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Voices rise and fall in distant rooms, but we’re the only ones in the main hall. I don’t want to start off on the wrong foot. I need to be honest with her. “I’m not sure I’ll marry any one of them, Marialena.”
She sighs, almost sadly.
“You will. You will see.” She pauses and gives me a curious look. “Something tells me… You don’t know who we are, do you, Vittoria?” Her eyes focus on me with concern. She isn’t the first to suggest that.
I hear Romeo’s deep baritone from the other room and look to see him conversing with one of his brothers. Tavi? Orlando? God, I can’t keep track. From here, I can watch Romeo unobserved, but I keep my observation brief.
He’s taken off his suit coat and rolled up his shirtsleeves. I swallow at the corded muscles of his forearms beneath the crisp white fabric, so utterly masculine my heart flutters. The rich outlines of his shoulders strain against the fabric of his dress shirt, and for one crazy minute I imagine slipping the shirt off and revealing his naked skin. Everything about him is commanding, defiantly masculine, though he carries himself with an almost nonchalant grace. Comfortable in his skin. His dark brown hair has flecks of gold, and curls in a way that’d be almost feminine if not for the cut of his jaw and his ruthlessly cold eyes. The shadow of stubble covers his chin, and I idly wonder what it would feel like against my skin.
I drag my gaze away. An attractive young man who doesn’t look like one of the brothers steps through the doorway and sees us. Though his face is unlined and shaven, giving him the appearance of someone younger than Romeo, there’s a world-worn weariness about him that’s unmistakable.
“Santo, meet Vittoria,” Marialena says. “She’ll be staying with us for the next thirty days.”
A muscle ticks in his jaw. He gives me a look one might give a pesky fly, his lips curved downward in a frown. “I heard.”
Marialena sighs and places her hand on his arm. “My grandfather was an eccentric old man, Santo. It wasn’t right that he excluded you.”
He shrugs her hand off. “Good luck, Vittoria.” He curses under his breath. “You’ll need it.”
He storms out the front door. Yeah, there’s all kinds in this house, and the only one I like is standing beside me.
“You ever get your Tarot cards read?” Marialena asks.
Oh Lord. “Uh, no.”
Her eyes gleam with excitement, and she’s going on and on about a friend of hers that does readings and the phases of the moon and horoscopes, but I’m only half-listening. Romeo’s having a heated conversation with his brother, and he’s looking straight at me.
I recall the feeling of his fingers in my hair, the fear that spiked my pulse before it melted to heat, his apology in the guest room.
If I leave tonight, I’ll spend the night in my car.
If I stay, I’ll spend the night in a castle.
If I leave, I’ll get nothing. Not a penny.
If I stay, even if I don’t marry any of them, I’ll end up with enough money that I can start my life again.
And if I marry one of them…
Nonna passes by me with a knowing smile. I want to ask her what exactly she knows. Ask her what the Montavio family has to do with mine, but she speaks hardly any English and I don’t know if she’s offering anything new.
I’ll ask her, though, even if I have to study Italian to find the answer.
I’ll get the answer, and hopefully before Romeo does.
“Vittoria.” I blink at the sound of my name in that deep, masculine voice. Romeo’s still staring at me from across the room. He beckons to me with his finger. “Come here.”
Do I go? I’ve never obeyed a summons from a man before, and I’m not sure why I’d start now.
“Go,” Marialena says furtively. “Just trust me. Please.”
I fold my arms on my chest and wait for a beat to pass.
His jaw tightens. “Please.”
I don’t miss Marialena’s gasp.
I walk to him, ignoring the way his brothers laugh. Marialena whispers to me, “Oh yeah. Romeo wants you. I don’t know if I ever heard him say please.”
When I reach him, he gestures to the older man who accompanied him the night before. “This is Leo, my father’s youngest brother. He thinks he might have known your father.”
I look at him in surprise. “Did you?”
He nods. “His name was Frances, no? Worked in NYC.”
My hope deflates. I shake my head. “I’m sorry, no. My father was Richard Mellow. DeSanto was my mother’s maiden name. She took it when my father died.”
Romeo frowns. “Why?”
“Why what?”
“Why did she not keep your father’s last name after his death?” The concept of a wife not keeping her husband’s name seems to bemuse him.
