Chapter 76

Mafia Kings: Valentino: Chapter 76 Despite Paolo being a worrywart, nothing bad happened. We got home in plenty of time.

At dinner, Don Vicari asked, “Did you enjoy your day out?”

Isabella started talking his ear off about Cefalù – the buildings, the restaurants, the ocean breezes, everything.

The old guy barely paid attention to her. He just grunted Mm-hm and That’s nice.

I think she was so high from her experience that she didn’t notice. Or didn’t care.

She just beamed like the sun coming out from behind the clouds.

“Can we go to another town tomorrow?” she asked eagerly.

“I suppose,” he said as he continued to cut his meat.

“Where?”

“I’ll talk with your fiancé after dinner.”

After dinner, Isabella almost went skipping out of the dining room.

The old lady came up and beamed as she patted my cheek.

“You a good boy,” she said, then followed her great-granddaughter.

Don Vicari had a slightly different reaction.

“I don’t care where you go tomorrow, just as long as I don’t have to hear every goddamn detail,” he said crankily as he walked out of the room.

Fuckin’ bastard.

Still...

We had his permission to keep going on.

That’s all I needed.

So that’s how we got to see Messina, on the northeastern tip of Sicily... and Augusta... and Santa Maria del Focallo.

Isabella and Ludavica were like two kids in a candy store.

They visited every museum, saw every famous landmark, and basked in the sunshine in outdoor cafés.

For the first time, they were truly experiencing freedom – and they enjoyed every second of it.

I can’t say I was experiencing freedom, exactly...

But every town we visited, I got to see Cat.

That was enough for me.

She was always happy when I first arrived – but I could tell she was having a harder and harder time as the days went by.

As the wedding approached.

I didn’t ask her what was wrong because I already knew.

We just held each other and made love...

And tried to ignore the disaster just over the horizon.

Speaking of the wedding, I asked Isabella where we were going to be married.

I was expecting a big church. Maybe a cathedral in Palermo, so Don Vicari could show off how rich and powerful he was.

I hadn’t seen any big preparations taking place – no flower orders, no futzing over the reception menu, no drama about the wedding dress – but I figured he had people handling it behind the scenes.

So I was surprised when Isabella said, “At the chapel outside Resuttano.”

“...Resuttano?”

I’d never heard of it.

Isabella smiled at my puzzlement. “It’s a little place about five miles from here. There’s a chapel on the outskirts of the village.

Papa and Mama got married there. So did my Papa’s parents, and Bisnonna, too.”

Bisnonna was her great-grandmother – the 91-year-old who kept calling me ‘good boy.’

“That’s where we’re getting married?” I asked in shock. “A chapel in a village?”

“Well, yeah. Rocco, Abriana, and Marcella all got married there. Why – did you want something bigger?” she asked with a frown.

“No – no, that’s great.”

But I still double-checked with Don Vicari at dinner.

“I understand we’ll be getting married in the chapel outside Resuttano.”

“That’s right,” he said, not even looking up from his veal parmigiana.

“So... not a big church.”

“Yes,” he said contemptuously, “chapels tend not to be very big.”

I ignored his snark. “Who’s coming?”

“Your family.”

“No one else?” I asked in surprise.

“Nonna,” he said, gesturing to his grandmother. “Plus Rocco, my other two daughters, and their families. Why, were you expecting someone?”

“Well, it’s just... normally, a ton of other families show up.”

By ‘families,’ I meant the Cosa Nostra.

The people who controlled cities like Rome, Milan, and Venice.

Don Vicari smirked. “Did they show up at your brother’s wedding? Not Don Rosolini’s – the other one.”

He meant Adriano’s.

Virtually nobody had gone to Adriano’s wedding, and Don Vicari knew it. Other than Alessandra’s long-lost grandmother from Genoa, every single Cosa Nostra family had believed we’d slaughtered the Agrellas, our longtime business partners in Florence.

In reality, it was a gangster named Mezzasalma, with my Uncle Fausto backing him from the shadows. But the entire Cosa Nostra thought we’d betrayed them, and they stayed away because of it.

“No,” I answered. “They didn’t go to Adriano’s wedding.”

“So why would they show up at yours?”

“I thought they might show up at your daughter’s,” I said coldly.

“Well, she’s marrying you... and in case you haven’t noticed, your family’s still in bad odor with the rest of the families.” Then he shrugged. “Fuck ‘em. They never came to the weddings Papa invited them to, so I never invited them when I took over.”

“Language,” the old lady snapped.

“Sorry, Nonna,” he said.

“So... just our two families at a chapel outside Resuttano,” I clarified.

“That’s it,” Don Vicari said, and gave me that cold, chilling smile.

I knew where the disaster would be: outside Resuttano.

And I knew when it would happen: in less than ten days.

So the only thing left was to enjoy what little time I had left with Cat.

I threw myself into it with a sense of desperation – and so did she.

We savored every minute... often staring at each other wordlessly, smiling sadly, as we lay in each other’s arms after sex.

Despite the disaster on the horizon, we were happy for a few hours each day.

In Messina...

And Augusta...

And Santa Maria del Focallo.

Then we went to Ortigia.

That’s when everything changed.