Page 99 of Skin Deep

Chapter31

Harrison

We all went our separate ways. Lachlan, Declan, and Owen went back to Scotland with mam and da. Owen knew a guy who was traveling with a band and was looking for someone to sublet his flat. It was only for two months, and it fit the situation. Cash and Keely went to Ireland, where Cash was from. From what I suspected, it had something to do with his twin brother. I wished him luck with my sister on the journey.

Georgina and I decided to go to Italy. She did better with warm air and sun. Modica was the first leg on our honeymoon, and then we were going to travel the country.

The day after we arrived, Stella came to the casa with her computer. She opened it up and showed us the screen.

New York. Dolce. The Scarpone family seemed to have had a shootout inside, from what the article said.

I wasn't sure what that meant, but Georgina and her mamma looked at each other and nodded.

“What?” I said, remembering Kelly bringing up Dolce.But I wasn't sure what they knew about it that I didn’t. Mostly, Kelly had been tight-lipped about Macchiavello and his dealings with him.

“Have you ever heard the name Vittorio Scarpone?” Georgina asked me.

I thought about it for a minute or two, reading over the article. I shrugged. “Not that I can remember.”

Stella and Georgina exchanged a glance again. Stella went into detail about who he was and how he was connected to Mac.

Three weeks later, I was still thinking about it. How I hadn’t connected the dots until Stella and my wife did it for me. Especially when I’d see him around the property.

I didn’t see Macchiavello all that often, or Mari, but occasionally we would run into each other. Georgina liked to take walks in the citrus groves, and apparently, so did he. Or maybe it was Mari. She liked to ride her bike around, too, and Macchiavello went wherever she did.

It seemed like some wars had come to an end, and some were in the middle, still burning hot. Kelly had only ducked out because of Rocco Fausti, but I knew when we returned to New York, it was going to be returning to hell. Kelly’s war was far from over, and so was ours with the Craigs. But like Georgina had pointed out, even wars sometimes take a break.

We were taking ours.

Two months was all we had. I tried not to think about returning to New York as I enjoyed the time with my wife. It was our own private world beyond the gates of the old man’s property, and I could see why Macchiavello was fond of fading from the world there. It was a protected section of heaven when hell was breathing down a man’s neck.

“What are you thinking?” Georgina was sitting at her makeup table, getting ready for dinner at her mamma’s casa, and she turned to face me on the bed.

I blinked a few times, zeroing in on the suitcases surrounding us. We’d be leaving the next day for someplace in Italy where Georgina was going to have a photoshoot. She’d mentioned the name of the Italian company that was going to have her face representing more of their products soon, but there were a few.

I realized how busy her life was and how much of a hiatus she’d taken when we’d returned from New York and a middle-aged woman stopped by to discuss her schedule with her. I remembered the look on the woman’s face when Georgina told her she’d be extending her hiatus indefinitely, but she was willing to finish all prior commitments.

The woman was shocked that we were married. She looked unhappy about it once the news settled. She was definitely unhappy that Georgina had made the decision to step back from her career. All I could see was satisfaction on Stella’s face when the woman left. I knew Stella blamed the world Georgina once thrived in for a lot of her daughter’s problems. She’d met Elias and Miles through it, and it had set her on a long and lonely path. Stella had described it as a road to “self-destruction.”

“That good of a thought, ah?”

“It would be easy to live here,” I said, realizing I hadn’t answered her.

She smiled at me, fiddling with the sunflower necklace at her throat. “Sì.I agree. Nonno once told me that places are alive, like people. This one felt like an outlet to him. To recharge the human spirit. Are you ready?”

“I am,” I said, sitting up.

Her beauty almost knocked me over again. Her hair was neatly pulled up, and she was wearing a white jumpsuit that was tight at the top but flowed around her legs. The color of it set off her tan skin, blue eyes, and black hair. It was more than that, though.

She’d found her place in the sun.

I nodded toward the mirror on her vanity. “Check that out,” I said.

She turned toward it. “My reflection?” She met my eyes through it.

“Yeah,” I said. “Only one face that I see.”

She’d told me once that her mirror always had two faces. The one the world got to see, and the one she saw when she was alone. They were not the same woman.

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