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The moment was too precious to darken with doubts and fears, so she wiggled deeper into his arms as he murmured soft sweetness against her forehead in the old language. Some things didn’t require translation.

She woke to utter darkness and a cool draft instead of Dante’s warmth. Reaching, her fingertips found his back. He was sitting on the edge of the bed.

“Come back to me,” she whispered.

The clouds had rolled in while she slept, so their second time was only touch, taste, and sounds. Kisses leaving trails of heat and murmured words that weren’t really words but feelings shaped into sighs mingling between parted lips.

Thirty-Eight

A gran salita, gran discesa.

The higher the rise, the greater the fall.

DAYS BEFORE DIVORANDO: 13

Alessa would’ve made the night last forever if she could, but she expected the sun to rise in the morning.

It didn’t.

The sky outside was dark, and her bed empty when she woke with nothing but tangled sheets beside her. She scrambled for the lamp, pulled the string too hard, and had to grab it before it tipped.

Dante was sitting on the couch.

“Come back to bed,” she said. “It’s still dark.”

“It’s morning,” he said. “Technically. Happy wedding day.”

The wall clock confirmed it was long past time for the sun to rise. Crollo had sent her a full day of darkness as a wedding gift.

Dante ran a bath for her, and she coaxed him into joining her. Lying back on his chest, Alessa watched as bubbles popped onthe surface of the bath water, ripples distorting the lines of her bare legs. Dante’s were too long for the tub and his knees jutted from the surface like golden islands on either side of her bare hips. He bathed her with the reverence of the faithful, and for once, she accepted it as her due.

“Tip your head,” he said, hands cupped above her.

Alessa closed her eyes and let him rinse the suds away. With lazy fingers, she moved her fingertips over his muscular thighs, swirling the dark hair. His breath frayed, but in true Dante fashion he refused to be distracted from his task. After soaping up again, he took her hands in his, massaging her palms with his thumbs, his fingers sliding slick and smooth between hers.

“My family had an orchard,” Dante said. “Right by the beach. It bothered me, at first. That you were a complete stranger but smelled like home.”

He worked his way up her arms to her shoulders, gently at first, then with more pressure, kneading the taut muscles.

“And now?”

Dante’s hands slid forward to trace her collarbone, and she tipped her head to one side.

His lips brushed the flushed skin of her temple. “It’s perfect.”

Only when her fingers were prunes and the water was cold did Alessa drag herself from his arms.

Three weddings. But this time was different.

Once, as a girl, she’d been asked to serve as flower girl in a neighbor’s wedding. Marveling at the flock of attendants who fussed over the bride’s hair and adjusted her jewelry, telling her how beautiful she looked, Alessa had dreamed of the day she’d be in the center of it all, surrounded by love and excitement.

Instead, she’d dressed for three weddings alone.

Now, on a day the sun wouldn’t shine, Dante fastened the buttons of her cream-colored dress, studded with diamonds. The first time she’d worn it, on the night of the gala, she’d faced off with a surly stranger who’d looked at her with scorn. Now he stood behind her, gathering her loose curls with achingly familiar hands to brush a kiss on the nape of her neck. He didn’t fuss, and he didn’t tell her she was beautiful. He didn’t have to.

The moon hung like a silent sentinel watching over the city. She wouldn’t have to worry about tripping over the detritus of Carnevale, despite the dark, because this ceremony wouldn’t be on the Peak.

This one was different in other ways, too. Less fear, more hope. Not the naive hope of a young girl, but a hope borne from trial and failure and overcoming.