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“What do you mean?”
“You and Alessia. You know we all love her, Max, but it’s understandable that you would still feel resentment towards her for what she did.”
Max grunted in response.
“Or is there another reason you’re imitating Gabe so perfectly?”
As if on cue, their cousin Gabe sauntered in, a look on his face that was half scowl, half grimace. “I can’t hear myself think in there. Your children are beautiful, Fiero, but so goddamned loud.”
“All children are loud,” Fiero laughed, shaking his head. “Come and join us.”
Gabe grabbed the scotch bottle and came to the table, turning a chair backwards and straddling it, so he could rest his arms along its back.
Fiero poured him a measure of scotch and Massimo watched as one of the servants at Villa Fortune cleared the table.
“Are you staying over?”
Massimo shook his head. “I have Raymond waiting,” he referred to his long-time chauffeur.
“Naturalmente he wants to return home. He’s a newly-wed after all,” Fiero reminded Gabe with a wink.
“For the second time.” Gabe’s demeanour shifted slightly, his eyes appraising Massimo. Though he was a cousin to Fiero and Massimo, the six Montebello grandchildren had been raised together, as one family – they were all like siblings and they spoke with the same frankness. Gabe threw back a generous measure of scotch, replacing the glass on the table top a little heavily. “How’s it going?”
“Fine.”
“You don’t seem fine.”
Max laughed. “Coming from you?”
“What does that mean?”
Max ran his hand through his hair, shaking his head a little. “Nothing. Forget it.” He pushed out a sigh. “Things with Alessia are…complicated.”
Gabe’s eyes narrowed. “Why?”
Max looked at him directly, sensing he wasn’t quite done.
“Why did you marry her again if you’re still angry?”
“I’m not angry.”
“You seem it.”
Fiero leaned forward, taking over from the too-direct Gabe. “You don’t seem like yourself,” he supplied instead. “That’s what I was saying – affairs are complicated. It’s okay to love her and still be angry with what she did.”
“I’m not,” Max answered swiftly. “As it turns out, Alessia did nothing wrong.”
Fiero and Gabe exchanged a glance. “We all saw the photographs.”
Massimo tilted is head in a silent concession. “It was a drunken kiss. She didn’t sleep with the guy.”
“The photos looked…”
“They were compromising,” he admitted. “But
that was the extent of it. And I can’t blame her, even for that.”
“For kissing some other guy on your first wedding anniversary?”
