Page 144 of Luca
Sometimes she worried I’d disappear. I had the same fear, but with each day the fear dimmed and my happiness grew.
“I’m never leaving you, princess,” I swore.
“I love you, Pàpa.”
I pressed a kiss to her temple. “I love you more than life itself. Always remember that,” I said softly. I’d uttered those words often since I’d gotten her back. I wanted her to always remember that.
“And I’ll never leave you, Pàpa,” she echoed.
“I’m happy to hear it,” I said, smiling. Her love was my biggest reward in this life. She always watched me with so much trust in her eyes that it made my heart swell.
She went back to her group of friends to play.
“You know that’s not true,” Cassio, always the practical one, noted. “All our kids will leave us eventually.”
A round of grumbles traveled around. None of us liked to think about the day our children would leave us to go and make their own mark in this world. We wanted to hold on to our family and keep them in our bubble - protected and safe.
Marchetti’s deal still lingered like a dark cloud, but thankfully he kept his distance. So did I. He got his commissions and true to Margaret’s word to the Bitter Prince, I’d already routed some of my shipments to his port. A DiMauro always paid his debts, and I’d be no different.
“This is close to perfection,” I murmured to myself, but my friends heard it too.
“Everyone who matters is with us,” Cassio agreed, indicating the people who joined our extended family and friends. Regardless if they were here or not.
“And we’d protect them all with our lives,” Nico said.
Penelope and Francesca shared a glance and giggled, their expressions bright. Matteo and Bianca’s twin girls stormed through the field and around us.
My daughter’s smile got me every time. She and my wife, our family, were what mattered to me more than anything else in this world.
They had my heart. They’d always have it.
EPILOGUE
Luca - Seven Years Later
Margaret’s eyes traveled over the busy courtyard of the grand opening of St. Jean d’Arc School. It was a big deal and the interest was great. I was glad Wynter DiLustro and her wild friends ended up allowing me to invest.
It’d ensure my kids got in. Especially my eldest who was the kindest and most sensitive of all our children.
We were pregnant again. It’d be our fourth child, and my wife swore it was the last baby. I wasn’t quite sure if I was ready to call it quits though. I loved seeing my wife glow with happiness and her belly growing with our child.
“I don’t know about sending our daughter somewhere so far away for school, Luca.”
“Penelope won’t be ready for another five to seven years, mia bella,” I comforted Margaret. “This school will teach her self-defense and how to protect herself.”
A shadow passed my wife’s expression, and it gutted me every time.
So far we hadn’t succeeded in finding a way to break off the arrangement with Marchetti. Thankfully the dickward stayed the fuck way.
But he was like a looming dark shadow, always present.
I pulled my pregnant wife closer to me and kissed her forehead. “She’s only ten. We have time.”
She rubbed her belly, her eyes studying all the people here.
“Why can’t you teach her to fight?” Margaret protested. “Or I could, once we’re done having kids.”
“Mia bella, I could never teach her without worrying I’d hurt her,” I reasoned. “I’d go easy on her because my instinct is to protect her.”
