Chapter 35: Chapter 35

After undressing in the bedroom, I tiptoed into the adjoining bathroom and turned on the warm water in the shower, only seconds later stepping into the cubicle.

My thoughts raced, dragging me back and forth so that nothing seemed clear. I had the second man on my conscience now, even though I wasn't the one who pulled the trigger, I still had her blood on my hands.

This feeling was pure disgust and I immediately turned the water on a little hotter, as if the steam that then filled the cabin around me could take the dirt from my soul. But he didn't.

I had to take care of myself and that's what I wanted to do now. The doctor was right. There was no point in letting myself go, it would just put me back in the hospital and I wanted to avoid that at all costs.

Almost compulsively, I soaped myself completely several times and washed my hair several times before enjoying the hot water on my naked body and looking down to watch the suds being pushed down the drain by the running water.

While I wasn't feeling any better, I've certainly been in the shower for well over an hour and my skin was starting to feel like it was starting to melt, so I turned off the water in frustration and suddenly heard something that made me hold my breath and listen.

Surprised and amazed, I opened the cabin and looked at the door, through which came the soft tones of an old Italian song. It was more of a wedding song and I shakily got out of the shower to quickly grab one of the white robes and sneak to the door.

Basically, I wanted to know immediately where this music was coming from in the middle of the night, but I hesitated because I was also kind of nervous about what would be waiting for me behind the door. What if it was Dario who confessed his love to me?

"Nonsense," I whispered to myself, rolling my eyes at my own naivety and shaking my head to take a deep breath and then slowly open the door.

The room was dark, just as I had left it earlier. Only the moon and a few candles lit up the room, so I recognized Gino perfectly, who was standing next to the bed, naked on top and with his black trousers on the bottom, with his back turned to me.

I glanced at the small radio on the bedside table playing the Italian music until Gino's dark voice drew my attention again.

"You said you like listening to music," he said, somewhat nervously, slowly walking towards me to stop right in front of me, staring into my eyes.

And already I was somewhat reassured that he wasn't lying dead in some ditch or wasting away in jail, so that my anger, the concern in my emotions, immediately overwhelmed me.

"You're a bloody idiot!" I blurted out and while he looked at me in disbelief, as if he didn't even know why I was angry in the first place, I slapped his arm several times in anger. "You just left me alone! I needed you!"

"Amore mio, I had to do this alone," he defended himself in a soft voice and I sighed in disappointment before looking at him with folded arms.

"Then you could have taken me with you!"

"Certainly not," he suddenly smiled. "You cry every chance you get and I don't want to have to take you to the hospital again. Do you really think I'll just take you with me when I go to dispose of a body like it's a fucking walk?"

"I don't always cry!" I snapped and after he just raised an eyebrow and grinned, I suddenly noticed that he was holding a small box in his hands. Startled by this, I glanced at the candles on the bedside table again and listened to the song until I looked at it again with wide eyes.

"Gino. what's that?" I asked uncertainly, pointing to the box, which made him smirk in amusement and gently took my hand in his.

"You wanted to protect me without thinking about what would happen. Now I know why you did it. Knows from Nunzio that a police officer must be after us. No one has ever done that for me in my life done," he explained calmly, constantly looking into my eyes, which, overwhelmed by these words, filled with tears again. "See, you're already crying-"

"Shut up," I cut him off, wiping away individual tears with a smile on my lips while his eyes began to sparkle with pride.

"You deserve only the best and I hope that someday I can be that for you, Ludovica Mancini."

He opened the box in his hand and I gaped and held my breath at the so shiny, beautiful ring as he took it out and tossed the box aside on the bed.

"It has an engraving," he said proudly and I took it carefully in my slightly trembling hands to look at it excitedly until I discovered the words "piccola anatra" and my whole face began to shine.

It doesn't matter if Dario was there for me, nobody had ever done that for me. I had never listened to anyone since my parents passed away. Nobody had ever shown me that they liked me the way I was, but Gino did, with all my faults and quirks.

"Gino," I whispered, looking up at him gratefully. "Please promise me you'll never leave me alone with my feelings again. Promise me you'll be there if I need you."

He seemed thoughtful about my request and ran his hand through his black hair before giving me an apologetic look.

"I'm honest Ludo, I know how I am and that I'm far from perfect. There will certainly be many moments where I will behave wrongly or even selfishly, so I can't promise you something like that, but I can I can promise you is that I will always do my best to behave like a husband to you."

