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His first Christmas with what he could call a family. Vittorio could scarcely believe it. He almost wouldn’t let himself. A family again, the thing that scared him the most, the thing that made him vulnerable, that could hurt him. But he loved them. All of them. Even though he suspected there may be treachery. He knelt beside the tree, the cover piece for the following year’s Sears catalog. His tree always was. It was a deal he’d had, one of many, that brought in more money than it should have. But at that moment, what was money? At least it resulted in a lovely photograph of his tree the year before, the one he and his beloved Elizabeth had danced so close to.
He reached back under the tree, to pull his gift to Edmund a little closer to the front, just a little bonus on top of the liquor that they and Nino had decided to exchange. He chuckled to himself. If there was one person he never thought he’d have in his home for any reason, it was the man he’d once envied. Who’d have thought that the preppy man would have a bit of a rakish streak in him, or that he’d end up with a politician’s daughter, or become such a close friend to him, because of Elizabeth?
And that politician’s daughter…good god, he didn’t know what to make of her. Loyal to a fault, willing to kill without a second thought, a firecracker with a heart of gold, yet silly as a small child when the mood struck. It overwhelmed him at times, as a man used to controlling and predicting people.
And now Edmund and Charlotte bustled about in the kitchen, insisting he let them make breakfast while Mama Donata visited her sister for the day.
He scooted a bit, making sure his gift to Miss Baker was near enough to the front that she might get it first. His employee. It might not have been proper to have one of his own waitresses in his home, but damn if she and his consigliere didn’t love each other fiercely, and damn if he didn’t see her as more of a sister than anything, with himself as her mentor. He saw something of himself in her, or at least, how he was until Constanza took him in as his ward. Only Miss Baker was good, kind, and her loyalty to Elizabeth might rival even her loyalty to Nino. One day, she may be tested.
Nino…The longest constant in his life, the person in whom he confided the most secrets, his crimes—their crimes, throughout the years. Yet when Vittorio finally melted the ice around his heart, it wasn’t Nino who he first let see what was beneath the coldness.
That had been Elizabeth. His Elizabeth. The mother-to-be of his—if she was correct that morning—his two children. It wasn’t real. It couldn’t be. She tried to have him feel them, but there wasn’t much movement. Wouldn't the two of them move around more? Twins? She’d given him so much already. She’d given him intrigue with her innocence and sharp tongue. She’s given him laughter when he thought he could never laugh again after the murders of his first wife and their son. She warmed his heart and gave him the love he needed when he’d shut the world out. She’d given him something to love for and someone to love again. And now…now she was giving his life the thing it still missed. She was making a father out of him.
"Gone away is the bluebird. Here to stay is a new bird!"
Her sweet soprano voice broke into his thoughts. He turned his head toward the doorway, awaiting her appearance. He thought she might sleep a little later. Growing even one baby had exhausted Cathalina and she didn’t even have the worry about societal rejection that Elizabeth had. A large belly, but no wedding ring yet.
“To sing a love song as we stroll along!”
“Walking in a winter wonderland,” he sang along with her under his breath. Her voice, her singing. Her. He loved her. And the previous Christmas, he had loved her too, but didn’t believe she could also love him. Didn’t want her to love him. Wanted her to leave him, be safe. He’d never have guessed, ever, that just one year later she’d be there again, but with his baby—babies—and an engagement ring on her finger.
The sharp rap of knuckles on the oak wood door upstairs brought a smile to his face. Of course she’d wake up Nino and Florence, but if he knew his consigliere’s appetite for the woman he slept with, they may not want to get up for a while.
“Come on, wakey, love birds! It’s Christmas, and there’s a lovely fire, and if you’re doing anything I’m not able to, I’m going to—” she yelled.
Vittorio smirked. They were. He just knew it. Poor Elizabeth, not able to do much comfortably anymore. But by god, when she could again, he may not have the control he did at the age of fourteen with the Protestant minister’s daughter behind the altar at the Catholic Church. The low rumble of Edmund’s voice to quiet Elizabeth down let him return to his thoughts a little longer.
Hell of a year, two more painful losses. He turned his eyes to the portraits above the mantle. To the lazy, yet kind eyes of his best friend, and the haughty smile of his other. For a moment, tears stung his own eyes. They’d been there for him, even when he’d pushed them away, had pushed everyone away.
