Uno
I
The very first time their parents’ friend showed the little girl to them, just for the first time since she had come to earth half an hour ago, safe in the man’s arms, they immediately fell in love with her, as old as they were. Two of them, Livio and Matteo, were four and one, Silvan, was five years old. Too young to understand, but not too young to feel that they wanted to be around her.
The man, Ciro, sat down on one of the chairs just outside his wife Grace’s room so they could get a better look at her. Silvan carefully held out his finger to gently stroke the little fingers first. He looked in amazement at the tiny nails and looked up into Ciro’s eyes who winked at him. “Small, huh?” He nodded and looked again at the sleeping face with the little nose. Silvan held out another finger to stroke the cheek.
“Be careful for her eyes, won’t you, sweetheart,” warned his mother, Franchesca. He nodded quietly, impressed. His friends, they were like brothers, fratelli, also approaching and carefully mirroring his movements.
Rarely had their parents seen them handle anything so carefully, except for the animals on the estate. Other than that, all three boys were real boys. They always came home covered in mud and stained grass, were always wandering with the three of them, jumped over ditches, splashed in the shallow river that ran through the estate, made car tracks and there wasn’t a tree that hadn’t been climbed yet.
“It’s a beautiful baby… how is Grace?” Franchesca put her arm around her daughter Sophia to pull her a little closer so she could see too, but Sophia looked bored and didn’t like it much. She was the eldest child of the four friends and was already feeling quite a bit. She was eleven years old and was already interested in boys and not with babies or dolls, something that worried her father Raul greatly.
“All right, they’re fixing her up a bit now. I’ll go right back in.”
“Beautifully done, Ciro,” Raul admired, as he, Gian, Matteo’s father and married to Maria, and Vico, Livio’s father - his wife had left after Livio’s birth with the man she said she really loved - came closer to the little girl.
Needless to say, someone who left their famiglia couldn’t tell the tale. They had never been able to find his wife’s lover, reason enough to believe he didn’t exist. Her last lovers, something that had shocked him greatly, could be traced back to a few months into her pregnancy. For a moment there was still a doubt whether Livio was his. Thank God he did, he was crazy about the little man ever since the nurse had put him in his arms.
But what had possessed his wife? Postpartum depression? Don’t feel like taking care of a child? Knowing that if she wanted to leave the family, she had to have a good reason to survive leaving. They couldn’t afford to let go of a wife of one of the top executives without losing face. Also because of the chance that she passed on secrets.
By saying that she was going to another man, she had signed her death warrant. Was that what she had wanted? It had hurt more than he cared to admit to himself, although a part of him was immediately relieved of his love for her when she said she was leaving and why. Especially when he found out that she had been cheating for some time. But she had given him Livio, and he was grateful for it every day.
“I’d like to know what big name you’ve given to the little thing,” Vico asked, shaking off his thoughts, crouching on his knees beside his son. He looked at Livio. “What do you think of her?”
“Beauuutful,” he said shyly, dragging the word, with a puzzled look at the girl. She yawned very cutely and opened her eyes. Out of focus, but it already looked like she was looking at the boys. Their mouths fell open and they let out a glorified sigh.
“How sweet she is, how beautiful eyes she has ,” sighed Matteo, “too bad it’s not a boy. How long will it take before she can play football?” Ciro burst out laughing.
“That will take a while, but that doesn’t mean you can’t play with her. Just baby games like peek-a-boo.”
“I remember Silvan laughing a lot when Sophia went dancing. Do you remember, Sophia?“, Raul tried to get his daughter a little more enthusiastic. The face that had been grumpy lately now made an effort to suppress a laugh at the memory. Fortunately, he thought with an inwardly relieved smile, she is not entirely indifferent. Puberty started early. “But then is eh... now tell us the name of that beautiful daughter of yours, Ciro?”
“Bianey.” They repeated the name and tasted it on their tongue.
“Nice, man,” Gian said, “does it mean anything?”
“White, pure.”
“I wonder if you can keep her like this for long,” Vico chuckled, “if she starts to look like your wife, you’ll have your hands full with her.”
“Hey! What do you mean by that?”
“Um, oh, no, no not like that, man. I mean Bianey’s mom is a beauty. Just like Maria and Franchesca.” They laughed loudly and Ciro talked to the boys again who couldn’t get enough of the little girl. He put a hand on Livio’s shoulder, ruffled Silvan’s black hair and patted Matteo’s cheek.
“I’m going to take her back to her mother, men.” They nodded, as small as they were, with a regretful expression on their faces.
“When can we see her again?” asked Silvan, always the one who took care of his younger fratelli and took them in tow.
“If all goes well, I can take Bianey and her mom home in a few hours. Then you’ll come and have a look tomorrow, won’t you? Mama Franchesca is going to take care of mama Grace and Bianey, so you can ask her when it’s a good time. As long as you don’t wake her up, I will always allow you to come and see her.” All three of them nodded well behaved.
Ciro stood up with the little bundle in his arms, all eyes on him and the girl, tender smiles on the lips of the friends.
He walked into the room where Maria and Franchesca were waiting for him. They had already gone to see Grace. “Your sons are already crazy about our daughter, ladies. Now already,” he chuckled with a loving glance at his wife and then again at the little sleeping bundle, before laying her down with his wife. “Are you okay, Tesoro?” Ciro pressed a kiss to her slightly swollen, tired face, but her eyes were shining.
