Lahat ng Kabanata ng MARRIED TO THE MAFIA: Kabanata 131 - Kabanata 140

LilaThe reception was exactly what Luca had promised me warm, golden, filled with people who actually seemed happy to be there.The garden had been transformed with long tables draped in ivory linens and little clusters of white roses. Candles flickered in glass lanterns, casting soft halos over everything. String lights crisscrossed overhead, so it felt like we were sitting beneath a canopy of tiny stars.It was perfect.I sat beside Luca, my hand resting over his on the table, trying to memorize every detail. Every smile. Every laugh. Every single moment that felt like something I never thought I’d get to have.Every so often, I’d look out across the tables and catch my mother watching me. She would smile, tired but luminous, like she was as surprised as I was that we’d made it to this day.Dad sat near her, quiet and uncertain. He didn’t reach for her hand, and she didn’t reach for his. But every so often, they would exchange a look that was complicated in a way I didn’t have the e

LucaHospitals were the kind of place you never got used to, no matter how many times you walked or wheeled through their halls.The scent of antiseptic and stale coffee. The faint hum of machines and the low voices of nurses passing updates back and forth.It all blurred together into something that crawled under your skin and stayed there, reminding you of everything you couldn’t control.I waited outside the ICU doors, watching Lila as she finally disappeared into her mother’s room. Her shoulders were tense, her small frame braced for whatever waited behind that glass wall.I’d never felt so fucking useless in my life.The doctor cleared his throat softly beside me.“Mr. Romano?”I turned my chair to face him. He was a tall, narrow man with kind eyes and a face lined by decades of experience delivering bad news.“Can we speak privately?” he asked.I nodded once. “Lead the way.”He guided me down the hall to a small consultation room just four beige walls, a round table, two chairs,

LilaI don’t know how long I sat there, my hand resting over hers, feeling the fragile flutter of her pulse beneath my fingers.It didn’t seem real.Nothing about this sterile room, this too-bright light, this rasping sound of her shallow breaths it didn’t feel like the place where I was supposed to say goodbye.Her skin had cooled gradually. Little by little. As if her warmth was slipping away molecule by molecule, until there would be nothing left but the shape of her.“Mom,” I whispered, my voice cracking.Her eyelids didn’t flicker.I swallowed and tried again.“Mom. It’s okay. I’m here.”Still nothing.I pressed my lips to the back of her hand, breathing in the familiar scent of her lotion. Something soft and floral, the same she’d worn since I was little.“I love you,” I whispered. “I need you to know that. I love you so much I don’t know how to be a person without you.”Tears slid over my cheeks, dripping onto the blanket.“You were the best thing in my life. The only person who

LilaI woke to the muffled sound of voices drifting in from down the hall.For a moment, I couldn’t remember where I was.My mother’s absence hadn’t hit me yet it felt like she was still here somehow, like I could walk into the kitchen and find her reading the newspaper with her tea.Then the ache in my chest reminded me.She was gone.The grief settled back over me like a wet blanket, heavy and cold.I curled onto my side, pulling Luca’s pillow tighter against me, breathing in the scent of him.It grounded me enough to uncurl my fingers and push myself up to sit.The bedroom door was cracked open.I heard Anna’s voice, calmer than it had been since the last argument with Richard and Alex’s quiet reply.For once, no one sounded angry.No one sounded like they were about to explode.And I realized they were trying to keep things peaceful for me.I pushed the blanket aside and swung my legs over the edge of the bed. My body felt heavy, my limbs uncooperative, like I’d aged fifty years ov

LilaI didn’t know what I expected when I walked into the viewing room.Maybe I thought it would feel less real if the lighting was soft enough, the flowers bright enough.But nothing could disguise what this was.The end.The final goodbye I’d spent half my life dreading.The funeral director stepped aside as Luca wheeled up beside me, his hand reaching for mine without hesitation.I took it, grateful for the steadiness of his touch.The casket was positioned at the front of the small chapel, flanked by tall arrangements of lilies and white roses. It was the simple oak one I’d chosen, but seeing it here, seeing her inside it…I almost couldn’t move.My legs felt like they’d locked in place. My breath caught in my throat, shallow and thin.“Lila,” Luca murmured, his voice low and careful. “If you want to wait, I can ask them to give you a moment.”“No.”I swallowed, forcing my feet to take the next step.And the next.Until we stood just a few feet away.She looked so peaceful.Her hai