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Blinking back tears, Annabelle waited for the gate at the end of the drive to open. Then she pressed hard on the accelerator to quickly put distance between her and Dante.
29
Annabelle sat with her feet curled under her bottom on the terrace of her father’s home, listening to Katydids and the occasional sound of a distant vehicle’s engine. She had helped herself to her father’s spirits and fixed a glass of vodka and cranberry juice, which had done a wonderful job of calming her nerves.
The door behind her opened, and she glanced over her shoulder. “Hi, Daddy.”
“Hey, honey. I just got in from dinner with Max and his wife, and Grace told me you were here. What’s going on?” He kissed the top of her head and lowered onto the chair on the opposite side of the table.
Annabelle released a controlled exhale. “Dante and I had a fight, and I needed to leave the house.”
“Oh. You fought, and then you left him at home?”
She thought she heard judgment in his tone. “Yes,” she answered reluctantly.
Her father ran his fingers through his hair and didn’t speak for a long time. Annabelle welcomed the silence because she was afraid of what he would say when he did speak.
“You shouldn’t be here,” Clifton finally said.
Her heart sank. “What do you mean?”
His chest expanded, and he blew out a puff of air. “Honey, when you fight with your husband, you shouldn’t run off and come home. That’s not the way to solve your problems. I regret letting you come home when the two of you were married the first time. I thought I was protecting you, but I… contributed to the end of your marriage. If you had stayed at home, you and Dante could have probably worked out your differences. Instead, I let you move back in when you asked, and… I don’t know… Maybe I needed you here because Iwas lonely. Your mother had passed only months before. I wasn’t thinking, and I was a little selfish.”
Annabelle didn’t know what to say. She remained silent, eyes trained on the reddish-pink hue of the liquor in her glass.
After a time, Clifton continued. “I also think I was too involved in your marriage from the beginning. Dante’s ego must have been bruised when I supplied the apartment and the furniture.”
“You were being helpful.”
He nodded. “Yes, but my gifts were probably an insult to a proud man like him.”
He was right. Annabelle saw that now, but she never saw the problem back then. Her eagerness to accept her father’s gifts had probably bruised Dante’s ego. When they argued the night he gave her the perfume bottle, he had confirmed his discomfort with her father’s generosity, and accepting those items without discussing the decision with Dante had probably made the situation worse.
“If you want your marriage to work, you have to work through the rough periods.”
“I know, but I don’t know if it’s going to work this time,” Annabelle said in a thick voice. She twisted the Asscher diamond on her finger.
“Why not?” Clifton asked, alarm in his voice.
Annabelle shrugged, unable to tell him the truth. That their marriage was never intended to last in the first place. She and Dante had lied to him and everyone else and pretended to be in love. Her father would be disappointed if he learned the truth about what she’d done.
“One thing I do know—running and hiding is not the answer. Do you love Dante?”
Tears crowded her eyes. Choked up, she nodded.
She had probably never stopped. That’s why she’d struggled whenever she saw him around town over the years.
“Then you have to be willing to put in the work to save your marriage. Fighting is normal. I wish I could have one more fight with Priscilla. Her death was extremely hard to accept because of its suddenness. How could a headache lead to death? I would do anything to hold her one more time and kiss her one more time. If you love Dante, think about how you would feel if you can’t see him anymore, hold him anymore, kiss him anymore. Think about what your life would be like without him.”
There was no life without Dante. How could she possibly go back to life before their second marriage?
“You can stay the night, but then you need to go home. Your home is with your husband,” Clifton said gently.
Annabelle knew he was right and nodded. “Yes, Daddy.”
They talked for a bit longer, reminiscing about the days when they were a family of four. They laughed hard and shed a few tears before Clifton finally pushed up from the chair.
“Time for bed.”