“Yes, now I am again. The best in my life close to me.” She looked at the little girl close to her and then up into the beautiful, sometimes almost black devilish eyes of her great love. She briefly put her hand on his cheek. “Did we go unnoticed, or you know?”
Grace had grown up in America in the same kind of family as she was now married into, well aware of the dangers of being powerful and wealthy. In America she wanted to be more distanced, to live a safer life. But when her family wanted to work with a family in Italy and her parents thought that she and her brother should come along so that the family could see that they were just as attached to the traditions and that they had their family well under control, she went with them to Italy, with the thought that it was the last thing she would ever do. She was a goldsmith and that was her passion, not to become a donna of some Italian family.
But she had never been there before and was in the mood for a holiday in the sun. She ran into Ciro and never left. Still as crazy and in love with him as when she first saw him three years ago. Although she didn’t want to give in to it. After all, she had other plans. Her parents saw how he looked at her and decided to give him a hand. Their efforts paid off, and now she didn’t want to think about having to miss him.
Fortunately, he encouraged her in her passion and she had received an entire studio as a wedding present. She did make it clear that she would kill him if he ever cheated. Something that is not very strange in these families. Ciro had chuckled and said that he had his hands full with such a feisty woman as her and no energy for anyone else. In reality, he had been totally smitten when he saw her. Hair shining like an aura, lips asking to be kissed and eyes shining like stars in the night. But he found her feisty, tough and very contradictory sweet character even more attractive to him.
With the help of her parents, he had been able to melt down her dismissive attitude, to stay in technical terms for love. And he still thought she was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. As she lay there, hair raging wildly around her, even though one of their friends had probably already combed it, with their daughter against him, cheeks blushing and both tired after their hard work, he felt like the happiest man on earth.
He only wanted to solve the worried look in her eyes for her. Ciro took her hand and looked reassuringly into her light, gray eyes. “The birth of an employee’s daughter, even though she is one of my best friends and we know that they are much more than that, is not interesting for the press. If you can go home and have your wig on, no one will notice that we have been here. And if it is, I’ll say it was for me.”
“Just saying you were for research to see if you’re capable of fathering children,” Maria joked. Ciro looked at her with horror.
“So no, huh.”
“It’s an idea,” said Grace, “they won’t expect her.” She nodded to Bianey. “By the way, what do you think of the name?”
“Very pretty,” Franchesca said, stroking her finger over the soft cheek. Maybe she should give Raul a sweet look again.
“Vico had a nice comment just now,” Maria revealed.
“Oh, tell me.” Ciro shook his head in warning, but she only chuckled.
“The dork reacted when he heard what the name meant by saying that he was curious how long she would stay pure with you as a mother.” Grace’s eyes widened and her cheeks grew even redder. She looked at Ciro in shock and shook her head.
“He didn’t mean it that way,” Maria felt obliged to help Vico, “but since you are so beautiful just like us. Saying that to try to save himself.” Grace giggled.
“Just the thing for Vico. Luckily, I know who said it.” She grabbed with her free hand, her husband’s. “You know I only want you, don’t you?” She looked at him a little anxiously.
“Of course, Tesoro, you know that about me too, don’t you?” She nodded and pulled his hand so that he would bend over and she could finally kiss him on the mouth.
The gynecologist, a nurse and the pediatrician came in. They looked at Grace and again at Bianey and said if she could go to the toilet she could go home. Grace didn’t know how quickly she had to give her daughter to one of her friends and let Ciro and the nurse help her out of bed and to the bathroom. When she came out, Ciro asked, “Are you ready, sweetheart?” She nodded, and Ciro helped his wife put on a wig that resembled Maria and Franchesca’s dark hair.
Maria, who was about the same height as Grace, was given the dark blonde wig. As crown princess of the heirs of a very powerful mafia Don, she had to be protected for as long as possible. Franchesca was the maternity nurse so Maria was the one who had given birth and they had the same dark brown wig made as Maria’s curly shoulder-length hair. She, in turn, put on a wildly wavy blonde wig that touched her waist. Ciro looked at his wife. Even with this dark hair, she was gorgeous. Her gray eyes seemed to stand out even more now.
“It looks great on you both,” Franchesca complimented the women, “maybe you should paint it sometime.”
“Don’t think so,” said Ciro and Gian at the same time, who had entered the room with Vico and Raul when they heard that Grace and Bianey were allowed to go home. The small room echoed with their laughter.
“Ready?“, Ciro asked again, looking at his wife inquisitively. She nodded decisively.
“Let’s go home.”
“Our idea,” Raul said.
They managed to get out of the hospital safely and unseen through a back exit where the secured cars were already there, with impatiently waiting little boys. The only difficult thing for Grace was that she wasn’t in the car with Ciro, but she had her girl with her and it was for a good cause. It was exciting for a while because just before the exit onto the main road outside the city, it seemed as if the car Ciro and Maria were in was being followed. Their wonderful driver managed to shake them off, but they were a bit spooked. It was nothing strange, it happened regularly, but now it had a somewhat heavier load.
Everyone sighed a sigh of relief as they drove onto their high-security estate.
Franchesca helped them settle in for a while and left the three of them to instruct the staff together with her amante Raul and their friends.
