Sempre (Forever) (69 page)

*  *  *  *

Rain splattered the window as it fell from the clouds hovering above. There was no sign of the moon or any stars, nothing but blackness. It was ominous, but it was fitting. It was how Haven felt on the inside.

Empty
.

She might have been taking oxygen into her lungs as her heart pushed blood through her body, but a part of her had stopped existing. It had been a slow, torturous death, agonizingly painful as she withered away from the knowledge that it had been her fault.

Glancing at the clock on the wall, Haven strained her eyes to make out the numbers. There was enough light for her to see the little hand was already past midnight, another day having begun.

She watched the rain for a while longer before a shadow moved, warning her someone was there. Carmine stood a few feet away, watching her. “I think we should go to sleep.”

Grabbing the book in her lap, she set it down on the table and hurried back to bed before he could say anything else. Carmine followed her and shut the door, pulling her body close to his when he climbed into bed.

“
Buon compleanno, mia bella ragazza
,” he said. “Happy Birthday.”

Chapter 43

Haven gazed across the room with blurry, tired eyes, seeing Carmine near the doorway. He held a small plate, a cinnamon bun on the center of it. A single blue candle stuck out from the top. Haven could smell the fresh pastry, a combination of spicy and sweet. Someone had just made them, and the subtle scent of something burnt told her who that was.

“You baked?” she asked, stunned.

He looked sheepish. “I wasn’t gonna attempt a cake. These damn things were hard enough. It took me forever to even figure out how to open the canister. I had to call Dia and ask.”

Haven smiled as he approached, her chest swelling with love to the point that it was painful. Despite everything, he was still her world, her one and only. Part of her may have felt dead, but there was still another part of her that lived for Carmine DeMarco.

“That’s sweet,” she said, taking the plate. “You didn’t have to. I told you—”

“I know what you told me,” he said, “but I can’t ignore your birthday. You’ve never had one before. It’s special, so no arguing, because it’s rude to argue when people wanna do shit for you. It’s like, punching a gift horse or something.”

She laughed. “Never look a gift horse in the mouth?”

Rolling his eyes, he reached into his pocket for a lighter and lit the candle. “Yes, that.
A caval donato non si guarda in bocca
. Just take it with a smile, and it’ll be over before you know it.” The moment he pulled his hand away, Haven blew out the flame. He laughed. “Eager, are we? Did you even make a wish?”

Her brow furrowed as he pulled the candle from the pastry. “Make a wish?”

“You make a wish before you blow out the candle,” he said. “It’s the whole point.”

“Oh, I didn’t know.”

“It’s all right. You’ll get another chance later with Dia.”

She tensed. “What did you say?”

“We’re gonna spend the night in Charlotte with Dia for your birthday. Come on, did you seriously think you’d get out of dealing with her? We’re pretty much her only friends.”

“But I didn’t want to make a big deal out of it.”

“I know, but it’ll just be the three of us.”

He looked at her imploringly, pleading for her not to argue.

“Okay,” she said. He continued to stare at her skeptically, and she realized she’d said the word he hated. “We can spend the day with Dia.”

Haven tore the cinnamon bun in half, sharing it with him. The bottom was black and hard to chew, but she said not a word about it as she ate her piece. Once Carmine was finished with his, he grabbed a gift bag from the floor. Taking it carefully, she pulled out the medium-sized glass frame with the foreign words printed inside the glass.

“It’s a selection of
La Vita Nuova
,” Carmine said. “It’s not much, but I didn’t know what else to give you, and I remembered you liked it.”

“It’s wonderful,” she said, trying to read the words, but she didn’t recognize a single one. “Thank you.”

He gave her a quick kiss before going to his room to take a shower. She took the plate down to the kitchen. She was straightening up a bit when Dr. DeMarco stepped out of the office underneath the stairs. “Good morning,
dolcezza
.”

“Good morning, Dr. DeMarco.”

He pinched the bridge of his nose. “You know you don’t have to address me so formally, child.”

“Yes, sir, but…” She trailed off and stared at him, not knowing how to explain it. He patiently waited for her to finish her thought, but his phone chimed before she had the chance.

