Mafia Don’s Secret Twins: Chapter 27

We can’t stay here forever.

Much as I’d be happy to just keep Marisol here, dry, warm, and completely isolated from the outside world, I know we need to move on. The rain is still coming down, and any minute the dirt floor is going to start to ooze, or the mud is going to come down the mountain and take us with it.

But, the image of her fainting?

That’s something that keeps me glued right here, where I can fuckin’ see her and hold onto her.

Where I can know that she’s safe, and that she isn’t going to collapse in the middle of the fucking jungle again.

The memory of that sends another chill through me, and I tuck her closer.

We’re both lying on the cot that was already in the little hut when we arrived. It’s tiny, cramped, and half of my body is hanging off the back, but fuck it.

I need to make sure she’s okay.

Hell.

I need to know that she’s okay, and the only way for me to do that right now is to just… touch her.

Marisol rolls in my arms, peering up at me. “You really see me as brave?”

I laugh softly. “Hell yes I do.”

“Why are you so…” she curls her lip, a mock-snarl that gives me the tiniest bit of joy.

Squeezing her close to me, I press a kiss onto her forehead. “Because, Marisol, I’m not gentle. I’m not sweet. It wouldn’t matter if you walked around fully armed to the teeth all the time. I’m proud of you and want the world to know you’re mine, so I’m gonna fuckin’ act like you’re mine, no matter how capable you are of taking care of yourself. Hell, I think it works even better because I know that if you ever need me, it’s because you really fuckin’ need me. I just want to be the man you need, even if I can’t be the man you deserve,” I murmur.

She frowns. “Who do I deserve?”

Possessiveness rumbles through my chest. “Don’t fuckin’ matter. I’m who you got.”

“Dino,” she scolds.

I sigh. “Fine. You deserve someone who can… walk into a room and not already have a beef with half the people in it. Someone who can fuckin’ write poetry or some shit. Someone who can wear a fucking suit and sit in a chair and create a world just for you to live in it.”

Marisol’s quiet just for a minute.

“That sounds like my dad.”

“What?”

She straightens, her brown eyes looking directly into mine. “You’re describing my dad. Or Marco, or Elio, if you’re not describing someone quite as vicious as Benicio.”

I frown.

Marisol sighs. “Dino, you’re who you are. I didn’t ask you to be Elio or Marco or my father… or yours,” she says softly. “I’ve had enough smooth-talking mafia men to last me a lifetime. I don’t want elegance and suits and all of that. I just want someone who sees me for who I am, and who chooses me. Someone that could look at the whole world, and every treasure or pleasure it offered, and turn them down to be with me.”

Fucking hell.

Her words make my heart ache.

I know how bad it feels to just… want someone to see you.

“I’ve had enough of people using me or trying to manipulate me. I’ve had enough of people assuming who I am. I’ve had enough of people looking at me and seeing something they want to see, instead of the real person I am,” Marisol says bitterly.

I lean forward, pressing my forehead to hers. “I see you, baby. I fuckin’ see you,” I whisper.

Marisol breathes, her shoulders shrugging like it’s a huge weight that’s gone from them.

I don’t know how long we lay there. Long enough, I guess, for both of us to fall asleep. When I wake up, the fire is low in the little hearth, and Marisol has her head tucked into my shoulder.

Seeing her there brings me so much joy it fuckin’ hurts.

I know that she says I don’t need to be anyone else. But, deeper than that, I still have a question that beats at my ribcage.

I don’t know who I am, either.

Her words resonated with me, but it picked at this scab, bringing it up until I can’t ignore it any longer.

How can Marisol choose me, out of anyone in the world, if I don’t have a fuckin’ clue who I am either?

My whole life, I’ve been whatever my brothers are not. If Marco was calm and collected, I was a fuckin’ mess. If Sal was smart and strategic, I was loud and ready to solve every fuckin’ problem with a hammer.

Even Caterina was the only person allowed to be kind. The only person I could picture being actually nice, in our fuckin’ shit-show of a family.

I’ve spent so much time trying to be just… different. Whatever that meant, whatever it took, didn’t matter. As long as I wasn’t like anyone in my family, I had done what I wanted to do.

Thinking about who I am, though, on my own?

Not a fuckin’ clue.

I know that I want Marisol. I know that she’s the perfect one for me, that I’ll never meet anyone like her.

But someday, she’s gonna figure out that I’m hollow.

There’s nothing inside me. The only thing that keeps me going, the only thing that’s driven me ever since I found out about the twins… it’s just her.

I don’t have anything to offer her. I can choose her all day, every day, but the outcome will be the same.

I don’t know if I’m a good father. I don’t know if I’d be a good husband for her.

Marisol can’t pick me, even if she wanted to.

Because me? The person I am?

It doesn’t fuckin’ exist without her.

And that shit scares me… more than it should.

When the sun starts to drift through the walls of the hut, Marisol sits up.

She looks down at me. “The rain. It stopped.”

Holy fucking shit.

It has.

We both scramble out of the cot.

