High Voltage (17 page)

~ Dino ~

The Best Women in the World

M
y mother doesn’t cause the same kind of drama as
Minka’s. A month after we return to Houston, I invite Mom to visit. She hates
to fly and thinks Texas is full of cowboys, but she’ll go anywhere to meet her
son’s future wife. I can’t wait to show Minka off, but my woman isn’t sure how
to feel about the meeting.

“I’m not Italian,” she says as we wait at the
airport.

“What? This is the kind of info you should have
fucking told me, woman.”

Smiling at my teasing, she crosses her arms. “I’m
nervous, okay?”

“Look, Apples, I love my mom, and she’s an amazing
woman, but I’m marrying you even if she thinks you’re the worst person in the
world. I want what I want, and nothing is changing my mind.”

Minka’s smile grows, and I wrap my arm around her
shoulders.

“Feel better?” I ask, kissing the top of her head.

“Extremely.”

My mother is one of the first people to appear past
the checkpoint. I bought her a first class ticket, and I know she plays up her
hip to get out of long lines. Gilda isn’t the only sneaky mother I know.

Mom’s gray and brown hair is wrapped into a stylish
bun. I know she went to the salon before the flight. She’s as nervous as Minka
about making a good impression.

I hug Mom tightly as soon as she’s in reach. I’m
careful with her prim red dress, knowing she put a lot of thought into this
get-up. I spent an hour earlier with Minka choosing clothes.

“Mom, this is Minka.”

The women smile nervously at each other.

“Hello, Missus Bellomi,” Minka says, going the
formal route.

“Call me Carla.”

“Isn’t she beautiful?” I ask Mom.

“An absolute doll.”

Smiling, Minka takes a deep breath. “I learned a
little Italian.”

Terror strikes me, and I pray she doesn’t do her
Mario accent. Instead, she says in nearly perfect Italian that I’m the best man
she’s ever met and hopes to make me as happy as my mother did my father. That’s
the breaking point for Mom. She hugs Minka tightly and murmurs about how she
never thought I’d meet anyone or fall in love.

By the time we’re at the baggage claim, Mom is
talking grandkids. “If I ever had a girl, I wanted to name her Elisabetta. I
knew a girl with the name back in Naples. She was as beautiful as a movie star,
and I always loved the name. Of course, Luciano and I agreed to name the
children of the same gender. With no daughters, I never had a chance to use the
name.”

“Mom,” I mutter. “Let her be.”

“It’s fine,” Minka says, taking Mom’s hand. “I
think the name Elisabetta is beautiful. If we have a boy, Dino’s already picked
the name.”

Mom looks at me hopefully. I take her suitcases and
set them on a cart.

“After Dad of course.”

“Such a good boy,” she says, taking my face and
kissing my cheeks.

I ought to be embarrassed. As a teenager, I’d most
definitely be horrified by her display. Not now with Minka smiling at us. Mom
leaving lipstick kisses on my cheeks makes my woman smile bigger than I’ve ever
seen her smile before.

I know Minka loves me. I’ve known she would all
along, but I still marvel at how she went from fucking hating me weeks ago to
the ball of smiles and joy I see now.

All I needed to do was visit Honky-tonk Hell, kill
a few people, eat a lot of bland spaghetti, and listen to way too much shitty
music. Every single horror I suffered was worth just one smile from the sexy
minx I’ve made mine.

~ Dino ~

Made Her Mine

I
marry Minka on the beach in Galveston. As an
inside joke, Minka wears a red dress. I go casual with a suit and no tie. Our
friends and co-workers attend. My mom and Minka’s siblings fly in for the
wedding. Gilda’s invitation gets lost in the mail. We never do see the shifty
bitch again.

One of our first issues as a married couple is that
I don’t like Minka’s apartment, and she doesn’t like mine. She suggests we live
separately. I suggest she live at my place and learn to suck it up. Troy
suggests we get a new place that’ll have things we both like.

Even if he’s right, I refuse to appreciate his
help. Troy might be a decent guy and nothing more than Minka’s friend, but I
will never be okay with someone who’s been inside my woman. If I had my way,
I’d kill Troy. Minka insists her best buddy live, though. We compromise again.
I threaten to kill Troy a lot but never will.

Saskia and her husband, Brad, live outside of
Houston on a large estate. After a visit, Minka and I drive around the area
looking for available land. I want my kids to grow up in a house with a yard.
Minka is still talking about only one baby, maybe two if I beg. Even without a
single kid, I want lots of space between the neighbors and me, just like how
things were when I grew up.

“Can you imagine?” Minka says to me when we find a
sweet piece of land a few miles from Saskia and Brad’s place.

“We’ll mix 1950’s Frank and Dino-style glamour with
your more modern rock and roll crappy style.”

“Compromise works better without using the word
‘crappy’ in your description.”

“I says them like I sees them.”

Minka wraps her arms around me tightly, maybe a
little too tightly actually.

“I’m going along with these big and fast dreams of
yours, Dino. Marriage, kids, a house. I’ll trust in you even if all of your
dreams scare the shit out of me.”

“Smart move, Apples.”

We buy the land and begin work on our dream house.
The damn thing isn't completed for over two years. Baby Elisabetta spends her
first nine months living in a rental apartment in downtown Houston. Not that
she remembers anything more than her parents doting on her.