“I have to take this,” he said, walking away.

Haven headed back upstairs, stepping into Carmine’s bedroom just as he was pulling on a pair of pants. Her footsteps faltered as her face heated with blush.

Carmine smirked, closing the distance between them. “There’s something I want to show you.”

He grabbed her hand and led her over to his desk, where he picked up a stack of papers. She took them from him. “What is it?”

“That,
tesoro
, is your life.”

Haven scanned the top paper, a certificate of citizenship, and tears formed when she saw her name and photograph. She flipped through the others as her emotions ran rampant, but they did nothing but confuse her. Wills, codicils, executors, beneficiary distribution, uniform transfers, custodians, residuary estate, fiduciary… it felt just as foreign as the poem he’d given her.

“What does all this mean?” she asked, holding up the packet of papers. “I don’t understand.”

“That’s your inheritance. It’ll take a few months before you see anything from it. Actually, it should’ve taken months for the rest of it, too, but Corrado somehow got it pushed through within a few days. I don’t know how he does it. Extortion, probably.”

She stared at him. “Inheritance?”

“Yeah, property and money and shit. I mean, I understand you’re not gonna wanna keep the house, but you can sell it or—”

“What?” she asked. “What house?”

He stopped speaking and looked at her with surprise. “Uh, the house in Blackburn.”

“Are you saying that house belongs to me?” He nodded, and she blinked a few times as she tried to absorb the information. “But what about their stuff?”

He shrugged. “It’s still there. You can take what you want and the rest you can throw away or donate to charity. Hell, if it were me, I’d burn it.”

Panic twisted her gut. “What about Clara? What happened to her?”

“They took her to Chicago.”

A naïve part of Haven had hoped she’d have gotten away.

“Anyway, everything will be yours,” Carmine said. “Corrado will put the money into a bank account.”

“I don’t want it,” she said. “I don’t want anything that belonged to those people.”

Frowning, Carmine grabbed her hand and pulled her to the bed. “Look, don’t think of it as them giving you anything, but after what you’ve been through, you deserve it. It’s like atonement. And I’m not saying any amount of money will make up for it, because it won’t. But after all of the torture and everything you lost, you’re at least entitled to this. Does that make sense?”

“Yes.”

“And money will help with these things,” he said, grabbing the papers in her hand and shifting them around so the citizenship certificate was back on top. “Now you have the means to follow your dreams.”

She smiled. “What happens to me now? I’m still here…”

“My father said you can stay here as long as you want, but you don’t have to.”

“But where else would I go?”

“Wherever you want,” he said. ”I told you that. California; New York; Timbuktu; Bum Fuck, Egypt… you name it, we’ll go.”

Tears streamed from her eyes, and she clutched onto the papers as her hands started to shake. Carmine pulled her down onto the bed as emotion took control and rocked her body in his embrace. Overwhelmed, she didn’t know what to think. “I don’t want to go anywhere without you, Carmine.”

“Good, because I’d miss you.”

They quietly stared at each other, his green eyes a flurry of emotion. He wiped the tears from her cheeks before his fingertips brushed across her lips. She let out a shaky breath as he kissed her.

She finally let go of the papers. They dropped to the bed as she ran her fingers through his unruly hair.

“
Ti amo
,” he whispered against her mouth before softly reciting parts of
La Vita Nuova
. Haven listened keenly, goose bumps springing up as the words wafted across her skin. He stumbled a bit on a sentence and paused before staggering words spilled from his lips. “
La mia bella ragazza
. I want you to marry me.”

She gasped. “
Marry
you?”

“I don’t mean today or tomorrow. It doesn’t even have to be this year or, fuck, next year. But someday, when you’re ready, promise you'll spend your life with me?” His words made her stomach flutter, stealing the breath from her lungs. “Look, I know I’m doing this shit all wrong, but—”

“Okay.” Her voice cracked. “Yes.”

He stalled. “Yes?”

She nodded. “Of course I will, Carmine!”

His face lit up as he smashed his lips to hers feverishly, and she laughed into his mouth, kissing him back. The outside world melted away in that moment as his hands roamed her body, his fingertips causing sparks to ignite across her skin. Electricity. Static. Chemistry. Lightning. “I need you, Haven.”

