CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

LOVE AND PIANO

Tulio lifted her up and held her when her parents left with the teacher and the principal. He picked her up on his lap and carried her to the bed. He didn't say anything, just let her slowly empty herself of the pain and shock of the surprising event. Cloe sobbed in his arms, her body jerked, and when she calmed down and became still and he thought the crisis had passed, new waves of shaking and sobbing returned, and so an hour passed.

He had heard every word her father had spoken, his teeth clenched, the urge to go to the door and settle it his way was contained at cost. He knew that it was a matter that she, his beloved, had to resolve, it was not his place to help her, to intervene, it was her family, her decision.

While hugging her trembling body, he thought that she was already changing him.

He remembered events, one in particular that had happened less than a year ago, where a father came to him as if he were the Godfather, with his head down, the red leather of h