Owning the Mafia Don

Proserpina

My days took on a familiar grey hue. I was determined not to fall into a state of despair and two days after Lucien had left, I began my yoga regime. The first day I could barely hold a couple of poses, my body was so very out of shape. But that only made me feel more determined to continue and I settled into my morning routine.

I also began to attend my weekly sessions with Dr. Asha.

The twins pranced around the house, making mayhem with a willing henchman, Claude Delano, ready to follow them anywhere and everywhere. If that was not enough to keep me busy, I had three little children who were always demanding milk! I had reduced my feeding as it had become too exhausting for me. When I looked about me, I felt eternally grateful that I had so many people around me who cared for me…

But I missed Lucien, desperately. Every second of the day, I thought about him. it was now almost two weeks since he had left and I ached for him, every day.

***

As he had informed me before leaving, gripping my chin in his hard, rough hand, he did not call. It was, he had told me, imperative for him to remain incognito; to remain in a place where no one would know where he was.

Dmitri Rudenko, the cunning man, had probably tried to infiltrate Lucien’s group. At any rate, although I fretted and fumed, I relied on Beston to relay any news he received, back to me.

Beston had his own network that kept him informed but he did not speak directly to my husband. As the Head of Security on our estate, he would lope in around mid-morning for a cup of coffee, black and sweet, and a slice of cake that I had baked or something to eat. While he stood leaning against the counter, munching, I would wait for him to pass on any information he had received.

In a distant corner of my mind, I noticed that Camille tended to hang around in the kitchen when Beston was around. It did not dawn on me that she was soft on him until my daughter, and of course, dear Bea, told me about it.

“That there nurse of yours,” said Beatrice smugly, with a sly wink one afternoon as I sat at my desk, working, “She got the hots for our Tony.”

I stared at her in some confusion. My work kept me busy and I was preparing to appear for an exam that would help me to apply for my doctorate in Buddhist Studies. Pushing my glasses off my nose and rubbing the bridge of my nose, I sighed and asked,

“Bea, what are you talking about?”

She looked at me, noting my tired eyes and the lines of stress and sadness that I saw in the mirror every morning when I looked at my reflection.

“Camille is who I si talking of,” she snapped crossly, annoyed that I was not receptive to gossip.

I sighed again and shook my head, reaching my hand out to take the long, cool glass of iced lemon tea she had brought up for me.

“Dear Bea,” I said, burying my face wearily in her apron, feeling her large soft belly, “What do you mean? I have no idea.”

She gently stroked my head for a while. Then said, “Camille is interested in Our Beston is what. They are courting.”

I stared at her, open-mouthed. The old fashioned expression made me dimple.

She shook her head in exasperation.

“Childe, you bury yourself in work and your yoga and your kids and your cooking and ye do not see what everyone can see. Is as plain as day!”

She crossed her arms around her massive chest and eyed me sternly. Feeling somewhat like a child who had failed a test in school and had to face the wrath of her parent, I nervously gulped down some of my tea and then I rubbed my eyes and turned to look out of the window.

My desk was beside the open window. I could see the lawn and the acres of land, well-tended and green, for a great distance. Philippe’s father Benedict Diaz was an artist, I mused. He trimmed and took care of the grounds like a man who had been trained in landscaping. Even as I thought about him, I saw young Philippe loping across, heading to the kitchen.

I smiled. The boy had taken it upon himself to come and check on me every day, four times a day. No one had asked him to do so but he came, looked in on me, smiled slightly and then disappeared.

“Ah, there’s another one.” sighed Beatrice.

“Another what, Bea?” I asked stupidly.

“Girl, you got eyes in your head or wot?” she demanded, her voice carrying her disappointment at my dense reaction, “You is like a lovelorn puppy, mooning over the Man, is all I see.”

I sipped the tea and frowned at her.

Now, what was she talking about?

“Our girl!” she snapped, glaring at me as I looked up, bewildered.

I was all at sea by now.

“Beatrice, please calm down!” I cried and then, I went on, gently,

“Bea, let’s start again. What are you talking about? Which girl?”

“OUR GIRL!” she thundered and I could almost see the words in capitals, floating out there above her head like a banner.

