I was two months along, and God, I'd wanted this for ages. It had taken this long because he was never interested in intimacy with me. He came to our bed out of obligation when he came at all, and he hated the thought of children. He'd said it more than once. Kids were loud. Exhausting. A liability in this life.
Not too long ago, I'd found something on his desk in the back office of the social club. Lists. Careful, detailed lists in his own handwriting. One for expectant mothers. One for newborns. Formulas, cribs, the name of a pediatrician on the Upper East Side. He'd even priced out a nursery renovation.
I thought he was finally getting on board. I thought he'd somehow found out and was preparing in his own quiet, controlled way. The way a Don prepares for anything. Thoroughly. Without sentiment.
And now I felt really stupid. Stupid in a way that went bone-deep, that sat in my chest like a stone. Obviously, he wasn't getting ready for me at all. Those lists, that careful handwriting, the nursery plans. They were for Silvana. For Silvana's baby. For the child he had chosen to give another woman while his own wife lay in his bed wondering why he never reached for her.