“Darling! Buon Natale!”
The pure joy radiating from her beautiful face made a wide smile stretch across Vittorio’s own. “Buon Natale, mia principessa.”
“Up, up, up!” She hurried to him as fast as she could and grabbed at his arms, forcing him to his feet as if the house was on fire. Her back pressed against his chest. She scrambled for his hands, to press them to a couple spots on her belly. “Feel this!”
Two things moving that were that big…it couldn’t be… His mouth dried. The blood drained from his face. A new panic hit him. Yet also a joy that surpassed all others he’d experienced. Two of them created in love by the two of them.
When Nino and Florence made it into the den, their hands joined his at Elizabeth’s urging. Vittorio wanted to yell at everyone around them, “Go away! She’s mine—they’re mine!” But he also wanted to stand outside on the rooftop in the snow and scream loud enough for all of New York City to hear it, that he and the woman he loved were going to be the parents of twins.
Somehow, some way, he landed on the couch nearer to the fire. Elizabeth followed him closely, and as he sat, she sat. Her soft fingers running through his hair awoke something in him that he didn’t want to rise to that morning. Her palm on the back of his hand calmed him. He focused on that and tried to count to slow his racing heart, but he couldn’t get past…“Two, Miss Baker,” he said to something he thought he heard her say. “She’s having two.”
Elizabeth’s bright, teasing laugh met his ears. “She knows, darling, remember? She felt them?”
“She did?” He didn’t remember. Just that he felt them. He didn’t know what parts he felt, but he could distinctly feel two.
The woman he loved laughed harder and brighter. “Florence, your fiancé may have to be promoted if this one can’t think straight.”
“They weren’t promoted,” Vittorio muttered to no one, his thoughts fixated on twins. “They’re just babies.” And with a stroke of Elizabeth’s fingers against his cheek and a kiss to his forehead, he, the father-to-be of twins, sat alone, afraid, yet excited, while she went to Florence. Twice the children, twice the presents to give. Twice the children, twice the trouble they caused.
But twice the children, twice the love. His heart nearly overflowed with it.
“It can be a hard time of year, but all of us are here for you, for whatever you need,” he heard Elizabeth say.
That pulled him back to his den. He got up and stepped over to them, tempted to pull both of them into a hug, but he stopped himself.
“Miss Baker,” Vittorio said, closer than either of the women expected him to be and startling them both. He hooked his thumbs in the navy belt loops to his robe, and licked his lips. “Tell us what you need.”
“Space. I need space. And air.”
He recognized the signs of panic and nodded his head. He felt it often himself when Elizabeth wasn’t in his sight. Nino had called him obsessed with her. He couldn’t disagree that her safety was indeed an obsession. He’d already lost her twice, and didn’t want to tempt fate by letting it have a third try.
"I just need a minute. I'm alright. Just need to breathe for a second."
The woman fled from the room. Elizabeth started after her, but stopped when Vittorio put his arm around her. If Florence needed a moment, then she needed a moment.
“Nino, what’s going on? Is she really all right?” Elizabeth asked.
A question Vittorio had started to ask himself, among others.
“I’ll talk to her later,“ Vittorio muttered under his breath in Italian.
Nino stayed quiet. Quieter than usual. Vittorio gave him a few minutes of space for his thoughts, while Vittorio battled his own mounting suspicions. He looked from his best man, to the door, to the tree. It had to be paranoia, he told himself. Paranoia and nothing more. Last Christmas he still had his best friend, not knowing Leonard would turn up a week later, dismembered and divided into multiple boxes. He supposed that was better than Leonard never turning up, leaving them unknowing and with nothing to bury.
Florence crept back in, sneaking her way to Nino’s side for comfort.
Just then, Charlotte nearly pranced into the den, carrying a large tray. “Breakfa—” Her disposition changed to concern. “What happened? Did someone die—Shit.”
They all heard it, the rare swears from Charlotte’s lips, and Florence was the first to laugh. Vittorio raised his eyebrows in relief. “Go sit down,” he said to Elizabeth, then went to the record player to play the record again. It wasn’t the new “Winter Wonderland.” He cringed at the thought of hearing it again unless sung by Elizabeth. How many times had they listened to it together? But it made her happy, and though he had grown bored of hearing Richard Himber, he could never grow bored of her happiness or the sound of her voice.
