Liam’s fury seemed beyond menacing. “If you think I’ll let you take them from me-”
“No I-I th-thought you’d take them from...from me,” she pressed her clasped hands to her mouth and inhaled. “They need me Liam I-I need them.”
Liam waited a long time before he spoke. “I know that,” he said.
Hope fueled the tears glistening in her eyes then. “Oh Liam-”
“You’ll never have them on your own. I’ll never let you be their sole influence. Not our children or my brother’s.”
Uncertainty wedged in alongside the anger that had taken shape over his words. “You would accept Giaimo’s child? Raise it?”
Liam looked to his wife’s waist. A muscle at his jaw performed a wicked display of movement. “As it turns out, I don’t have a choice.”
Confusion bloomed full in Athena’s uncommon eyes then. Liam didn't allow her curiosity to linger.
“He’s gone, Thea. Giaimo is dead.”
She watched him calmly at first as if he’d just told her it might rain that day. Then came the slightest shift of her head. The shifting grew more rapid until she was shaking it with the unbridled ferocity of a belligerent child.
“Y-you’re mistaken he-that can’t b-be. He can’t be-”
“He is.”
The confirmation sent discomfort lancing Liam’s chest, splicing it with regret and grief. He watched Athena lose strength to stand. She went to her knees, arms wrapped tightly at her waist as she began to rock herself.
Liam wouldn’t let himself feel anything, least of all pity. If anything, he leaned on anger. It was easy to summon as he watched his wife on her knees sobbing for the loss of his brother, the father of her unborn child.
“What happened?” Her question sounded distorted, her voice all but lost in the garble of her sobs. “You didn’t-”
“The Irish,” Liam said. “They set a car on fire with him inside it.”
Athena’s rocking speed increased. As Liam continued to watch, he was helpless to stop himself from succumbing to the pity funnelling in to take precedence over all other emotion.
“You loved him,” he said.
“I love you,” she swore.
“You loved him too.”
“I...” she tucked her chin into her neck, unable to deny anything more. “He didn’t ask me-need me to-to change. I could be who I am with him. I love you, Liam.” She saw fit to add.
Liam didn’t return the words. He didn’t know if he could or would ever want to again. All he knew was that his brother was gone and that hate had radiated from his own eyes when they last saw each other. He would never be able to take that back.
Yet, a piece of Giaimo lived. Liam would never be able to look upon his brother with love, but he could lavish it upon Giaimo’s child-on the innocent that slumbered in Athena’s womb.
He went to her, kneeling close. “It’s alright, it’s alright,” he soothed when she shrank away in fear. Liam drew her in and her sobs wet his shirt when she buried her face against his bicep.
“If it’s a boy, we’ll call him Stone,” Liam said, smiling softly when he heard her gasp.
Athena leaned back after a moment, looking up into Liam’s face. Her eyes glistened anew. “La grande pietra,” her voice shook with a hint of laughter so faint it could’ve been imagined.
The great stone. She remembered Liam’s story of his gregarious older brother. One who could send the dullest place into a maelstrom by the sheer force of his presence. Like a stone hitting the water.
Athena began to nod. She kept nodding while her head bent to Liam’s arm again. They held each other for a long while.
~21~
Stone Lucciano Tesano came into the world, a weighty, lively soul with eyes of vibrant green and mounds of lush dark covering his head.
His brothers were curious, delighted and giddy over the arrival of the new baby. Their excitement was contagious. Everyone who knew the Tesanos was thrilled, excessively so in light of the tragedies the generous family had to endure.
Liam and Athena took their parenting responsibilities as seriously for Stone as they did for their other sons. Only Liam’s brothers and best friends knew the boy’s true lineage. No one else knew the baby to be anything other than the third beautiful son to bless the couple.
The love lavished on Stone was no act. His mother adored him and Liam was thankful for the chance to build the kind of close relationship with Stone that he’d never quite been able to manage with the child’s biological father.
Business was consistently growing. The factory was fully operational, functioning at a level that felt streamlined and sustainable instead of disjointed and temporary. Liam decided that the former apartment of the building’s super would be better for the growing family. The apartment boasted four bedrooms. The Tesano’s original apartment would serve as the new home office. It was an exciting time. Tesano Textiles seemed to be in a perpetual state of change. In addition to clothing and textile manufacture, the shipping end was enjoying massive growth. Liam had drawn the services of seven captains and their boats. With the competitive pricing he offered, Liam was able to outbid other fleets. His colleagues in the garment industry were enticed by the opportunity to save money and get their product in front of more diverse clientele.
The Tesanos were repeatedly outdoing themselves with more and more accomplishments becoming associated with their names. They were even getting a few nods from certain members of New York society, something that thrilled Athena beyond measure. So much, she began to question, subtly of course, when another move might be in order. The ex-Super’s apartment was more spacious, but it was still a walk-up in Brooklyn. In Athena’s opinion, it wasn’t the sort of place fit for people being noticed by New York elite.
The Tesanos weren’t simply revered for their growing business acumen, their features were also an undeniable attention getter. Liam’s Adonis looks matched by Athena’s exotic beauty were making them one of the most envied couples among the circles they were starting to travel. Only Liam and Athena knew the envy was misplaced. They knew people saw them and their beautiful sons and conjured all sorts of fairytale existences for them. The speculators would have been shocked to learn that the marriage bed of the vital couple had been used for nothing more than sleeping during the three years following Stone’s birth.
That had scarcely been noticed by the couple during the first year. With all the unrest in their lives, it had been enough just to feel the storm subside. That had opened up time to grieve and prepare for the new innocent life about to join them. Liam and Athena spent the following year adjusting to being parents of three demanding boys, not to mention everything happening with the business.
Now, amid the third year of their sexual drought, Athena had no idea how to approach her husband on the subject of resuming their marital relations. She knew Liam had to be as starved as she was. Work and parenting could only go so far in its ability to keep the mind off the body’s basic needs.
Athena decided to talk with Liam at the factory that afternoon. The guards at the main entrance had already told her he was due back in an hour or so. She couldn’t afford to miss him. He wouldn’t return home until Sunday evening. He was due in Boston where he was to tour a new mill he was considering for a new Tesano Textiles factory. She hoped his trip there might give him time to consider what she was about to ask.
She reached up to give a self-conscious pat to the chignon she’d drawn her hair into. Spiral curls dangled along her temples and kept the style from appearing too severe. She slowed her steps when her breath caught in her throat. She was excited-nervous as a young girl. Scared too. She had no idea what to expect, but couldn’t convince herself not to try.
