Read Online Incubus Moon by Andrew Cheney-Feid - Free Book Online
Authors: Andrew Cheney-Feid
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origins, the trail conveniently vanished. “That there is no Riccardo in the family.”
In the days that followed, Zia Lucia, along with several prominent members of the Marmaggi clan, lavished sumptuous meals on us in their equally sumptuous apartments located in the most desirable neighborhoods the city had to offer. A few even boasted picture-postcard views of such famous landmarks as the Coliseum, Piazza Navona, and the Pantheon.
The Marmaggi’s were clearly a wealthy lot.
Strange how that on my last visit nine years ago, Laura’s relatives were living in modest dwellings on the outskirts of the city and working unassuming jobs.
Now, they were respected bankers and lawyers, doctors and politicians, some of whose adult children had gone on to become famous television and sports figures throughout Italy and Europe. All this mega success in under a decade.
Some might call their rise to prominence magical. Other might say the family had struck a deal with the devil. Whatever was behind their good fortune, I was growing more suspicious of them by the day. Mark and Christie, on the other hand, were having the time of their lives.
Thrilled to be given the royal treatment, they reveled in our after lunch or dinner strolls through Rome’s Historic Center, discovering its hidden jewels that most tourists would never get to enjoy. We were also afforded private tours of the city beneath the city off-limits to the general public; a part of Ancient Rome that had been buried for millennia beneath newer structures and still survived strikingly intact. Even I was impressed by these steps back in time.
Trouble was we weren’t here on vacation—at least I wasn’t.
It was also getting harder to control my emotions’ constant yo-yoing between anger and frustration. Anger, I was learning, triggered a new and dangerous strength in me. I was going to have to keep it together, considering that a fair amount of people and situations were routinely beginning to piss me off. My crushed iPhone was another matter entirely.
Luckily, my friends had been too distracted to bring the subject up again. But I continued to wear the gauze bandage Christie had affixed over wounds that were no longer there.
On the eve of our final night in Rome, Lucia pulled me aside.
“ Caro Austin. Questi documenti di cui mi hai parlato si trattano di uno scherzo cattivo e nient’altro. Perché non te li scordi ?”
Because I wasn’t the least bit convinced that the adoption papers were a bad joke. I also had no intention of dropping the matter. Not after the Riccardo incident.
Someone out there knew the truth.
Now more than ever I was determined to find out who that someone was. Particularly after several family members claimed to have met my father, Joshua, shortly after his marriage to Laura. He’d supposedly been stationed at the U.S. Military base in Naples and met my mother on a day trip to Rome. Photographs of him? But of course. They had dozens of them somewhere , along with pictures of Laura pregnant with me.
Contacting that military base before I returned to Los Angeles moved to the top of my To Do list. They’d have documented proof of whether or not my father had been stationed there.
It seemed that yet another facet to my becoming an incubus was a newfound ability to perceive falsehoods. I could feel rather than specifically hear a person’s thoughts. And behind the smiling eyes of the Roman branch of the Marmaggi family were a great many secrets and lies.
I was relieved to be getting out of Dodge.
Mark and Christie were naturally disappointed for me, but also sad to be leaving sooner than planned. We weren’t due back in Los Angeles for another five days.
“I still think you should’ve accepted their invitation to put us up,” Mark said in the taxi en route to Leonardo Da Vinci Airport. “They seemed like nice people to me.”
Christie nodded and patted her stomach. “And Laura’s sister’s an amazing cook. This has got
In the days that followed, Zia Lucia, along with several prominent members of the Marmaggi clan, lavished sumptuous meals on us in their equally sumptuous apartments located in the most desirable neighborhoods the city had to offer. A few even boasted picture-postcard views of such famous landmarks as the Coliseum, Piazza Navona, and the Pantheon.
The Marmaggi’s were clearly a wealthy lot.
Strange how that on my last visit nine years ago, Laura’s relatives were living in modest dwellings on the outskirts of the city and working unassuming jobs.
Now, they were respected bankers and lawyers, doctors and politicians, some of whose adult children had gone on to become famous television and sports figures throughout Italy and Europe. All this mega success in under a decade.
Some might call their rise to prominence magical. Other might say the family had struck a deal with the devil. Whatever was behind their good fortune, I was growing more suspicious of them by the day. Mark and Christie, on the other hand, were having the time of their lives.
Thrilled to be given the royal treatment, they reveled in our after lunch or dinner strolls through Rome’s Historic Center, discovering its hidden jewels that most tourists would never get to enjoy. We were also afforded private tours of the city beneath the city off-limits to the general public; a part of Ancient Rome that had been buried for millennia beneath newer structures and still survived strikingly intact. Even I was impressed by these steps back in time.
Trouble was we weren’t here on vacation—at least I wasn’t.
It was also getting harder to control my emotions’ constant yo-yoing between anger and frustration. Anger, I was learning, triggered a new and dangerous strength in me. I was going to have to keep it together, considering that a fair amount of people and situations were routinely beginning to piss me off. My crushed iPhone was another matter entirely.
Luckily, my friends had been too distracted to bring the subject up again. But I continued to wear the gauze bandage Christie had affixed over wounds that were no longer there.
On the eve of our final night in Rome, Lucia pulled me aside.
“ Caro Austin. Questi documenti di cui mi hai parlato si trattano di uno scherzo cattivo e nient’altro. Perché non te li scordi ?”
Because I wasn’t the least bit convinced that the adoption papers were a bad joke. I also had no intention of dropping the matter. Not after the Riccardo incident.
Someone out there knew the truth.
Now more than ever I was determined to find out who that someone was. Particularly after several family members claimed to have met my father, Joshua, shortly after his marriage to Laura. He’d supposedly been stationed at the U.S. Military base in Naples and met my mother on a day trip to Rome. Photographs of him? But of course. They had dozens of them somewhere , along with pictures of Laura pregnant with me.
Contacting that military base before I returned to Los Angeles moved to the top of my To Do list. They’d have documented proof of whether or not my father had been stationed there.
It seemed that yet another facet to my becoming an incubus was a newfound ability to perceive falsehoods. I could feel rather than specifically hear a person’s thoughts. And behind the smiling eyes of the Roman branch of the Marmaggi family were a great many secrets and lies.
I was relieved to be getting out of Dodge.
Mark and Christie were naturally disappointed for me, but also sad to be leaving sooner than planned. We weren’t due back in Los Angeles for another five days.
“I still think you should’ve accepted their invitation to put us up,” Mark said in the taxi en route to Leonardo Da Vinci Airport. “They seemed like nice people to me.”
Christie nodded and patted her stomach. “And Laura’s sister’s an amazing cook. This has got
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