The Body #1: Santo and Fiorella

Chapter 11 (Fiorella): Change Your View

Santo had texted someone as we waited outside and the helicopter arrived not five minutes after we'd walked out of the house. He'd walked me away from the house because I'd been flinching every time I heard Dario scream. 

Basically, I was flinching non-stop. 

How Santo wasn't even affected by the agonized screams baffled me, but he didn't even register them with a grimace or a blink. Instead, Santo had examined my cheek and apologized to me. "I have a plastic surgeon heading to the house to take care of this, my soul."

My soul? What in the hell? My husband had just called me his soul when he had a mistress pregnant with his baby waiting at home for him? I jerked my chin out of his grasp and turned away to watch for the helicopter that I could hear in the distance.

I was having an internal debate as to whether I should have Santo ask a different kind of doctor to examine me as well, just to make sure that being knocked out and stressed beyond belief hadn't hurt the baby in any way. Making up my mind to tell him when we got home, I watched the helicopter land.

"Andiamo," he ordered me, taking my limp hand again. Let's go. 

He helped me into the helicopter and strapped me in, then ran to the other side and hopped in. Seconds later, we were taking off, Santo texting the whole way. I watched the scenery below me, trying to focus on that rather than the reality of what had happened this afternoon.

It could have been so much worse. But Lucio and Santo had been waiting there, inside the house, and had clearly stationed their men outside. Dario, who should have been fully protected as the Head, had been left completely vulnerable and was now...I shuddered, thinking of what he was now. A pile of parts? His screams had been relentless and...not human, and I didn't even want to think about what Lucio and Federico were doing to elicit those sounds.

I was left with so many questions my mind was whirling. We landed, and Santo helped me down from the helicopter and led me to the waiting car by my hand. Once again, I looked out the window on the short drive home, and Santo kept his hand on my thigh. It seemed that he was trying to reassure himself that I was still there. 

On the way into the house, he told me only that the plastic surgeon was thirty minutes away and would see to me immediately when he arrived. I got the idea from his tone that Santo was displeased that he wasn't already at Santo's house.

We walked into the house and Tanya was there, pacing the living room, looking annoyed and angry.

"You missed my doctor's appointment," she snapped at Santo the second he came through the door, her arms crossed over her chest. Oh, yeah. Definitely not happy.

"Pack your things. You're leaving," Santo tossed those surprising words at her.

"What?" she and I said at the same time. He was kicking out his pregnant mistress?

She looked at me, then at Santo. "You can't send the mother of your child away!"

"We both know I'm not."

Again she glanced at me before returning her attention to Santo. "What's going on? I was all alone at my appointment today, and I wasn't happy that someone wasn't answering my calls."

 Santo tapped his phone, then turned it around to face her. "Pretty safe to say you'll be alone at all future appointments."

She recoiled from whatever he'd shown her on the screen, her face draining of color. "No. That's not --"

"I assure you, the father of your baby is currently doing a really good imitation of a five hundred piece jigsaw puzzle, but they expect to finish off the puzzle soon."