(Filippo Valentini)
“You look stunning!” I compliment her as I feel my pants tighten.
“Easy boy, it’s not time to rip that dress that’s getting in the way of our view yet.” – I mentally speak to my member that is tightening inside my pants with just the sight of her.
Renata comes parading towards me, a black bonded dress draws all her curves, the neckline is not very revealing, but the little bit of exposed skin is enough to make me salivate and want to stick my face back in between those two round, soft pillows. I move my view down to the bottom of the dress and notice the medium slit in the side of the dress that leaves from the knee down exposed, her hair is loose.
“Thank you!” Renata speaks, smiling shyly.
I extend my arm to her and she accepts, and we leave the house.
I’m trying to keep calm, I really don’t want to take her, but I can’t deal with her coldness, I can already imagine the headache I’ll have when I get there: my mother will fill us with questions, she will surely get angry that I didn’t tell her I was dating and fill Renata with the talk about us having children, even though she knows I can’t have a child with a woman who is not married to me, we can’t have bastards in the family.
Yesterday, I felt very bad knowing that she acted that way because she thinks I am ashamed of her, she is the most beautiful woman I have ever had in my arms and I doubt very much that one day I will feel something similar for another woman. I tried to demonstrate to her how perfect her body is by kissing and sucking her all over. Since I don’t want to cause any future problems for her, I had sex with her using condoms, if she takes too many pills she could become sterile and in the time that we’ve been together I can already tell that she wants to have children.
“A dollar for your thoughts.” Renata’s voice brings me out of my reveries.
“That my girl will attract more attention than the bride,” I say without looking at her, keeping my gaze fixed on the road.
“You looked worried.”
“My mother, she will be there.” Warning.
“Ah, so I’m meeting my mother-in-law today,” Renata smiles, making my heart heavy. Even if I wanted to, my mother would never be her mother-in-law. This courtship of ours is fake, even if only I know it, but I can’t help feeling bad that it has to be this way.
My heart chose her, my body did too, since I have laid my eyes on Renata, I have not seen any other woman, for the first time in my life, I feel that I like someone. Yesterday, I ended up whispering to her, I hope she didn’t listen. Although I said I thought I loved her, I can’t say that for sure, I have never been as interested in a woman as I am to this day in her.
“Don’t get mad if my mom starts talking about us having kids, okay?”
“Does your mother want to have grandchildren?” She asks.
“Yes,” I answered.
“I imagine that for her the more the better, right? How many nephews and nieces do you have?”
“None, my brothers don’t have any children either, so she gets on my case,” I reveal.
“Maybe one day we’ll give her one,” she says smiling.
“We won’t, we’ll never have children,” I try not to sound so rude, but I don’t think it worked. Renata’s bright face instantly faded, her smile died, and she turned her face to the window. “Unfortunately,” I whisper to myself, I would like her to carry my children, but the only woman who will be able to do so is the woman my brother decides I should marry.
After twenty minutes, we get out of the car and hand in hand we enter the property of the Onore mafia, the head of the Rafaelli family, the current Don: Marcos Rafaelli, receives us.
“Welcome, Filippo!” The old man speaks with a smile, but breaks it off as soon as he sees my unfriendly face. – Who are you?
“I am Renata Pellegrini, and you are?” She speaks gently, and I can see that the smile on her face is forced.
“You can just call me Marco,” He extends his hand to her. “Come, come in.”
The old man speaks, entering and guiding us inside. As we get close to the chairs out of tune with my family, the first thing I see is my mother’s smile opening from ear to ear.
“Figlio!” – “Son!”, my mother gets up and hugs me, as my mother doesn’t speak English, we only communicate in Italian: “Only this way to see you, boy!”
“How are you, Mom?” I hug you and back.
“I’ll be much better off if you give me the news that this young lady is expecting a grandchild of mine,” Mine says, looking at Renata.
“I… am not pregnant, ma’am,” Renata answers with a slow voice. I know she is sad because of my words.
“You guys are giving too much ball to a luxury escort, aren’t you?” Alisa, my third cousin on my father’s side, speaks up, rolling her eyes.
In some families it is common for third cousins to get married. Alisa is fifteen and has decided to marry me, even though I assured her that it would never happen, that she should feel disgusted because I am old enough to be her father.
“She is my girlfriend,” I say, and hug Renata around the waist.
“You cannot date any woman other than the one chosen for…”
“Alisa!” Vincent calls her attention to him in a warning tone, and she immediately shuts up. “Bella ballerina, forgive her rudeness. Alisa is just a fifteen-year-old girl who doesn’t know what she’s talking about,” Vicenzo extends his hand and shakes Renata’s, who smiles at him.
“That’s fine,” Renata replies.
“You are a very beautiful girl, dear, my name is Luna, I’m your boyfriend’s mother,” my mother says and pulls Renata from my arm to hug her.
“Very nice to meet you, Mrs. Luna,” Renata speaks kindly, and this time she doesn’t smile yellow.
I don’t know whether to be relieved or afraid, I didn’t expect my mother to accept me having a girlfriend, I know she is crazy to have a grandchild, so crazy that she even wants to bend the rules and make me have a bastard child. But, I never imagined that she would accept a courtship.
“Just Luna, dear.” She speaks smiling gently at Renata. “Come, sit down, in a moment the bride will enter.” Luna takes Renata’s hand and makes her sit next to her.
I sit next to Renata and Alisa leaves Vicenzo’s side to sit next to me, she starts rubbing her leg against mine making me pissed.
“Alisa!” My mother now gets your attention. “Sit down where you were.” She commands, but Alisa just turns her face away. “Will I really have to punish you?” Luna asks in a threatening tone, making Alisa tense up and quickly move away from me. I sigh relieved, this girl is too annoying, I just never did any harm to her because she is my cousin.
The women have to follow the hierarchy among themselves. Alisa is not the wife of any boss and my mother, besides being her aunt, is the widow of the former Dom and mother of the current one, that is, she is now the second in command among the women, the first is Lais, Matteo’s wife who cannot come because she is hospitalized, with the loss of her last child, she is very weak.
“Where is Matteo?” Renata asks, and for some reason, the fact that she misses him here makes me jealous.
And another fact, I need to be careful when speaking in Italian around her. Renata is improving her Italian and now talks without difficulty to my mother. I didn’t even see her studying.
“Oh, there he is, dear.” My mother points to the entrance of the hall.
Everyone present gets up, Matteo enters holding our cousin’s arm, she is Alisa’s older sister, and since their father is already dead, Matteo is the one who will take them.
“The bride looks beautiful!” Renata speaks in admiration as Giovanna and Matteo walk down the aisle.
As soon as Matteo shakes the groom’s hand and hands it to our cousin, the bridal march ends, everyone goes back to their seats. The bride and groom kneel before the priest, but before he begins to speak:
“Pow-pow-pow” the sound of three gunshots echo loudly throughout the hall, I feel my eyes widen and all the blood run away from my face for a few moments as the blood splatters across the floor. This can’t happen.
I hear the sound of Renata screaming next to me. My mother tried to run close to Matteo but Renata held her back. I mentally thank her for that, I don’t want my mother to get hurt.
I don’t care, I know I promised not to do it again in front of her, but at this moment, I don’t give a shit about that promise.