Total pages in book: 134
Estimated words: 129676 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 648(@200wpm)___ 519(@250wpm)___ 432(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 129676 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 648(@200wpm)___ 519(@250wpm)___ 432(@300wpm)
Scooting forward on the couch, I gasped. “Why is she still clinging to life then? Obviously, she saw that I’m married and taken care of.”
“Well, of course, she doesn’t want to die in this drab robe!” Lina threw a hand in Mum’s general direction, her expression scandalized. “She wants to go fashionably. To die the way she lived. She gave me instructions. Write this down.”
She snapped her fingers, and I sprang into action, taking out my phone and opening my notepad.
“She wants to go a certain way. And by the way, she is horrified that you’ve let so many strangers see her looking like this.” Lina clucked her tongue disapprovingly. “She wants you to put her in the asymmetric Zimmermann organza silk dress, the one with the Havana, and the buckled silk Manolo Blahniks.”
I typed her instructions fast. I was now 100 percent sure this wasn’t a setup. Mum loved pairing the two together. They were the same shade of rose gold.
“What else?” I looked up from my phone.
“She wants you to color her hair. She doesn’t want any grays when she passes on to the next life, and for heaven’s sake, style it. Her hair is frizzy from all the times you brushed it!”
Laughter burst out of me, and my eyes brimmed with tears. “Okay. Got that down. No more brushing. What else?”
“Full face of makeup, of course.”
“What shade of lipstick?” I asked. Mum had about twenty of them, all a different hue of red.
“Gucci’s ruby.”
I nodded. “Good choice. Anything else?”
“That’s mostly it.” Lina tapped her lower lip with a French-manicured fingernail. “She wants this to happen sooner rather than later. She’s ready, Gia. I think she’s been ready for longer than you can imagine. She pushed through for you. But you are okay now. You have someone to take care of you.” Her eyes crinkled, sweeping to Tate. “Someone who would go to great lengths for you.”
Tate’s expression was impenetrable. He stared forward rigidly, like a queen’s guard.
The weight of her words pressed like a boot against my solar plexus.
Could someone broken put another person together?
I guessed we had to wait and see.
Five hours later, my mother was clad in her favorite attire. Her makeup was flawlessly done the way she liked it—applied meticulously by yours truly—and her shiny coal hair was swept and pinned into elegant perfection, still oozing the pungent scent of ammonia hydroxide.
She looked beautiful, and I was glad she asked for this. It gave me a chance to take one last look at her as the woman I adored. Since she was already made up fully as per her instructions, I had time to ask Filippo to go to Walgreens and get me clear nail polish.
I didn’t miss Enzo’s gaze or the way he played with that knife so expertly, reminding me he could make a Birkin out of my skin without batting an eyelash. “Dude, you knocked it outta the park. She’s beautiful.”
Tate did not leave my side. We operated in silence, him watching my every move and me clasping Mum’s cold hand in mine, painting her nails, which were thin, overgrown, and stacked with vertical ridges.
My back was to my husband when he said, “When was the last time you saw her chest move?”
I lifted my head from the third coat of nail polish I was applying. “Pardon?”
“Her chest.” He swung his gaze from his phone, perched on the incliner. “She hasn’t inhaled in over a minute.”
“You’ve been…monitoring?”
“My marriage kind of depends on it.”
I placed two fingers to Mum’s cold throat, where her pulse should thrum. I waited, the silence in the room thumping between my ears.
“I feel nothing,” I swallowed.
“Welcome to my world,” he murmured.
“No, Tate, I think she’s…” I couldn’t utter the rest. “Come look.”
He placed his phone on the arm of the recliner and stood. His fingers gently brushed mine as he checked my mother’s pulse grimly. I stared up at him, tears clinging to my lower lashes.
One second chased the other. I knew he wasn’t feeling any pulse. Finally, he removed his fingers from her neck. Closed her eyes with a gentleness I didn’t think he possessed. Produced his pocket watch to check the time. “I’m sorry, Gia.”
I buried my face in the rich layers of organza in her lap, heaving a panicked yelp. She was well and truly gone.
I wept in Mum’s lap while Tate stood quietly behind me. Every now and again, I thought about how, not too long ago, he’d lost a parent too and didn’t have the privilege of hugging him one last time. I’d played a big part in him losing the only human who ever loved him, and he graciously forgave me for that.
Dr. Fields peered through the crack in the door, accompanied by a nurse. He rapped gently. “I promised you a checkup…”