Page 111 of Masked Don

“If all you want is ten minutes, then ten minutes it is.”

One more deep breath. I watch him take another box out of the center console, another box for another mask, this one simple and dark and plain.

“Ready?” he asks.

“As ready as I’m ever going to be.”

With that, he leads me out of the car and through the doors. Security waves us through, and we’re soon walking into the same space, that big open room with hundreds of men and women in masks.

The place goes silent. I guess I’m a little more famous than I thought, because even with the mask, people recognize me. A hush rolls across the floor, faces turning, the same collectively held breath. For one horrible second, it’s that night again. I see myself standing there in a dress that’s too small, and my hands are shaking holding the tray of drinks.

But it’s not the same. I make myself look, and it’s not the same at all.

First of all, they’re not laughing. No one’s laughing at me like they did that night. Every pair of eyes is on me but without contempt or mockery. No, it’s more like awe.

They know I’m the woman who stood toe-to-toe with Luca Santini, who was taken prisoner by him and lived to tell about it. They know I’m the woman who works at Enzo Accardi’s side.

The same roomful of people who laughed at me before are now dead silent, as if I alone hold their fates in my hands.

“Word travels fast, it seems,” I say quietly.

“Indeed, it does. Now, ready?”

I smile just a bit. “Ready.”

We move through the crowd and they part. I stride across the same room where I was humiliated, and with each step, I understand more what Enzo wanted to show me.

This is different. My mask is gorgeous, my dress is made for my body and mine alone, and Luca? Luca’s nothing but a bad memory.

As we reach the middle of the room, Enzo stops. He gestures to the musicians, who guide their song to a close. He takes off his mask and tucks it into his inner jacket pocket.

“Enzo,” I say. “What on earth are you…”

“Five years ago,” he says. He’s not talking to me. His voice has lifted, and it carries through the expanse of the room, filling the silence. No one is saying a word; all eyes are on him.

“Five years ago, I stood in this room and watched a petty, small man try to humiliate a woman. And I did something about it. I stood at her side and put a ring on her finger and told you all she was mine.” He looks around at everyone, letting his gaze sweep over them in the same way his father does. “I meant every word. But I never asked her, and some of you saw that.”

My heart is pounding so hard, it feels like there’s a little person in my chest trying to sledgehammer his way out.

“I said it to protect her. I’d stand beside her again a million times.” He pauses, lets the words sink in. “I thought I was being so heroic, coming to the aid of the charming and beautiful damsel, whisking her away from the evil monster. But here’s my mistake, the one I was too blind and arrogant to see.”

Everyone in the room seems to be holding their breath. God knows, I am.

“I put a ring on her hand without asking. I told myself it was rescue. It wasn’t. The asking I never did, I’ve regretted every single day.”

Then he turns to me. In front of hundreds of people, in front of the elders, in front of the entire underworld of this city, Enzo drops to one knee.

The room takes a collective gasp.

“So,” he says, “tonight, I’m asking.”

He reaches into his jacket and takes out a small box and opens it, and my breath stops. It’s the ring. The same cool, heavy ring he slid onto my finger five years ago, the one I left on a pillow before dawn and found again on black velvet in his drawer.

“Stevie Callahan.” The perfect steadiness to his voice has broken just a bit. “Five years ago, I told a room full of strangers you were mine to protect you. Tonight, I’m asking you to make it true, and to be my wife for entirely different reasons. You gave me a son. You came into my home and looked me right in the eye and told me just who I was. You saw the worst things in my soul and challenged me to become something better. And I want to spend the rest of my life proving to you that I can be.

“No locked doors. Not ever. Stevie, I love you more than I can bear. And I want to love you for the rest of my life. Will you marry me?”

I look down at this man on one knee, standing in the exact room where I was made to look like an idiot. But also, where all of this began. I can feel those old memories fading, turning into little blips of insignificance, replaced by what’s happening right now, this very moment.