His heart swelled just to think of Elizabeth’s exuberance in the upstairs hallway when interrupting Nino and Florence and he was certain they were interrupted.
“When shall we get to opening?” his wife-to-be asked, but was answered by compliments to the chef. That Edmund really did cook well.
“If he didn’t run a paper, he could be a cook at the diner.” Charlotte said from where she decided to sit on the floor. “Florence, put in a word for him with the boss, huh?”
Florence laughed heartily. "Walter could use an extra hand. Man's a master at the oven, but I imagine a few more days off would be nice."
It was hardly worth dignifying with a response, yet he chuckled. The truth was, if Edmund wasn’t his social equal, he might consider offering him the cooking job. But how would it be taken to offer a man of his financial position a hot, tiring job?
Vittorio had only taken a seat next to Elizabeth moments before she began to bounce. Vittorio was certain that, if she were a puppy, she’d be wagging her tail so hard that her back end would keep jumping off the ground. “Can we at least—”
“You’re not going to eat until we start, are you,” he said with a laugh. It wasn’t a question. There was only one answer.
“I can’t. I want them to have their things.”
He melted at the plea in her big blue eyes. It meant a lot to her, the gifts for Charlotte and Florence. Her mother’s long tope of pearls, taken apart to make them three matching sets of necklaces and bracelets. And for as excited as she was, how many times now had she asked him if he was sure they’d like them?
He kept staring into those eyes of hers, his fingers tracing her from jaw, to ear, to chin. He knew what he was doing to her. The look on her face changes from joyful glee to hungry. Starving. As starving as he was for her. But that would have to wait. Without regard for who was watching, he brushed his lips over her and with their mouths still just inches apart, whispered quietly, “I love you, mia principessa.”
“Ti amo, mio principe.”
Her American accent on his native language had to be one of the sweetest sounds to ever meet his ears. It brought out something in him he hadn’t thought was still there. She made him want to walk away from the life he led, away from the mafia, away from the power and money of it all, and to just live a quiet life with her. He’d give farming a try if the consequences of leaving didn’t include death. When you were made, there was no leaving. If your own don didn’t have you killed, another don would have one of his men do it. There was too much information that could be leaked. Omertà at risk. He witnessed an execution of one of Brambilia’s men who tried. But that didn’t mean that he didn’t wish to leave it for her. It simply wasn’t safe and he wouldn’t risk her life by trying. The safest thing for her was his increase in power. She had no idea how much he really had, who he had in his pocket, how many bribes were passed each month, and it would stay that way.
His moment of getting lost in her eyes ended with a tap of Charlotte’s toes on his ankle. He glanced down and around, and stopped on Florence to find her staring quite sentimentally at the engraved lock box he’d given her.
"Thank you, sir."
”No, thank you, Miss Baker.” Vittorio leaned across Nino to tap the box and wink at her. “Open it later.”
He’d spent several days trying to compose a letter to her, uncertain as he’d become. But she wouldn’t risk her new family for anything, he realized. None of them would. They were all any of each other had left, with Charlotte’s father in prison, and Elizabeth’s and Florence’s fathers estranged, all of their mothers dead or nonexistent, and his and Davis’s dead, sisters gone…only Nino had and family, but contact was scant. So what was going on?
He watched package after package ripped open. Florence’s letterhead set to Edmund was quite admirable, he thought. Elizabeth passed him a package handed in red, and he checked the tag. It felt like a book of some sort. He pulled his arm from around her to open it carefully. Tearing wrapping had never been his style. Inside it, he found a book bound in blue silk so dark it was almost black.
“What is this?” he asked, glancing down to find her staring up at him, her eyebrows pinched together with worry. “What’s wrong?”
“I just hope you like it.” She bit her lip for a moment. “I made it and did the binding myself. And look!” She opened it to the first page while he still held it.
“‘Thus much and more, and yet thou lov’st me not’,” he murmured in a warm tone, exactly one year before, on exactly that same sofa, he’d held her, unable to tell her of his love for her, trying to deny it even to himself, but he couldn’t. She’d apologized for wanting to kiss him, but he couldn’t apologize for accidentally calling her “Mrs. Puzo,” for he wanted to her be so much that it hurt him to not be able to tell him he loved her.
