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“He was asking your boobs.”
“Then you two have a shared interest.” Her chin stays high and gorgeous, and neither of us calls it what it is on the floor. “What of Allegra, with her hands all over you?”
“That was nothing. The deputy minister—”
“He may have been appreciating the scenery, but he didn’t treat it like braille, unlike someone’s ex-girlfriend.”
The realization hits all at once, and I grin. “I finally know what you look like when you lie.”
She blinks at me. “What?”
“You told Allegra that you’re not jealous.”
Her lips part, indignant. Then she huffs and puts her party face back on. “I am not jealous. I thought I should play the part of a jealous new bride. That’s all.”
“Here? Where no one but me hears you?”
“And what about you, Lupo? Worried about a deputy minister, of all things.”
“What’s that—”
“If you should be worried about anyone, it’s the club owner. Much more fun, that one. He doesn’t leave me all alone to dance with his ex. Younger too—”
I pull her in close and kiss her, propriety be damned. She tastes like sweet prosecco, and her lips make me lose my mind. When I pull back to break the kiss, her pupils are blown. “We should go. Now.”
“Yeah,” she gasps.
We head out quickly. The valet line, the cameras again, the long black car with Enzo behind the wheel and the partition already up because Enzo has driven for me a long time.
The door shuts. The city starts sliding past.
“You’ve known her your whole life?” Veda says to the window. Her posture says she’s less interested than she was on the dance floor, and I’m not sure why, other than that big brain of hers worked overtime from here to there.
“Allegra is ancient history.”
“She ordered your drink. She spoke Italian into your ear for forty-one minutes of dinner and one entire waltz.” She turns from the window, eyes dark. “History doesn’t retire in this town, does it?”
“You counted the minutes,” I say, and I’m not smiling now either. “The minister counted the freckles between your tits, so we’ll call the surveillance mutual.”
“You don’t get to be jealous. This marriage is a fraud.”
“Then neither do you, and yet here we both are.” The car takes the curve past the Duomo, and the space between us on the seat has been shrinking since the valet line. “Say it plainly, Doctor. Whatever’s in your teeth, say it.”
“She had a lifetime with you.” Her voice drops low and rough. “I have a contract, a purple dress, and thirteen days, and I still wanted to put a fork in her hand at the fish course. Tell me I’m crazy, and I’ll believe you.”
“You’re nuts. Like me. Come here.”
She’s across the seat before I finish saying it, and this time nobody’s quiet.
The kiss is rabid. Her fingers wreck my bow tie. I gather purple silk up her thighs in fistfuls, and she climbs over me in a rustle of it, knees on leather.
“The dress survives,” she orders against my mouth.
“Fine, but nothing else.” I hook her underwear aside and find her already slick, and the sound she makes has teeth in it. She gets my belt open with two furious pulls. Veda takes me in hand and sinks down hard, and “fuck” arrives from both of us in stereo, her forehead slamming into my shoulder. The city lights are strobing through the glass across all that purple.
She rides me rough. I meet her rougher, gripping her hips hard enough to leave prints. Her nails answer through my shirt. When she moans too loud, I don’t cover her mouth this time—I want the memory loud.
“Mine,” she breathes, vicious, right at my ear. “Tonight you’re mine, not hers. Say it.”