His eyes fixed me and he seemed visibly nervous about what I was going to say to that and I was more than overwhelmed myself. There was still so much between us and in the end I hardly knew him. But when I was drunk, I couldn't wait to be with him. When he got into a fight, I was willing to do anything to protect him. Add to that the jealousy that got hold of me, and I kept feeling it felt when these half-naked women were near him.

Was that a sign that I was in love?

"So?" he interrupted my thoughts, putting his hands on my waist. "Are you accepting my real proposal. Without any compulsion. I don't want to have to think anymore if you're just putting up with all this because my father is forcing you to, amore mio."

Tenderly, he stroked the fabric of the bathrobe and only stopped with his hand when he gently placed it on my cheek.

I took a deep breath, trying to block out all thoughts but him and looked down at the really beautiful ring, which I then held out to him without expression.

"Take him please," I said seriously and immediately he looked at me almost in panic, so I started to giggle softly. "You have to put it on me, tesoro," I added with a cheeky grin and he immediately exhaled in relief and took the ring to carefully put it on my finger.

"You're going to kill me," he whispered with a grin and after the ring fit like a glove on my finger, Gino pulled me jerkily by the waist to put his lips on mine demandingly.

"If you just send me away again, that could really happen," I retorted between our kisses and he laughed out loud before giving me a raised eyebrow.

"But you should learn to shoot first," he joked amused and I rolled my eyes at his arrogance.

"Then teach me."

I gave him a defiant wink and somehow all the burden and all the worries seemed to have blown away. The flickering of the candles. this quiet Italian music and the ring on top of that. I felt like I was in a movie. A really cheesy movie and I have to admit I liked it. That moment was burned into my mind and I wanted to hold on to it forever.

"I'd love to, anatra! Anything you want!"

Staring at the ring on my finger, I stood in front of the bedroom mirror and reflected on my life, which had changed quite a bit in a short amount of time.

It had been three weeks since Gino had actually proposed to me, so to speak. Three weeks in which I completely avoided Dario and only focused on myself. I started to pay more attention to myself and my health again, so I almost exclusively pursued my own interests.

In the evenings, as soon as Gino drove to the club, I read a lot of books alone in our bedroom, while in the afternoon I mostly went for walks in the large area and enjoyed the Palermo sun.

My fiancé even got me my first car of his own.a white BMW to match his black one, although I still had a few driving lessons to go. But he believed in me and also that I would pass the exam without any problems.

We also went to the beach together a few times, spent a lot of time getting to know each other and Nicolo and Enzo became more and more like my family.

Of course, Gino and I continued to fight almost every day, because his work in the nightclub got on my nerves at times, just as his jealousy seemed to be getting worse and worse. Where initially he wanted me to wear skimpy clothes, now they had become a red rag to him, just like any other man around me.

He almost poked a security guard in the eye with a fork just for watching me in a bikini by the pool.

But together with Enzo I was able to stop him from robbing this guy of his sight. However, he was released on the same day.

Despite everything, we always got back together quickly and the reconciliations that we mostly made out in bed were all the nicer.

With a smile on my face and a tingling in my stomach, I turned to the bed and watched Gino still sleeping soundly. No wonder if he had worked again until this morning.

I walked slowly towards him in my long black dress, gently stroked one of his black strands from his forehead and gave him a kiss, and then quietly disappeared from the room downstairs.

My feeling of being here had also changed. It was starting to feel like home and even Giovanna left me completely alone, which was probably partly due to the fact that Dario was hardly around and she had to take care of the upcoming wedding all by herself. Most of the time she ran around the house like a frightened chicken and bossed the poor maids around. It still annoyed me how disrespectful she was to others, but I didn't interfere. The thought that she might have had something to do with the shot at me still existed and I wanted to have as little to do with her as possible.

Then there was the question of what was going on down there in the basement and the question of whether the policeman was still out for revenge. These questions still bothered me. I tried skillfully to block them out, though, just as I did now, arriving in the entrance hall and glancing at the locked door under the stairs.

"Good morning," Nunzio tore me out of my thoughts and I turned to him with a friendly smile, who was just coming in the front door with Nicolo.

"Good morning," I greeted them both and immediately ran to Nicolo to stare at him questioningly. "And?"

He pulled down the hood of his blue sweater and smirked and ran a hand through his light brown hair before looking at me and winking.

"Passed!"

"Ohhh," I said immediately and pulled him into a short hug. "About time," I added and broke away from him again, while Nunzio now fixed me and demanded my full attention.

"I hope you pass the first time, not like him," he laughed and nodded towards Nicolo, who only gave him the middle finger and disappeared past me into the living room. We stared after him, grinning, until Nunzio cleared his throat and I looked back at him.

