Page 54 of The Sicilian Billionaire's Neglected Wife
SignoraChavez cuts me off with a sage nod. “Ah.”
If it were anyone but her, I would have bristled at the wealth of innuendo she’s managed to inject in that single syllable, and that’s me being nice.
“That’s why she left you then.”
I can’t help stiffening. “Scusa?”
“A couple that never fights is the first sign of trouble,giuvini.It means there is no communication, no real trust.”
Ah,I am almost tempted to say back. If this isSignoraChavez thinking she’s being helpful instead of simply rubbing salt on a viciously bleeding wound, then I do not want to know how she is when she’s not being nice.
“But all is not lost.”
She says this reluctantly though, so that doesn’t exactly give me much hope.
“You can still do something about it, if you know who to ask.”
I should have known. Really should have known.SignoraChavez used to be like all the grandmothers of our town. Went to church faithfully every Sunday, prayed the rosary every morning, and went back to doing crime for the rest of the week simply because it was the life they were born to.
Everything changed, however, when my own father came to know God. Since then, he and Serena have not stopped talking about him, and faith spread throughout our little town like an epidemic. It terrified me the first time, to be honest, hearing a once-hardened gangster like my father speaking boldly of his faith.
And yet...
“God doesn’t allow divorce,” I hear myself say. “So why is it that my father is arranging the end of my marriage?”
“God also says that we must take care of ourselves because our bodies, and that includes our hearts, are His temple. Don’t you think there is more than one way for a marriage to end without divorce?”
SignoraChavez gets up to pack me a paper bag full of freshly baked bread, just like she used to do in the years Olivio and I hadn’t a mother to look after us. “Take it with you before you go. All bones and heartbreak do not look good on you, Aivan. And if you insist on working things out on your own, without His help, well...I hear there’s this very nice, very handsome lawyer Sienah has been meeting lately?”
Sienah
IKEEP WAITING FORhim to get tired of waiting.
Because it has to happen, right? One day he’ll finally accept it’s over and go back to his first love...racing. In the ten years we’ve been married, this is the longest he’s been away from his beloved work, and surely...surely he’s about to give up anytime soon.
Right?