My first child is extraordinarily beautiful. In
fact, the only person capable of drawing my gaze away from Elisabetta is her
mom. Minka is so sexy when pregnant that I can’t keep my hands off her.
Especially her luscious breasts.

We settle into the house just before Elisabetta’s
first Christmas. The tree I buy is fucking huge and barely fits through the
door. Once inside, though, the evergreen stands tall in our two story family
room.

We go overboard buying gifts for Elisabetta, who
barely opens one present before crawling after our new shepherd mix puppy, Kid.

Despite her hatred of flying, Mom visits often. She
spoils her first grandchild. For the first year, the house is overflowing with
pink and glitter. Luciano introduces shades of blue and baseball caps. To
Minka’s horror, our boy wears his hats sideways by the time he’s walking.

“My kid is turning into The Situation!” she cries
more than once.

“I wore it like that when I was a kid, and I turned
out just fine.”

Minka always gives me an unimpressed eye roll when
I claim to be a well-adjusted man. She isn’t wrong, but I won’t admit this aloud.

I grew up in a normal world surrounded by bad men.
Unlike my father, I didn’t embrace the working man’s life. I wanted to be a bad
man. Now I find myself only interested in being a husband, father, and son.

My family made me happy as a kid. When the power
and darkness of my job seduced me, my family returned my humanity. These days,
my wife and kids make me a better man.

~ Minka ~

Reality Kicks Fantasy’s Ass

W
hat was I thinking with my sensitive, book-reading,
dream guy? I clearly didn’t know a thing about myself. Fortunately, fate
brought me the man I needed.

Dino is the whole package. He’s sexy in and out of
bed. He manages to be smart without becoming obnoxious about it. I’ve never had
someone so devoted to making me happy, yet he keeps me on my toes with his
teasing.

Most mornings, I wake up thanking the universe for
Dino’s stubborn streak. If left up to me, we might never have enjoyed a single
hot night together, let alone a lifetime. My stubborn streak nearly cost me
someone perfect. Dino knew best.
This time anyway.

For the most part, I enjoy pregnancy. The last
month sucks, and I always feel like a moose. Before I can swear off pregnancy
forever, I give birth and promptly forget about the miserable last month.

Our first child, Elisabetta, is the perfect first
baby. She sleeps when we want her to sleep. She wakes up when we want to play
with her. She likes her crib when we need space. She craves our bed when we
want to stare at her for a few hours. Some of my favorite memories the first year
are of Dino and me resting in bed with a sleeping Elisabetta between us.

“We made this amazing creature,” I say.

Dino plays with her dark waves. “You can’t mix two
people like us and not create perfection.”

Despite his cocky comment, Dino is absolutely in
love with our daughter. He doesn’t even push for a second child because he
claims he won’t have enough space in his heart for another kid. I ignore his
worries and skip my birth control for a few months. Soon we’re expecting a son.

Luciano and Elisabetta are joined two years later
by Vittoria, who looks like a girl version of Dino. Unlike her siblings, she’s
obsessed with mommy rather than their perfect daddy. Vittoria’s affinity for
Joan Jett freaks out Dino. Every pregnancy, he forces me to listen to The Rat
Pack so his kids would be born with good taste. Somehow, Vittoria slips through
the cracks.

Our final baby is a boy, and Dino insists I name
him after my dad. I hate the name Ed and all of its variants. Dino won’t let me
weasel out of honoring my father, so my compromise is Enzo. The name begins
with the same letter. Dino isn’t fully pleased, but once I throw other possible
names at him like Julian, he quickly agrees to Enzo.

A weird thing happens after I have kids. Well,
maybe not so weird, but I never expect to get so damn soft. I have no interest
in taking the difficult security jobs anymore. After Luciano arrives, I scale
back my work and do most of it through teleconferencing while my kids are in
the next room.

Dino can’t even manage to care that much. He quits
the firm and stays home with the family. His days revolve around playing with
the kids and sneaking me into closets for quickies.

Even retired, Dino doesn’t get soft. Especially not
when it comes to acting like a dumbass around other men. Even after a decade
together, he still growls at Troy for standing too close to me.

“No one knows your pussy except me,” he always
says.

I can only pat his cheek and laugh. Reality will
never be his friend in that regard.

Domestication doesn’t mean I completely lose my
edge. I teach my kids how to fight. Dino teaches them how to cheat at cards.
Mainstream parenting might not be our strong suit.

I didn’t marry a sensitive schmuck like my dream
guy. I found someone better. A man who talked me into loving him. A man who
convinced me to give motherhood a try. A man who keeps me on my toes. A man who
still makes me whimper at night and laugh in the daylight.

Apples found her Italian Sausage.

Living
in Indiana with my three sweet sons, three wacky cats, one super mom (and her
ugly dog), I love writing, cats, Denny's, 1970's rock, Beanie Boos, and sitcoms
cancelled before their time.

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Bijou Hunter Books

Ramsey Security Series

Thunderstruck * Live Wire * High Voltage

Damaged Series

Damaged and the Beast * Damaged and the Knight

Damaged and the Cobra * Damaged and the Outlaw

Damaged and the Dragon * Damaged and the Bulldog

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