Looking suitably chastened, I thought for a minute. She had to mean Ria or Tara. No one had taken the time to give names to the little boys yet, sadly enough, I sighed. Lucien had waved me away when I asked him for suggestions. He had rolled on top of me, his mouth descending to mine as he penetrated me and growled,

“Name them what you want, woman…” and he had made love to me again.

After a pause, I smiled hesitantly and began again, “Ummm…Which one?”

That earned me a look that said she thought of me as being a little better than a dunce.

“RIA!” she cried.

Immediately, there was a patter of feet and my little girl appeared at the door in her flowered sun dress, her long blonde braids swinging, her face smudged in the dirt, bare feet covered in mud. She had been playing in the sand pit, I thought dully, although she had been expressly forbidden to do so in the afternoon.

“Mumma?” she inquired, her eyes moving from my face to Beatrice and back, questioningly.

“No, you can run away!” cried Beatrice, waving her arms like someone trying to drive away a pesky chicken.

Ria pulled a face and I heard her tearing down the corridor, slamming the kitchen door shut as she escaped onto the lawns.

“I need to send those two to school,” I sighed, placing my head in my hands and massaging my eyes tiredly.

“Look!” cried Beatrice triumphantly and I followed her pointing finger.

My twins were on the lawns, with young Philippe in attendance. Claude was also a little way behind them, demanding that they slow down, waving his podgy arms to get their attention and Philippe immediately slowed down to pick him up. He lifted my son and placed him on his broad shoulders and I smiled. Philippe was growing into a handsome young man; there would be many hearts he would break along the way. I sighed and stretched my arms and realized that Beatrice was eyeing me, a glint in her eyes.

She was obviously expecting an answer to her observation but I was confused.

“See WHAT?” I asked timidly, the conversation making me feel like a maze runner. I glanced at my laptop which had gone to sleep. I had a few forms to upload, and…

As I looked at her questioningly, she sighed, her shoulders slumping.

“You do not see it, do you?”

I thought of the couple of emails I wanted to reply to… and gave up.

Beatrice snorted.

“Now you stop tapping away on them keys and listen up here a bit, young lady; that there young man,” she jabbed at the window for emphasis, “That there, Philippe.”

I nodded, mystified as I followed the direction of her pointing finger, “What about him, Bea?”

The old woman looked fit to strangle me. All I could see were the children playing, shouting and whooping, with the gardener’s son Philippe

“He loves Our Ria!” she hollered.

I stared at her in shock and then, for the life of me, I could not help it, I burst out laughing.

Beatrice looked comically furious and that only made me dissolve in peals of laughter.

She looked vexed and deeply disappointed by my reaction.

I threw my arms around her and hugged her.

“Oh, Bea!” I laughed, “Ria is just getting to be SIX years old! And as for Philippe, he must be …what?… almost fourteen or something? Surely the difference in age matters? I mean, he’s a teen and she’s barely out of her nappies!’

“And the Boss and you was a year older than each other when he fell for you eh, Miss Smarty Pants?” she demanded, still cross.

That stopped me. Lucien was two decades ahead of me, at the least.

She went on, self-righteously, “Seems to me and a whole lot of folk, he snatched you from your cradle, that man did.”

I felt my face turn warm and I turned again to look out of the window.

Philippe was as always, standing guard. His eyes were riveted on the twins, Ria in particular. My little girl was sitting on the ground, in the sand pit, laughing her head off, dimpling, eyes shut as she and Claude covered Piers in the sand. She looked beautiful, a sun child, I thought wistfully. Paddy was doing his own thing, emptying sand over a pail in the pit.

And then it struck me; Philippe had not taken his eyes off her. He had the look of a star crossed youth as he stood, his arms hanging limply by his sides.

Understanding dawned on me.

Beatrice snorted as she followed my gaze.

“He sometimes got that look the Master have on his face when he looks at you,” she said slyly, her big frame rocking in laughter, hands on her hips,Upstodatee from Novel(D)ra/m/a.O(r)g

“What look ?” I asked absently before I could stop myself.

“Like he got the entire Thanksgivin’ turkey to hisself and don’t have to share!”

She chortled and Camille, who had appeared behind her, a baby in each arm, joined in the laughter as I turned pink. Behind her, Tadhana, who had turned up with a sheaf of papers, smiled smugly and the nurses with my third baby, smiled knowingly.

But I looked again at Philippe, who was watching Ria, oblivious to the devotion glowing in his soft brown eyes.

Was she right?