“You have me,” she said without thinking twice. Knowing she was free and had a life of her own, and that despite everything she’d been in the past, he still wanted her for the future, made her insides burst into flames of passion. She never wanted to lose that moment when she finally felt like a real person… when she finally felt
alive
.

*  *  *  *

It was early evening when Carmine pulled into a parking lot across from the dingy brick apartment building in the city. The old elevator vibrated as it took them to the sixth floor, and they headed down a narrow hallway to apartment sixty-seven.

Carmine reached up to knock, but the door was pulled open before he could. Dia stood before them, wearing a pair of ripped jeans and a blue top, her hair a mixture of black and purple streaks. “Happy birthday!”

She ushered them inside, and Haven froze the moment she stepped foot into the front room. The walls were a cream color, the paint barely visible due to the hundreds of photographs wallpapering every inch. The apartment was decorated in vibrant colors, so bright that the large bunch of birthday balloons almost blended in. There were presents with them and a small, round birthday cake.

Gratitude and guilt battled for control. “You shouldn’t have.”

“Don’t be a buzz-kill,” Dia said, pulling her over to the table. Haven sat down as Carmine leaned against the wall and gazed at her.

Dia stuck candles into the cake and lit them, stepping off to the side to belt out the birthday song. Haven stared at the flickering flames for a moment, remembering to make a wish this time.

Please, she silently pleaded. Bring my mama back to me.

Taking a deep breath, Haven blew out the candles and watched the puffs of smoke rise from the smoldering wicks. Dia pulled them out before thrusting a present at her, making her flinch.

“Sorry,” Dia said quickly. “Didn’t mean to freak you out. I’m just excited for you to see it.”

Haven opened the package and pulled out a small copper box with a glass window on the top of it. Inside the window was a four-leaf clover, along with red hearts and shiny silver beading.

“It’s a reliquary box,” Dia said. “You’re supposed to store your favorite things in it.”

She smiled. “I don’t think Carmine will fit.”

“Yeah, I don’t think so, either,” Carmine said, chuckling. “Not even my dick would fit in that thing.”

There were more presents to open, and afterward they ate the cake. The three of them watched movies and listened to music all night, the evening feeling more like a regular day than a celebration. Haven felt ridiculous for her anxiety over it all, grateful to be able to relax with friends.

Friends
. It was still so surreal to her that she had people in her life that she could call friends.

“So, have the two of you thought about what you’re doing next year?” Dia asked eventually. “I’m guessing you’re not going to be staying in Durante much longer.”

Haven glanced at Carmine, who just shrugged. “We haven’t decided. We talked about California or maybe New York, but it doesn’t matter to me. If she married me, I’d follow her to the gates of Hell.”

Dia had been taking a drink but choked on it, spraying soda all over herself. Coughing, she threw her hands into the air. “I can’t believe I just heard that.”

Carmine’s brow furrowed. “What?”

“You talking about marriage.”

“Whatever. I never thought I’d do the shit, either. I’m just glad she agreed. With my luck, I thought she’d laugh in my face.”

“Excuse me? Did you just say she agreed?”

“Yes.”

“You proposed?” Dia jumped up and grabbed Haven’s hand. “Where’s the ring?”

Carmine groaned. “I didn’t have one.”

“Did you at least get down on one knee?” she asked. Carmine shook his head, and she smacked him on the arm. “What kind of freaking proposal was that?”

“It wasn’t a real one,” he said. “I just asked if she’d marry me someday.”

“That’s even worse!” Dia reached out to hit him again, but he was prepared that time and dodged the blow.

“Shit, stop hitting me. It’s not like I planned it. It just came out.”

She shook her head. “All the planning you put into Valentine’s Day, and you completely blow the proposal.”

He opened his mouth to respond, but Haven chimed in before he could. “He didn’t blow it. I don’t need any of that stuff.”

Carmine smirked. “See, Warhol? I didn’t fuck up.”

“You still could’ve gotten down on one knee.”

Carmine chuckled. “Well, I may have gotten between her knees, if you know what I mean.”