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Then I walk away.

CHAPTER FIVE

Amanda

The hotel room is too quiet, and that's the problem.

I've tried everything. The TV plays some Italian game show in the background, all bright colors and a host who laughs too hard at his own jokes. Room service brought me a plate of pasta I picked at and abandoned. I scrolled my phone until my thumb cramped, watching other people's perfect dinners and perfect partners and perfect lives flicker past.

My laptop chimes.

The email is from Casa Aurelia's events team. The subject line has three exclamation points and a champagne emoji, which tells me everything about who wrote it before I open it.

Amanda!!! As a thank-you for the incredible work this week, Casa Aurelia would love for you to join us at a gala this Saturday evening. Cars, couture, the whole thing. Invitation is for two. Bring whoever makes the night more fun!

A palazzo party. The kind I've spent years on the wrong side of velvet ropes for. The kind I'd screenshot and sent to Vittoria with forty exclamation points eighteen months ago.

Bring whoever makes the night more fun.

I read that line three times. The cursor blinks at me, patient and merciless.

Whoever.

As if I have a whoever.

I set the laptop aside and pull my knees up to my chest, and for one breath, I let myself feel it.

The thing I never say out loud.

The thing that makes a Saturday gala feel less like an invitation and more like evidence.

I’m lonely.

I’m so lonely the room feels louder because of it.

Then I do the thing I absolutely should not do.

My phone is in my hand before I've decided anything. I find his name sitting there in my contacts because he put it there himself with those scarred, certain fingers and I stare at it.

This is a terrible idea. He's not a whoever. He's a grown, dangerous man who mocked my entire industry to my face and then walked out of a café like a closing door. He's not going to want to put on a tuxedo and drink prosecco with me while I work a room.

My thumb is already typing.

Hi. Random question. I have an invite to a gala this Saturday. Plus one. Casa Aurelia spoiling me. Any chance you want to come?

I read it back. Too needy underneath the casual. Too please don't make me sit in this room alone.

I send it anyway, because apparently I hate myself.

The little sent-receipt slides up. I put the phone face-down on the duvet like that'll make it less real. I pick at the loose thread on my robe and I stand up, sit down, stand up again. I tell myself he's asleep. He's a normal person with normal hours, unlike me, and he won't see it until morning, and by morning I'll have texted again to take it back, haha never mind, found someone, you're off the hook⁠—

The phone buzzes.

I lunge for it like it's the last lifeboat. The screen lights my face up in the dark.

Where.

One word. No question mark. So completely him that I let out a laugh, sharp and surprised. He doesn't even ask why, or who I am, or whether I'm joking. Just where. Like he's already reaching for his keys.