He Claimed My Sister So I Married A Mafia Don Chapter 05
I Chose to Leave
Matteo turns his phone toward me.
“Dante wants to talk.”
I’m standing at his kitchen counter, cutting a peach.
I set down the knife.
The message is exactly what I expect.
A need.
No question about whether I have one of my own.
“You can say no,” Matteo says.
“I know.”
I look through the window at the front steps.
“Ten minutes. Outside.”
He types the reply.
“Would you like me to stay?”
“Until he gets here.”
“All right.”
Dante arrives twenty minutes later.
The guard at the gate calls the house before letting his car through.
For once, he has to wait for my answer.
When he gets out, he looks first at Matteo.
Then at our joined hands.
Then at my ring.
His face goes still.
“Adriana.”
“You wanted to talk.”
“Alone.”
I turn to Matteo.
“I’ll be all right.”
He nods.
“I’ll be inside.”
He lets go of my hand and walks back into the house.
Dante watches the door close.
“He’s enjoying this.”
“Then you can leave.”
His eyes return to mine.
“I didn’t come here to fight.”
“Good.”
He looks tired.
I know how little sleep it takes to put that crease between his eyebrows. I used to notice it before he did.
“Get in the car,” he says.
“No.”
“We can talk on the way.”
“To your engagement party?”
“To ours.”
“I withdrew. In writing. You approved the new arrangements.”
“I thought you’d come back.”
“I know.”
He stares at me.
“You knew?”
“My father told me you wanted them to keep preparing. I assumed you meant what you said.”
“You knew I didn’t want Bianca.”
“You should have told Bianca.”
His jaw tightens.
“She understands now.”
“That must have been an unpleasant conversation.”
“Adriana.”
“What?”
He glances toward the house.
“Is this because of him?”
“No.”
“He picked you up that morning.”
“After I ended our engagement.”
“How long had you been talking?”
“About hotel budgets? Years. About going to dinner? After I left you.”
He looks away.
I wait until he looks back.
“If you’re here to accuse me of cheating, we’re done.”
“I’m trying to understand.”
“Then listen to my answer.”
A breeze moves the ribbons on his car.
I remember choosing them with his mother while Dante took a call from Bianca in the hallway.
He had come back just long enough to say we were taking forever.
“You can’t marry him to punish me,” he says.
“I’m not.”
“Our families have been planning this for years.”
“And they’re still speaking. Their businesses are still open. Nobody needs me to marry you to keep them that way.”
“That isn’t the point.”
“Then what is?”
He takes a step closer.
“We had a life.”
“I had a room in a house where my sister could overrule me.”
“That’s not fair.”
“She had unrestricted access. She had my office. You let her decide how we lived, then told me I was difficult when I objected.”
“I’ll change the instructions at the gate.”
I say nothing.
“She can return the key. I’ll have her things moved.”
“You told everyone she belonged there.”
“I was angry.”
“At me.”
He lowers his eyes.
“Yes.”
“For asking you to stop humiliating me.”
He drags a hand over his face.
“I shouldn’t have posted the comment.”
“Or liked the one saying my family sent the wrong daughter.”
“I wasn’t thinking.”
“I know. That was the problem. You could hurt me without even stopping to think.”
He looks at the ring again.
“What does he know about you?”
The question catches me off guard.
Then I think of Matteo asking whether I wanted company.
Remembering which meeting I was worried about.
Listening when I said no.
“He asks,” I say.
Dante’s mouth tightens.
“I know you.”
“You knew how long I’d put up with something before I cried. You knew what to say to make me feel guilty afterward.”
“That isn’t all we were.”
“No.”
For a moment, neither of us speaks.
There were good days.
I don’t have to erase them to remember the rest.
“We can fix the house,” he says. “The room. Whatever you want.”
I look past him at the waiting car.
“You can do what you want with it.”
His face lifts.
“I’m not coming back.”