It started out slowly. Under the guise of being a loyal friend, she’d tell me that she’d heard rumors about him with other girls in the city. Her brother was an associate of Angelo’s, and Genevieve would regale me with stories of their wild parties atCosa Nostra-owned strip clubs. She chipped away at my insecurities and planted seeds in my mind, painting a grim picture of my future with Angelo. A future where I’d be home alone while he was out enjoying his time elsewhere. She told me not to get too invested. That I deserved better.
It went against everything I knew to be true about him. Angelo had only ever had eyes for me. But my younger, more vulnerable self also knew how this world worked. I’d grown up in it.
She had me twisted up in knots until I caught her trying to kiss Angelo one day. He rebuffed her, and when I confronted her, she told me she was trying to prove her point. When that didn’t work, she let her mask slip and threw a fit, stating that I didn’t deserve him.
At the time, I thought maybe it was a way of getting back at Ares for not wanting her. But her interest never wavered. She followed Angelo around and meddled in our relationship at every opportunity. If there was one thing I could give her creditfor, it was that when she made it her mission to ruin someone’s life, she committed with her whole heart.
Back then, Angelo never took the bait. But seeing them together now poisons me with envy. They seem well acquainted, judging by the way she’s sitting on his desk, and I have no idea what’s happened between them since we’ve been estranged. If this is part of Angelo’s revenge plot, I have to admit it’s top-tier. He knows how I feel about her. Yet here she is—on our honeymoon.
“Oh my goodness, Abella,” Genevieve drawls in a syrupy sweet voice. “What happened to your face? You look terrible.”
Darkness flickers in Angelo’s gaze as he observes the bruises she’s referencing, and more than anything, I want to know what he’s thinking.
Does it bother him?
“Genevieve.” I spare her a disinterested glance. “It’s been so long.”
“It has, hasn’t it?” She offers me an icy smile. Her shrewd gaze moves over my figure and pauses to linger on the huge rock adorning my finger. “You’ve filled out since I last saw you.”
I almost laugh at her thinly veiled insult. I’m not the same insecure girl she used to taunt, but clearly, she hasn’t changed.
“Thanks.” I return her smile. “I’m in my happy, healthy era.”
Her expression sours, and I can tell she’s biting back a response, but she doesn’t give voice to it. Regardless, I’m not ashamed of my body, and I refuse to let her get to me. I’ll always be short and curvy, but clearly Angelo didn’t mind when he was fucking me into oblivion last night. It’s tempting to tell her as much, but I refrain.
“What are you doing here, Genevieve?” I get straight to the point.
“Oh, haven’t you told her?” She brushes Angelo’s arm with her fingers and laughs. “We like to joke that I’m his work wife.”
Work wife?
Genevieve looks pleased as punch that she’s blindsided me with this information. Meanwhile, Angelo seems wholly uninterested in contributing to the conversation.
I’m annoyed and flustered, but that’s the entire point. He wants me to suffer the same way I made him suffer—until death do us part.
“Did you need something, Abella?” He arches a brow at me.
His words are steeped in provocation. He’s daring me to say something about her being here, but my pride won’t let me. I told myself I’d give our marriage thirty days before I dropped an atom bomb on it. If I plan to stick to that, there’s no point arguing about Genevieve or even Matteo. It won’t change anything in the end.
I have to remember the bigger picture.
“I…need to get on the WIFI,” I blurt.
Smooth, Abella.
He scrapes a hand over his jaw, clearly irritated that I’m not playing his little game. “And you couldn’t ask any of the crew members for that?”
Genevieve smirks, thoroughly enjoying this little show.
“Noted.” I turn on my heel. “I’ll ask someone else.”
Over the courseof the next three days, I see very little of Angelo. True to his word, he gives me space to mourn the loss of Matteo, where he can’t see it. But after what Alessio told me, I’m not even sure I should be mourning him. It’s hard for me to reconcile the Matteo I knew with a version of him that could betray his own brother. I’m still having trouble accepting it. It’slike cherishing a treasured gift from someone for years, only to one day see it cracked open—full of poison that’s slowly killing you.
I was angry at Matteo for forcing my hand into marriage, but I truly believed he did it out of desperation. He was always the quieter one. The softer one. The man who would run from conflict. Women didn’t look at him as often, and I know he struggled to connect with them. So when we entered into a fake engagement, I wasn’t all that surprised when Matteo developed a crush. We spent more time together out of necessity, and while I tried to encourage him to meet someone else, I think he saw me as a ready-made bride who had fallen into his lap by chance.
If it weren’t for my father’s desire to get rid of me, Matteo would have never had a leg to stand on, and he knew it. He dragged it out for six years, hoping something would miraculously change. Admittedly, I felt a little sorry for him. But not once did I ever truly feel threatened. Even if we had married, I know he would have never argued with me when I shut down his physical advances. So I can’t imagine him standing toe to toe with the most dangerous threat of all to steal the Vitale throne. But then again, I guess he didn’t have to…because he sent him to prison.
It's exhausting to think about, so I try not to. Instead, I fill my days with reading, napping, and wandering around the yacht.