“‘And never wilt,’” he continued, finishing the poem Lord Byron had written over a century ago, ‘“love dwells not in our will, nor can I blame thee, though it be my lot, to strongly, wrongly, vainly love thee still’.”
Her words he’d remember until he died.
“It’s not in vain. Love may hurt when it’s unrequited, but when given freely and without expectation of being returned, then it’s never in vain. That’s when it’s the truest and purest love. She’ll come around and love you too. Maybe she already does, and is too scared to tell you, like you’re too scared to tell her.”
“It wasn’t in vain,” he said with a small smile, “and you didn’t need to come around, did you?”
“No,” she said with a shake of head, “I loved you already. We were just too scared.”
“Silly us,” he chuckled.
“Silly—” she began to repeat when Florence suddenly nearly tackled her in a tight hug. She wrapped her arms around her friend, her sister—she’d called Florence.
“They’re perfect,” Florence cried. “I’m honored. This family is all I’ve got. Thank you, Lizzie. I…” She let go of Elizabeth to stroke the pearls, at a loss for further words.
But Charlotte couldn’t even speak. She’d never known a mother at all. But he knew, and Elizabeth knew, what her silence meant. The tear rolling down her cheek said it all.
“I think we’re all any of us have got.”
Elizabeth’s words rang uncomfortably true to Vittorio. He kept quiet, watching Edmund and Charlotte toss wrapping paper into the fire, Florence leaning against Nino, and Nino’s comfort with having her so close so openly. The man had changed a lot over the years. He never thought Nino would date again, and now? Vittorio blinked hard, somewhat still in disbelief that there’d soon be a Mrs. Ricci.
Not so long after Charlotte and Edmund had left on a scavenger hunt to find Charlotte’s gifts from the three men together, Vittorio got up and took the last box, the largest that had been meant to look like part of the festive decorations, and began to lift it, but stopped. It would be tempting fate. He’d believed he’d have one child. How could he present to Elizabeth the Corsican cradle he’d had made when there were two babies? He placed a hand on each side of it, but then paused.
"And who would that be for?" Florence seemed to have picked up on his hesitancy.
“Nothing, Miss Baker. Just adjusting it a little. I recommend opening that lock box alone.”
"Right. Noted. It really is beautiful, thank you."
“Please do so when you have a moment. Loyalty in families…” He held back what he meant to say. “Loyalty in families should be without question.” But he had to question that now, had to question all of it, after it chipped away at his heart, breaking it into a thousand shards.
Needing some time and Elizabeth needing a moment alone to talk with Florence, he stepped out onto the patio, followed by Nino. Good. He needed a chance to speak with him.
"You alright, boss?" Nino leaned against the railing, opening his cigarette case and offering one to Vittorio.
Vittorio stared at him, his face blank, his thoughts hidden behind a wall of marble. “As fine as a man can be, considering the situation.” He waved away the offered lighter, opting to just tap the unlit cigarette into his palm, craving it as he did each time he tried to stop for her. “Too much of the smell on me makes her sick. Used to be something she didn’t mind so much.”
"I imagine it's a bit heavy when you've already been carrying two babies around for six or seven months." He nudged his friend with a broad smile. "Congratulations, Vitto."
“Twins. I never would have believed it. I don’t know if I can do this anymore.” His lips pressed together.
Nino hesitated, his grin falling. "Can't do what?"
Vittorio took a very deep breath and exhaled it, his suspicions nagging at him. For the first time, he couldn’t tell Nino the truth about his thoughts, that he was struggling with trust, that he knew the changes in the small habits he’d observed were because of seven years of having to distrust. He couldn’t tell Nino he’d spent several days suspecting one of those closest to him of working against him…including Nino. When he was suspecting his family for what he logically knew was no reason…
“This,” he spread his hands while keeping his elbows on the rails, shaking his head, unable to smile at Nino, “any of it.”
Nino curled his fingers into his palm and moved to grab his lighter, but didn’t. He turned his head toward his boss. "You could always retire. Cefalu's real nice in the summer."
Vittorio’s eyebrows shot up. It wasn’t the answer he wanted, nor expected. Nino knew the only way out was death. There is no retirement. There is no leaving. If there was a way, he’d already be on a farm with Elizabeth. But if Nino were to replace him as don, Nino would let him—no. Constanza was right. Nino had been too power-hungry before. He’d mellowed since the deaths of Catalina and Cristofano, but to suggest such a thing as walking away? It was to suggest death. He had to test Nino.
