Page 103 of The Fall Affair

She kissed both my cheeks. “You Americans, what is it you like to say? I have daddy issues.”

I probably shouldn’t have laughed, considering the subject matter, but her honesty was refreshing. “Thank you for coming.”

She looked over at the front gardens. “Bellissima.”

“My grandmother—” I caught myself and shook my head. “Our grandmother loved a wild garden. It matched her personality.”

“And you? Does it match yours, too?”

“Umm… No, definitely not. I’m more of a rose bush, trimmed neatly with a bunch of thorns.” I nodded toward the house. “Come in. The apartment is upstairs, but I thought maybe we could sit out back under the loggia down here. I need to open wine and grab the food I put together first.”

She eyed the antique store. “I heard about the shop when I was little. When I got older, I thought about coming and pretending to be a shopper. Just so I could meet my—” She caught herself, the same way I had. “Our father’s mother. He spoke about her a lot.”

Upstairs, Camilla continued to take everything in. She set the wine she’d brought on the table and picked up one of the bottles Matteo had given me. “Ooh… this is one of my favorites. It’s made here in Montepulciano, yes?”

“Right next door. I’m actually…” I hesitated, still getting used to things. “I’m dating the owner.”

Her mouth curved to a grin. “Smart girl. Free wine.”

I chuckled, pulling the corkscrew from the drawer and twisting it into the cork. It was startling how quickly she felt like someone I could’ve been friends with under different circumstances. “I dug out some photo albums. They’re already outside.”

Before we headed down, Camilla glanced at the refrigerator, her eyes catching on some photos I’d found over the past few weeks and hung there. One, in particular, seemed to snag her attention.

“That’s her. The one and only Sophia Bianchi,” I said. “I found that picture in a box. It really captures the spirit of who she was.” The photo was Nonna riding her purple Vespa, a silk scarf tied around her head, oversized Gucci sunglasses covering her eyes, and bright red lipstick that hadn’t faded a bit in the lifetime I’d known her. Sitting sidesaddle on the back was her best friend and partner in crime, Francesca, both of them grinning like they owned the world.

Camilla shook her head. “I should’ve come to see her when I was a teenager and curious. I can tell by this photo that I missed out.”

I didn’t want to rub it in that she had, so I grabbed two glasses and the wine and asked her to carry the platter downstairs for me. “Come on. There are a ton more photos downstairs.”

We spent nearly half an hour looking through two old black-and-white albums. When Camilla saw baby pictures of Nonna, she took out her phone and scrolled to find one of hers that her mom had posted on her twenty-fifth birthday. I would’ve thought the photos were of the same baby, except one was in black and white and the other color. It was the first of many similarities we noticed.

At one point, she stared down at a picture of our dad that had been taken probably twenty years ago.

“This is how I remember him.” She paused and then met my eyes. “What was he like, as a dad?”

I thought back to the man I once believed I knew and shook my head. “He was…amazing. At least, I never saw anything else. He made pancakes with strawberry eyes and nose, blueberry mouth, and whipped cream eyebrows.” I smiled sadly. “Even when I was fifteen and got embarrassed when my girlfriends stayed over. He never missed a birthday or a school event, and I thought all other men couldn’t hold a candle to him. Until recently, when I found out he was like the rest of them in my life.”

Camilla’s lips curved into something that wasn’t quite a smile. “He never made me pancakes, didn’t come to a single school event, and when I was six, I waited for him to call like he usually did on my birthday, and he never did. I never heard from him again.”

I felt a heaviness in my chest. “I’m sorry.”

She shrugged, but I saw the sadness in her eyes. “My therapist, she says I shouldn’t apologize for other people’s behavior. But I still do it.” After a quiet moment, she tilted her head. “Did he ever seem…guilty?”

I wanted to say yes. That I saw little cracks in his otherwise perfect facade, little hints that showed he carried the weight of another life. But the truth was worse. “No. He seemed happy. When I was with him, I felt like we were his whole world.” A bitter laugh rose from my chest. “Turns out, we were only half of it.”

Her eyes dropped, and it looked like she was on the verge of crying. “Do you hate me for that?”

“No. I hate him. Not you.”

She looked up at me and something lit in her eyes. “I hate him, too. For pretending I didn’t exist. But sometimes…I hate myself for thinking about him and wondering if he loved me.”

Her words cracked something open in me. I leaned forward and squeezed her hand. “It’s okay to wonder, but we can’t let his choices define us and how we see things.”

Camilla gave me a sad smile. “I used to chase the boys who I knew would leave. Now I date men who are twenty years older and have fewer places to go. I don’t think we need Sigmund Freud to figure out why I’ve made the choices I have.” She stared off for a moment. “What about you? Do you have trust issues with men?”

I leaned forward and grabbed the bottle of wine, refilling both our glasses. “We’re going to need more of this for that question.” Sitting back in my chair, I took a moment to reflect on my relationship history. “Yes, but I had issues before finding out my father lived a double life. The two serious relationships I had ended in disappointment, and I work in divorce law, so I spend my days witnessing what happens to marriages that started happy and end in cheating, lying, and stealing. I was wary of men before, but deep down I still held out hope that they weren’t all bad. After all, my dad was a good man.” I scoffed and sipped my wine. “The funny thing is, finding out that not even he was trustworthy probably had me building an even bigger wall to protect myself. But then I met Matteo, and he didn’t hit the brick wall and walk away like most men do. Instead, he quietly took it down brick by brick without me even noticing.”

Camilla smiled. “You are in love, yes?”