The endearment sounded like an answered prayer to my soul as it met my ears. Sniffing back my emotions, I gave him a watery smile, “Welcome back, querido…”
“What… What?” he tried to ask. I shushed him and shook my head.
“Everything’s okay, you’re okay.” I looked up at Austin and Levi standing anxiously on the other side of the bed. And reassured, “We’re all okay.”
Axel slowly followed my gaze, bringing him to Austin and Levi. “Fratelli…” he said quietly, slowly lifting up his hand.
Austin was the first to reach for Axel’s hand, his head lowering until his forehead touched their clasped fingers. “Axel… I’m so fucking sorry…”
“Vai bene,” Axel replied. He next looked at Levi. “Lev…” he said with feeling. I could see Axel’s eyes shining with unshed tears. He loved that kid to death.
Levi slumped to a chair like his legs could no longer take his weight, then his head hit the mattress, back shaking with the force of his tears. “I’m sorry, Axe… I’m so sorry…” he cried. Austin released Axel’s hand. Axel laid it on Levi’s head.
Levi looked up as he did so and wrapped it in both of his hands. “We should have trusted you.”
Axel closed his eyes then opened them a second later. “Ain’t ever… given… you much of a reason… to trust me in your lives… I… get it.”
Austin shook his head. “You’ve only ever protected us, Axe… I get that now…” Austin wiped his eyes with the heels of his hands and asked, “those sculptures, Axe… why didn’t you tell us…?”
“Shame…” he replied in embarrassment, “I didn’t deserve it…” His head rolled on the pillow to me, his eyes wordlessly telling me how much he loved me, “none of this. I’ve been… unfairly blessed.”
Feeling my heart swell, I leaned down and kissed his lips. “You’re wrong.”
“I’m a sinner,” Axel said. I could hear how much he believed that statement. I could see it in his honest expression.
“No,” I soothed, “A sinner is a man who doesn’t recognize his wrongs. You have, querido, you’ve recognized them and done everything in your power to fix them… you’re not a sinner. You’re redeemed.”
“She’s right, Axe,” Levi said and his breath caught, “Mamma… she would be so proud of you.”
“Lev,” Axel whispered. Austin sat beside Levi, adding his hand on top of theirs. “I’m so proud of you… I have pride that you’re my blood.”
Those words seemed to resonate with Axel, they meant something to the two of them and tears escaped Axel’s eyes. The sight of the three Carillo's together was my undoing.
After minutes of the Carillo boys mending fences, Levi suddenly said, “Only good things for us from this point on, yeah?”
Axel exhaled and I could see the pride for Levi’s show of strength glittering in his dark eyes.
Levi looked up and met the eyes of both Austin and Axel. “Swear it.”
Austin wrapped an arm around Levi’s shoulder, pressing a kiss to his head and said, “Lo giuro.”
They both then looked to Axel. Axel smiled through his swollen cut lips, a full genuine smile that I’d not seen him display before and he whispered. “Lo giuro.”
*****
Several hours passed as the three of us kept vigil by Axel’s bedside. He was tired, slipping in and out of sleep, but we stayed. The three brothers talked about Axel’s time in prison, Austin unable to believe that Axel hadn’t told him how he’d suffered. But they managed to move past it. Levi spoke of his fears of losing them both, but admitted he had bottled up his feelings for far too long, wrongly blaming Axel for all his pain.
They laughed, they cried, and when the night wound down, a peace had been found.
When the doctor entered to tell us visiting hours were over, Austin and Levi reluctantly rose to their feet, but before I could join them, Axel gripped my hand. “Don’t go,” he asked sleepily, and my heart melted.
I looked to the doctor and threw him my sweetest smile. “Can I stay the night? He needs me.”
The doctor sighed and I begged, “Please? I… I almost lost him…”
Seeing sympathy in his expression, he said, “Just you.” Austin and Levi both kissed him on the forehead and promised to see him tomorrow.
As they reached the door, I asked, “Will you please tell Molly and Rome I’ll see them tomorrow?”
Austin nodded and smiled at me. I staggered back at the power of that smile and, casting a last glance to his brother on his bed, he said only so I could hear, “Look after him, Al. Never thought I’d see the day, but that brother of mine fucking loves you to death. He may not show his feelings much, but he can’t hide how much he adores you.”
Reaching up to my tiptoes, I pressed a kiss on Austin’s cheek and whispered, “Siempre.”
Austin laughed. I kissed Levi too before shutting the door. Everyone but the two of us had left the room.
As I moved to the bed, Axel was staring at my shoes and met my eyes with a smirk. “I love those fucking shoes,” he said sleepily. I moved to the bed and, just as I was about to sit down on the nearby chair, Axel firmly shook his head and weakly patted the bed.
He began shuffling to the side to make room for me and I jumped forward at seeing the pain etched on his face. “Axel!” I hissed, as he winced in agony and held his stomach wound. Beads of sweat formed on his forehead as he relaxed back into the mattress… a space for me now at his left hand side.