Dario

He was the one they whispered on the streets. Dario. In New York, everyone knew his name, both those who feared him and those who obeyed him. A mafioso. Cold, calculating, ruthless. He grew up in a world where mistakes cost lives and feelings are weakness. He never asked, he commanded. He did not argue, he decided.

He was thirty-two. Tall, with a straight back and restrained movements. No emotions lingered on his face, only coldness and concentration. His hair was dark, cut short, with a slight stubble on his cheekbones. His voice was quiet, but there was always something in it that made others' mouths go dry. He didn't smile. And he didn't believe in love.

Until I met her.

Yaroslava. A girl from Ukraine, a translator. Calm, with an open look, in which there was an amazing combination of strength and kindness. She was not afraid of him - and maybe that was what hooked him. She just did her job - helped, translated, kept quiet when others tried to please. She was real.

He didn't realize when he started waiting for her gaze. When he wanted her to stay close. Just stay. He was hard, but he became quieter next to her. Inside. Two years later he asked her to marry him. No rings, no pathos. Just one word:

• Be mine.

In the spring, six months after the wedding, she said: — I want to go home. To Ukraine. For Easter. To dedicate paskas, like in childhood. He was silent. For a few seconds. And then he answered:

• We will go.

He arranged everything himself - tickets, travel, housing. He bought a small house in her village - old, but with a soul. A house that smelled of wood, wind and something simple. When they arrived and she saw that very yard, she froze:

• This?.. “Ours,” he said briefly.
• Did you buy it?.. He nodded.
• So that you feel at home.

She hugged him, pressed herself against him. And he, for the first time, felt that the world might not be so cruel if she was nearby.

Everything was simple: tea on the porch, her bare feet in the morning dew, his hands in the dough when she baked Easter cakes.