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“Well…” She looked at Dante as if wanting confirmation that I was indeed sick and he wasn’t running away fromherwith me.
“We can talk on Monday,” Dante clipped.
We had to wait for his sedan, and while we did, he stood, his lips pursed into a thin line. He wasangry. No, correction, he wasenraged. And I had no idea why. Was he upset that Cristina praised me in front of all and sundry? Was he upset that Luca was talking to me? No, I didn’t think so. Maybe he was annoyed that Luca knew so much about the bistro and he didn’t. No, that couldn’t be it. He’d never even bothered to know what I did with my time.
I was still pondering his behavior when the sedan rolled up in front of us. Dante all but hauled me into the backseat and then told the driver to get to his flat.
"No, no, Via Aldo Manuzio,per favore," I corrected.
“Si,” Dante gave permission to his driver tolistento me. He then raised the privacy screen and turned to face. “Do you know how poorly it reflects on me to have you flirting with Luca Carrera? Do you know how embarrassing it is for you to be that desperate for his attention?”
Heat flushed through me, but not from embarrassment—but from ire. Hot, bubbling, fuckingire.
How dare he behave like this? As though I existed purely as an extension of him, someone with no agency, bound to feel things in context only to him.
“What is your problem?” I hissed.
His eyes were stormy and unreadable. “Luca Carrera and you. That’s my problem.”
I folded my arms. “What about him? He’s a friend. Is that suddenly a crime now?”
Dante didn’t respond, but the tension in his jaw and the way his eyes burned into mine made me realize something.
“I don’t understand what this is about.” I was aghast at his behavior. I’d never seen Dante lose control, and dragging me out of the gala was him definitely losing his shit.
He gritted his teeth. “What will people think when you throw yourself at Luca?”
“Excuse me?” If my eyebrows could raise any further, they’d hit my hairline.
“You know you need to behave yourself in public. You’re Dante Giordano’s wife, not some subpar winemaker’s daughter languishing in Brooklyn.”
He’d insulted my father, Brooklyn, and me all in one sentence.Bravo!
“I wonder what people were thinking whenyouthrew yourself at Lucia,” I wondered aloud, tapping a finger on my chin. “Oh, I know because Renzo Carrera mentioned it to me. He and everyone else thinks you’re screwing around on your marriage vows. But this is Rome, and men of your station have been doing it for ages. But I wonder sometimes if Lucia is the mistress or I was.”
“You have no idea what you’re talking about,” he thundered.
“I think I do,” I threw back at him.
"The discussion we’re having now is about your behavior and how you were flirting with Luca," he said condescendingly, like I was a misbehaving pet in need of correction.
Maybe I was.
I had been docile, the peacekeeper—always smoothing things over, always swallowing my pride because that was my nature. And yet, somehow, he had driven me to become this angry version of myself, a woman I barely recognized and didn’t particularly like.
I was, by nature, an optimist, someone who found joy in small things. But having your heart broken, your love dismissed so carelessly, does something to you. It twists you into someone unrecognizable, someone whose rage burns hotter than hope.
And that kind of fury?
It was draining.
“Luca and I were merely talking, Dante.” I exhaled slowly, feeling the fight slip away. I didn’t want to be this bitter woman. I wanted to be me. “Are youseriouslyupset because I had a perfectly normal conversation with Luca?”
“Perfectly normal?” he snapped. “You were laughing with him, leaning into him. You looked….”
“Looked like what?” I asked nervously as I prepared to be brutalized by his words.
“Like you were desperate for his attention…or was it mine you were seeking?” he smirked when he said that last part.