AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I stood there, fists balling beside my thighs. My heart pounded so loud, I thought it was going to burst across the floor and flip like a fish out of water.
Wolfe and Emily had betrayed us.
Disloyalty had a taste.
It was bitter.
It was sour.
It was even a little sweet.
Most of all, it taught me an important lesson—whatever the four of us had, it wasn’t sacred anymore. Our hearts were tarnished. Stained. And guilty.
Unpredictable to a fault.
And bound to break.
Chapter
Five
FRANCESCA
The next morning, I threw the Godiva chocolate in the kitchen’s trash where he would hopefully see it.
I dragged my famished body out of bed voluntarily, driven by the one thing stronger than the pain of hunger—revenge.
The text messages I’d found on my phone were enough to fuel me. They were dated the night of the masquerade, the same night I’d avoided taking out my phone out of fear I’d beg Angelo and make a fool of myself.
Angelo: Care to explain that kiss?
Angelo: On my way to your house.
Angelo: Your father just told me that I can’t come there anymore because you’re soon to be engaged.
Angelo: ENGAGED.
Angelo: And not to me.
Angelo: Know what? Fuck you, Francesca.
Angelo: WHY?
Angelo: Is that because I’ve waited a year? Your father had asked me to do it. I came in every week to ask for a date.
Angelo: It was always you, goddess.
There weren’t any new ones since then.
Eating was still firmly not on my daily agenda—something I’d heard Ms. Sterling complaining to Wolfe about on the phone as I breezed past her, a flowery chiffon wrap dress clinging to my ever-shrinking body.
At this point, my stomach had given up and stopped growling altogether.
Yesterday, I’d forced myself to steal a few bites of bread when Wolfe was busy making his point with Emily, but it wasn’t nearly enough to appease my shrinking gut.
Somewhere in the back of my mind, I had hoped I’d faint or cause enough damage to be rushed to the hospital where perhaps my father would finally put an end to this ongoing nightmare.
Alas, hoping for a miracle was not only dangerous but crushing altogether.