Marisol puts her shoes back on, and the outer layers of the sweatsuit she had on finally dry from the fire. Cautiously, we head out into the forest, which is, in fact, a hell of a lot drier than it was.

“Brasilia isn’t meant to get this much rain,” Marisol says, surveying the scene around us. “It’s not the Amazon. We’re not supposed to have this.”

“Fuckin’ climate change, I guess,” I mutter.

We survey the scene in front of us.

It’s clear where there’s been a mudslide, or the rain has washed something away. The trees and landscape have clear scars on them, and the sun is bright in the spaces that have been left behind.

I blink.

Something moves at my side, and I startle.

“Easy,” Marisol murmurs. “I was just trying to hold your hand.”

My chest tightens, and I wrap my hand around hers.

“Why is your hand so small?” I mutter.

She gives me a little squeeze. “Who cares, Dino. It fits, doesn’t it?”

Her words make my mind go to a very different place.

This is not the fuckin’ time. We’re both covered in mud that’s probably toxic as hell. Marisol fainted, and neither of us has had any food for I don’t know how long.

But damn.

“Come on. Mind out of the gutter. We need to go,” she says.

“You don’t know what I was thinkin’,” I growl.

She laughs. It feels just as bright as the sunshine around us. “Yes, Dino. When you look at me like that, I know exactly what you’re thinking.”

I start walking.

The world around us is too quiet, especially when you’re used to a forest of sounds coming at you from every angle. When we hear the rumble of a truck, we both flinch.

“Hide,” I rasp, looking around for somewhere to tuck both of us.

Marisol nods, heading for the side of the road. She finds a fallen tree and crouches behind the roots, and I do my best to cover her with my body.

When the sound of a speaker screeches, we both jump.

I can’t speak Portuguese, but some kind of message is being blasted from the truck.

Beneath me, Marisol twitches, wiggling to get up. When I don’t let her, she looks up at me. “Dino. They’re from the government. My father would never have anything to do with them. They’re looking to rescue people and take them into town.”

“No,” I grunt.

The speaker blares again, the unfamiliar words clashing against my eardrums.

“Dino. Seriously. This could be our way to get back to the girls.”

The desperation in her voice makes my chest knot. “Marisol…”

“I’ll tell them that I’m pregnant. They’ll take us straight into town. Please,” she begs.

Fucking hell.

The word pregnant throws me off, and my brain is scrambled for a second.

“Please, Dino. Trust me,” Marisol whispers. “I know what I’m doing.”

Shit.

Even though everything in me is screaming to keep her hidden, she’s right.

Marisol is smart. She’s a fucking survivor.

And I need to trust her.

I straighten. She looks back at me, her face flooding with relief. “I’ll do all the talking.”

“That would be good,” I grunt.

She pauses for a minute, then scoops some mud off the ground and smears it on my tattoos on my neck. I raise an eyebrow, and she shrugs.

“Just in case. They’re not exactly subtle.”

I wish I could laugh at that.

Slowly, I follow Marisol over to the truck, which has paused as soon as she waved. She flags them down, a torrent of words coming out of her. She clutches her belly, then waves at me, maybe explaining something about why I don’t speak.

The soldiers don’t even blink.

We’re loaded into the truck, along with a couple of other people who are just as mud-soaked and fucked-up as we are. One of the soldiers smacks the side of the truck, which lumbers away…

Back down the road, toward the city.

I’m tense. I have no fucking clue who else is loaded into this thing, and I don’t want to make fuckin’ enemies or find someone who would give us right back to Benicio.

I might not have won the competition, but I don’t give a fuck about that.

I won the only thing I cared about, which was Marisol.

I’m staring out the side of the open truck when Marisol sits on my lap. She cuddles against me, her lips near my ear.

“No one here is going to hurt us, Dino.”

“Easy for you to say,” I grunt, trying to hide my mouth as well. I don’t know if it matters, but giving away that I only speak English is probably not a great way to keep a disguise.

“All these people were working the farms nearby when the mudslides happened. They’re in the same boat as us… just trying to get out of here.”

“Yeah, and what about when they pull your father and his men out of the mud and we’re fuckin’ fighting with them?”

“Benicio Souza lost us when we walked out,” Marisol whispers. “And the rest of them…”

She lets her voice trail off, and I sigh. I know what she means. Even if there are any men left alive, it’s going to be an all-out war to establish a new leader if Benicio…

“He might be dead,” she says softly.

Yeah.

That.

“How do you feel about that?”

“I don’t know,” she says honestly. “I really don’t.”

I nod.

I know what it’s like to have complicated feelings about your father, living or dead. I tuck her closer, resting my chin on her head.

You have no idea how to be a fuckin’ dad, man.

I don’t.

Marisol wants me to be the father of our children. But how am I supposed to do that when I have no fuckin’ clue how?

You can’t give her what she wants.

The truck rumbles down the hill, and the thoughts circle my mind like vultures.

Now that we made it out, I don’t know what I’m doing. Marisol is mine. I have her. She’s tucked safely in my arms, and we’re just two people trying to get dry and warm after a natural disaster. Right now, I have her.

But do I have what it takes to fuckin’ keep her?