“What?” Alba asks.
“Am I supposed to forgive him now for lying to me about Matteo?” I muse.
“Technically, he didn’t lie,” Alba points out, waving her glass toward me.
“Technically, you didn’t lie either,” I sneer at her. “You just hid things from me.”
“Ladies!” Toni raises both hands, palms out. “Calm your tits! Did you hear me? Nico is about to lose his job.”
I pour myself more grappa, already aware that tomorrow’s hangover is going to be epic. There’s the usual kind—the kind you earn by overindulging in wine or cocktails—and then there’s a grappa hangover, which is like waking up in the seventh circle of hell, a place Dante himself would recognize without a map.
“How’s he going to fire him? Who do you think he’s got on the board?” I ponder.
Alba exhales slowly, and her breath turns into a pale cloud between us. “Rainer would jump off a cliff for Papà.”
Rainer Mancini is the Chief Financial Oversight Director for the House of Alighieri trust and a complete simp.
“Rio?” I ask.
Alba shrugs. “He’ll do what’s right for the trust. And I’m afraid he’ll convince himself that keeping Papà happy qualifies as that. Also, Nico just got here, right? He hasn’t established himself yet. Firing him will be framed as correcting a hiring mistake quickly and decisively.”
I stand up and let the blanket fall off me. “But Papà can’t just fire him for hiring me as a winemaker?”
“No. That would be a lawsuit,” Alba acknowledges. “He’s going to manufacture a reason to fire him.”
Toni’s eyes brighten. “We need to figure out what Papà isactuallyplanning to do and when and how.”
The three of us exchange a glance that feels as smooth and inevitable as clockwork.
Sisters.
Strategists.
Survivors.
We carry our drinks—and our cold bodies—into my office in the cellar, where I open a bottle of an elegant Chianti Reserva that Matteo made. This kind of work requires good wine.
Alba pulls up the corporate calendars on her tablet, her fingers moving fast, precise. She doesn’t frown at first. That comes a second later.
“Papà’s stacking meetings,” she says quietly. “Back-to-back. Governance. Compensation. Executive review.” She scrolls again, then stills. “And notice what’s missing.”
I lean closer. “What?”
“Strategy,” she replies. “No long-term planning sessions. No growth reviews. Just oversight. Control.” She looks up at me, eyes sharp. “These aren’t conversations. He’s getting people on his side.”
I turn back to the allocation reports spread across my laptop. At first glance, nothing is wrong. That’s the genius ofit. The numbers add up. The margins are still technically acceptable.
But technically acceptable doesn’t keep an estate breathing.
I trace a column on my laptop screen with my finger. “Delayed releases,” I murmur. “Nothing dramatic. Just enough to choke cash flow.” I flip to another worksheet. “Inventory held back under the guise of market timing.” I browse through the windows of Excel. “Andhere—distribution tightened right before peak ordering.”
Alba exhales slowly. “So when revenue dips?—”
“Nico takes the fall,” I finish.
Not for hiring me or disobedience, but for performance.
Papà will blame him for missed targets and weakened quarters and announce things like “loss of confidence.” Then he can fire him, and no one will say it’s personal; they’ll agree that it’s fiduciary. That will not only get Nico kicked out as CEO but also ruin his reputation.
