He Claimed My Sister So I Married A Mafia Don Chapter 07
Let Them Read It
By the time Dante leaves the hotel, someone has already sent me a video.
He stands at the microphone beneath the flowers Bianca chose.
“There will be no engagement tonight.”
A murmur moves through the room.
Then someone asks about me.
Dante looks down.
“Adriana and I have ended our engagement. What happened afterward was a private misunderstanding.”
I stop the video.
Private.
Half a dozen accounts have posted photographs of my sister with his hand resting on her waist.
Under the newest one, someone has written:
She found herself a Rinaldi. Of course a De Luca wasn’t enough.
Matteo sits across from me.
He waits while I read.
“Do you want to answer?” he asks.
“Yes.”
I open the folder I made the morning I left.
Our engagement announcement.
The photograph.
Dante’s comment beneath it.
The insult he liked.
Then the email in which I ended the engagement, dated before Matteo came to get me.
I play Dante’s voice message once.
“You’re the one I’m marrying, Adriana. Don’t turn this into a problem.”
Matteo hears it from across the table.
He doesn’t interrupt.
I select the recording and add a transcript.
Then I write.
Dante De Luca and I were engaged when he publicly called my sister his fiancée. I ended our relationship that day and notified both families in writing the following morning.
My relationship with Matteo began afterward.
I withdrew from today’s celebration six weeks ago. I did not ask anyone to replace me, and I did not participate in the arrangements that followed.
The attached records establish the timeline. Please stop claiming that I pursued my sister’s fiancé or left mine for another man.
I read it twice.
Then I turn the phone toward Matteo.
“Does that say anything it shouldn’t?”
He reads slowly.
“It says what happened.”
I post it.
Within twenty minutes, the account that published the original photograph adds a correction.
Others share the recording.
Some people apologize.
Some find a different reason to dislike me.
At least now they have to read what I actually said.
My father calls.
“You should have spoken to us first.”
“I did. Six weeks ago.”
“You know what I mean.”
“Yes. You wanted another chance to ask me to stay quiet.”
He exhales.
“Dante should have been clearer today.”
“So should you.”
For a moment, all I hear is movement on his end.
Then my mother speaks.
“Bianca’s getting terrible messages.”
“So did I.”
“That doesn’t make it right.”
“No. It didn’t then, either.”
She goes quiet.
I rest my hand on the table.
“I haven’t asked anyone to contact her. I’ve corrected what people were saying about me.”
“We were trying to protect the family,” my father says.
“I’m in this family.”
The words come out more quietly than I expect.
He doesn’t answer immediately.
“I know.”
“I need you to remember that before the next time you ask me to absorb something for everyone else.”
“We should have stopped it sooner.”
“Yes.”
I let him sit with that.
Bianca sends a message that evening.
You knew he didn’t love me. You let me look like an idiot.
I read it once.
Then I reply.
I told everyone I was leaving. What he promised you afterward was between you and him.
I mute the conversation.
Over the following week, my father tells me he has ended the extra payments he made whenever Bianca complained that her allowance wasn’t enough.
My mother asks whether I would come to dinner if Bianca weren’t there.
I say I’ll think about it.
Neither change gives me back the years before it.
But I notice that, for once, they aren’t asking me to apologize.
Dante requests his ring through the planner.
I return it by insured courier.
That evening, Matteo finds the receipt beside an unopened stack of wedding brochures.
“Already?” he asks.
“My mother.”
He sits beside me.
“We don’t have to open them.”
“Do you think we’re rushing?”
He looks at me.
“Do you?”
“Sometimes.”
“Then we slow down.”
When he proposed, we were alone in my apartment.
No fathers waiting for an answer. No business discussion attached.
He told me he wanted to marry me.
I asked what would happen if I needed more time.
He said he would keep asking me to dinner.
Now he picks up a brochure, then puts it back.
“We could wait a year.”
“Would you mind?”
“I’d mind if you married me because you felt you couldn’t change your mind.”
I take his hand.
“Six months,” I say. “Then we talk about a date.”
“All right.”
He reaches for the takeout menu beneath the brochures.
“What do you want tonight?”
For once, that’s the only decision I have to make.