“Do you think I’d move Elizabeth so far away from Florence and Charlotte? The demeanor of our women, these past months—it’s been…”
He waited to see if Nino had noticed. Maybe it was all just in his head. But maybe it wasn’t, and this time, he couldn’t be direct with the one person he should have been able to trust with his life.
That line of thinking made Nino itch. It was the kind of thinking he'd had to do plenty of times, looking for the small cracks in people that lent credence to suspicion. He was a consigliere. It was his job to find the damage and mitigate it.
It had been hard enough to judge his brothers like that. Considering one of his best friends, his protégé, or his own fiancee as someone who could be a threat was not something he'd ever wanted to do.
But yes, there had been signs. Florence's lack of sleep, the way Elizabeth would suddenly shift topics when he entered the room, amongst other handfuls of oddities he'd prayed were just coincidental.
Nino shook his head. "Strange. I know."
Vittorio battled back the bile rising in his throat. The last hope he’d had was that he’d been imagining things when it came to Elizabeth and Florence. Yet they were confirmed to be true. But it wouldn’t be prudent to ask Nino anything else, not just then. Nino’s lips were pressed together from the weight of whatever was on his mind. Vittorio decided to give the man time to collect his thoughts. If he thought he’d been alone in imagining things, then Nino probably felt the same.
With a sigh, he went back inside, but stopped after a few steps. They were asleep cuddled together, like a couple puppies, and the sight of them…it hurt. Bad. He took a couple quick steps toward them, but stopped. Touching her might wake her. He wanted to grab her and hold her forever. He wanted her to sleep. Nino nudged him and passed him a quilt. Had Nino remembered it was the quilt he and Cathalina had been given when they married? He never had any reason to question Cathalina.
As quietly and as carefully as he could, he covered Elizabeth while Nino covered Florence. He had to force himself to keep his hands away from the lock of hair over her face that his hands itched to brush behind her ear so he could kiss her cheek. He could only gaze at her with all the love he had for her. Whatever was going on, he would love her still. The mother of his children. The woman who made him laugh when he thought he’d forgotten how, who made him feel safe enough to feel love again.
"She's actually asleep. It takes her ages lately,” Nino said a short distance behind.
Vittorio joined him, suddenly self-conscious of standing, still in his blue pajamas that matched Elizabeth’s. He tried to smile, thinking maybe that would help. It didn’t. He sighed, confused. He didn’t like being confused. “There’s something they’re not telling us, Nino. What secret are they keeping?”
One of Nino’s eyes twitched. He shoved a cigarette between his lips and chewed on the end, grinding his teeth back and forth. "I ain't got a clue." He flicked his eyes to his boss’s, then nearly stormed off toward the kitchen. There was only one thing he could be searching for when he stormed off alone. The good stuff was in the den. The man intended to drink by himself.
Alone with the women they loved, Vittorio stared hard at them. He loved Elizabeth almost more than he could bear. He wanted to tear the world apart to hold her, to merge into one being with her. But his heart seized in a fear he had only known once before: the night she went missing with his rival. Please, he silently begged her, don’t do anything to make me lose you again.
* * * * * * *
The fire crackled by his feet. His first Christmas with what he could call a family and uncertainty tainted the joy he’d had in the morning, a morning that seemed so long ago now. Yet his heart still burst with love. This was his family, what he had of one. And it scared him, made him vulnerable, both inside and out. A man with no one to lose can’t be so intimidated by his enemies with threats against those he loved. He never thought he’d have to question whether that vulnerability was within the walls of his own castle.
Nino and Edmund, an arm around each other’s shoulders, were more sloshed than he’d ever seen either of them. Though Edmund was barely tipsy, a man who could hold his alcohol as well as Vittorio, and Nino to the point that Vittorio had had to cut him off—they slurred together the words to the album Vittorio only tolerated because Elizabeth loved it. Though he’d listen to her sing it until the end of time just to hear her voice.
Elizabeth. On the floor with Florence and Charlotte, building a house of cards. Rather impressive, it was. Seven stories high. He’d never seen one so tall. Quite the skill to build it. But no matter the talent involved to build it, it only took one skillful hand pulling out the wrong card, and the entire house fell down.