"How's Gino?"

"He's still asleep. Why are you asking?" I asked, since Nunzio looked kind of worried, which I found really unusual.

"Just so. He had a pretty bad headache last night."

"No wonder," I rolled my eyes. "With all the smoke and the loud music, I'd have a headache too. How much longer is that supposed to go on?"

"What?" Nunzio asked with a confused expression, looking down at me.

"Well, with the nightclub. I mean, you could do it, then he could do something else," I explained, really hoping my fiancé wouldn't have to keep working with all those whores.

"It's his club, Ludo. He's also responsible for the prostitutes. I have nothing to do with it and to be honest, be glad that he doesn't have anything to do with gun deals like Dario does. You'd sleep even more shitty at night."

I rolled my eyes again and suddenly had to giggle at my own thoughts.

"He could also work something normal. Taxi driver or something," I threw in amused and jumped when Gino's voice suddenly sounded behind me.

"Sure, I don't have anything better to do than push ungrateful people around either," he laughed, wrapping his arms around my waist from behind to plant gentle kisses on my shoulder. "I missed you in bed, anatra," he whispered excitedly in my ear, and with my eyes on Nunzios, I blushed and turned embarrassed to Gino, who looked so sleepy and just too sexy with his messy hair.

"Then you should have woken up earlier," I replied with a provocative grin and he immediately grabbed my hair to pull me tight, causing our lips to meet with a passion that immediately took over everything in me.

"I . I'll be at Nicolo's then," I heard Nunzio behind me and listened to his footsteps, while Gino pulled me even tighter and conquered my mouth stormily with his tongue. My legs became wobbly and, taken completely by surprise, I grabbed my hands on his shoulder to avoid falling backwards from his dominance.

"Let's go upstairs, la mia bellezza," he breathed into my mouth in a dark voice, and when his dark eyes literally pierced mine, I immediately felt this intense tingling in my abdomen and would have loved to surrender to his body, but I had an hour's drive and didn't want to be late. Especially since Enzo paid for these hours for me.

"I can't," I replied apologetically, and he immediately raised an eyebrow at me.

"Why?" he wanted to know and ran his hand over his face once to look at me expectantly.

"Driving school."

He narrowed his eyes at me and then rolled his beautiful eyes in annoyance to let out a frustrated breath.

"If you weren't busy with your club at night, we would certainly have more time," I said in response to his reaction, but he seemed kind of irritated by it. I had brought up the subject of clubs and whores too often lately and while he had initially calmly explained to me that it was a family business and that I had to accept it, the more often I brought it up, the angrier he became.

"This topic again?" he asked and at the same time turned around to precede me to the kitchen.

"Yes, and this topic will continue to be in-"

I opened my eyes in shock and gasped when I heard a loud bang, from which I couldn't even place where it came from or what had triggered it at first.

Insanely I ran towards Gino and yanked at his black shirt to make sure it wasn't a bullet until he took my chin and gave me a serious look.

"What are you doing there?"

"Didn't you hear that?!" I asked in a panic, looking at him for help while he stared behind me, seemingly unimpressed.

I turned around too and through the wide archway saw Dario in the hallway, his white shirt stained with blood.

"Somebody probably didn't do what my brother wanted," I heard Gino whisper behind me in amusement and I was always amazed at how indifferent he was to the subject of death. How could everyone stay so calm about something like this?

As Dario disappeared from view, I turned my eyes to Nicolo and Nunzio, who were sitting on the large couch in perfect stillness, staring at the TV. Either they hadn't noticed at all, or I really was the only one whose heart was racing uncontrollably at the thought of what was going on down in the basement.

"Shall I pick you up from the driving school? I have something to do and I would like to have you with me."

I heard Gino, who was now standing at the coffee machine, but I was still recovering from the image that Dario had just shot someone. How I wanted to ask him if he was okay. How he was handling everything, but I had vowed to stay away from him, so I took a deep breath and looked over at Gino, who met my gaze immediately..

"Sure, gladly," I answered him, slowly walking towards him. "What do you have to do?"

"Just collecting debts," he retorted, and I immediately frowned in irritation as he handed me a cup.

"Isn't that what Nunzio actually does?"

"Yeah, but not today," he smiled and kissed my forehead before walking past me with his coffee. "I'm going to train some more. See you later, baby."

He disappeared out of the lane door and walked past the pool to the pool house, where there were several machines for exercising, while I wondered why I should go with him when he was going to collect debts..