”
I shook my head. “We looked in the study and knocked on the door to his room.”
“Have you asked—”
“—Max?” I replied with a smile. “No, have you seen him today?”
She tilted her head as she thought about this. “You know what? I haven’t.”
“Is it his day off?” Valencia asked.
