A gentle squeeze of longing tightens behind my ribs.
“I like the softness and warmth,” he continues, voice softer. “Windows flung open to the breeze, books piled everywhere, your unreasonable number of throws. I like how your place smells like wood and wine—and like you.”
I swallow, tasting the truth in his words. “Are you going soft on me, Mister ex-Playboy?”
A corner of his mouth quirks up. “I’m a one-woman man,cara.”
And he’s mine.Isn’t that what he’s saying?
Without thinking, I step into his arms. He folds around me—chin resting on my head, arms settling as though this is where they’ve always belonged. In the hush that follows, the Palazzo fades.
There is only us.
Maybe, I think more optimistically than I have in the past couple of weeks, we can find our way back to each other—even if the path is steeper than either of us imagined.
Alba is in loungewear…made by Gucci.
Cashmere pants and blouse. She brings with her the clean, sharp tang of her favorite Guerlain perfume softened by a whisper of vanilla.
Toni, who lets Alba shop for her because she doesn’t care, is in a chocolate maxi dress. “It comes with an inbuilt bra,” Alba announces, “Which is the best part about it.”
I wear my usual, comfortable old jeans and a T-shirt.
“I’m so glad harvest is over and you can take a break.” Toni fills our glasses with Franciacorta.
We’re in Alba’s apartment at the Palazzo. Toni and I always stay here when we’re in Florence—neither of us has ever bothered to claim space of our own here.
Toni because she’s accustomed to orbiting between her sisters, and me because my home has always been Pietra Alta. Florence has never asked me to belong to it.
Alba, on the other hand, has made herself entirely at home.
She designed the apartment with intention.
Three bedrooms, a generous office, and a full theatre room—larger even than Nico’s space downstairs. Alba loves movies almost as much as she loves Valentino, and judging by the investments hanging in her closets, that love runs deep.
The staff has already lit the fireplace, flames licking softly against marble, and we’re stretched out on an overstuffed velvet sofa that swallows you whole.
This is, after all, the theatre of an Italian woman with refined tastes and a designer habit—there is no room here for ugly home-theatre excesses.
No cup holders
No plastic trays.
Just crystal champagne flutes balanced elegantly in hand, as God—and good design—intended.
“So, what are we starting with?” Toni asks, leaning her head against Alba’s shoulder as she reaches into the bowl of popcorn.
This isn’t microwave popcorn—nothing in Alba’s kitchen ever is. It’s been freshly popped in Alba’s popcorn machine, lavishly buttered, salted just right, and finished with truffle because restraint is apparently optional in this family.
“Bringing Up Baby,” Alba tells us.
The projector hums and flings a ragged beam of light onto the far wall.
Cary Grant’s perfectly knotted ties and Katherine Hepburn’s fearless laughter flickers to life.
“This is a masterclass in chemistry,” Alba observes.
Toni snorts. “This is a masterclass in chaos,” she counters, tossing a kernel across the room.
