Horrified that he'd even suggest such a thing, I tried to reassure him that I would make sure she never got anywhere near him. I offered to send her away. Swore to talk sense into her. I told him she was still mourning our son, that she just needed time. But all of my pleading fell on deaf ears. Even Luca, his own son and one of my best friends, couldn't talk him out of his decision. If I didn't do it, someone else would.
I went home that night and made love to my wife for hours, bringing her to orgasm over and over until she was sobbing and reaching for me. Only then did I take my own pleasure in her sweet body, fucking her like it was the last time I would ever be able to do so.
And then I got up from the bed, retrieved my gun from the top of the dresser, and I shot her in the center of her chest as she slept.
"You were mine," I told her as I held her hand in the ever-growing puddle of blood soaking my bare skin. "MINE. Why wouldn't you stop, Ale? Why couldn't you let it go?" I sniffed and started rubbing her arm. She was growing so cold and pale. "Caro, this was a war that would have no winner. It was a war we couldn't win. Why couldn't you see that? Why wouldn't you believe me? Even if I'd chosen you, we wouldn't have gotten away. We would both be dead now."
Perhaps that would be better, I thought as I pulled my wife's body up onto my lap. The sobs I couldn't hold back anymore wracked through me as I hunched over her as though I could protect her in death like I couldn't in life.
Three days later, dressed in my finest black Armani suit, I stood beside her open grave and watched as they lowered her body into the ground beside our son's. The funeral had been expedited. Luigi wanted this "mess" forgotten as soon as possible.
"At least she didn't suffer," Luca told me. "She didn't even know it was coming. It was better this way."
Yes, I knew this to be true. Luigi wasn't known to be a compassionate man, and he didn't appreciate the fact that I was unable to keep my wife under control. If I had refused to carry out his orders, he would've sent his men after her. And as much as it hurt me to do it myself, I couldn't stand the thought of another man's hands on her. Of someone else hurting her. And they would've hurt her in ways I couldn't even imagine. She'd threatened the boss's life. There was no other way this could've ended.
Luca's next words interrupted my grief. "Thank you."
"For what?" I asked him.
"For staying with me," he said. "I need you, Enzo. I'm glad you made the right decision."
"I'm not so sure that I did," I told him quietly as I watched people dressed in mourning clothes throw handfuls of dirt on Alessandra's coffin and begin to wander off. Back to their lives. Where they would tell each other what a shame it was that it had come to this as they went about their business like nothing had happened. Like my heart wasn't in pieces inside my chest, shattered by the weight of my sorrow and guilt. "If I was more of a man, I would've-"
He cut me off before I could finish the thought. "You would've been killed, along with Alessandra."
I turned to look at him, pulling off the sunglasses I wore to hide how fucked up I was inside. "At least I would be with my wife and son."
"And then what the fuck would I do without you, my friend? Huh?"
"You have Tristan."
"I do," he agreed. "And I have no doubt he would protect me with his life. But Tris is missing something inside of him, Enzo. We both know that. He follows my orders without question. But who will be around to talk me out of doing stupid shit when my temper gets out of control? Who'll be here to remind me there are other things that matter sometimes besides the business? To stop me from becoming my father?" He took my face between his hands and forced me to look at him. "I need you, Enzo. YOU. Don't you dare fucking leave me." His fingers tightened on the sides of my head. "Swear it to me."
But I couldn't. I couldn't make him a promise I wouldn't be able to keep. The guilt of what I'd done ate at my insides like worms. I was a coward. And a fool. I belonged in the ground with my family.
"I'm your family, too," Luca said quietly, knowing what I was thinking without my having to say it. "I was your family before you ever met Alessandra. And so was Tristan. Could you forgive yourself if you left me and something happened to one of us?"
His face blurred before me. "No," I admitted. And it was true. I'd never be able to rest in peace with the two of them still here.
"Then swear it to me," he said. "Swear you'll stay here with me always."
I blinked away the tears as the sound of mounds of dirt hitting Alessandra's coffin filled my ears. "I swear," I told him.
And I kept that oath. The days went by, gradually turning into months, and then into years. My grief for my wife and son never left me, but it did get easier to think about them over time. Luca saved my life that day. If he hadn't been there, I had no doubt I would've put my gun to my head right then and there and joined my wife in her grave. In return, I watched over his. And there was never anyone in my life who would make me regret my vow to him.
Until now.