My father growled and left.
We both knew who I was going to see but he didn’t need to know all the details, like I was ending things with Cara so I could focus my attention on my new wife.
3
Giovanna
After I was ready for the day, I’d noticed a note had been slipped under my door. Naturally, I suspected it was from Alessio and I had been right. The insufferable man would do anything to save his ass.
Well, he didn’t need to try so hard with me. I knew he had a woman he loved and I’d overheard him telling his father last night in the hallway that he’d be discreet. That was right. Discreet. He’d gone out to be with her and his father couldn’t careless, and neither would I.
I looked at the note, written in what I presumed was Alessio’s very neat handwriting.
My dearest Giovanna,
I’ve planned a full day for us to get to know each other better. I feel we got off on the wrong foot and would like a do-over.
Meet me for cappuccinos and cornetti in the solarium at nine.
Until tomorrow, Alessio
I rolled my eyes. Until tomorrow? Had he felt guilty when he returned home from being with his lover, so he wrote a note to me? Jerk.
And a do-over? Clearly, he was aware of his ill-mannered behavior last night. Unfortunately, I had no other choice but tocomply with his request. No matter how much I disliked Alessio Remotti, he would soon be my husband.
In a few minutes, I was to meet my father and Mr. Remotti in the office to sign the marriage license. Alessio and I would be legally married and that scoundrel would probably want to consummate our marriage tonight.
I growled quietly as frustration built inside me. Had I known there was a woman in his life, I wouldn’t have agreed to sign away my life.
How could I compete with the woman who held his heart? I’d been prepared to do everything possible to make him like me, but he’d been with her for years… Years!
He’ll never love you.
The romantic that I was wept for everything I would never have while being married to Alessio. It wasn’t right and incredibly cruel. Since I was a little girl, I’d fantasized about falling in love and marrying the most handsome and honorable man on the planet.
Alessio was incredibly handsome and a little charming, but there wasn’t an honorable bone in his body. He was a ruthless, cunning mafia man just like so many others I knew.
Sadly, I was destined to be miserable for the rest of my life, so the killings would stop.
Why should you be happy? What makes you so special?
I hated it when my conscious called me out.
When I looked in the mirror, I only saw an average Italian woman. There wasn’t anything special about me. I was like most girls except I was the daughter of the Don of the Amano Mafia.
My childhood hadn’t been typical, but at the time, I hadn’t known the difference. I recalled how I’d been driven to school by one of many soldiers that reported to my father. He’d wait in the parking lot all day for me, then drive me home when school ended.
But my illusions of normalcy had been shattered when an enemy of my father’s targeted my primary school. Instead of my usualoneguard, I had three for several weeks. It had never occurred to me to ask why the change.
I would later find out the reason, after masked gunmen stormed the school in search of me and killed some of my classmates. Tensions in my father’s region had escalated and rather than take me out of school and disrupt my routine, my father had assigned extra protection for me.
Yes, I’d gotten out safely, but I was the reason some perished in the hallway. I recalled thinking,one day you’ll get yours, Gigi.
Gigi was a nickname my family called me when I was a little girl. Now that I was a grown woman, I went by my birth name Giovanna or Gia, but only those closest to me called me Gia.
The Mafia life was a deadly one. It was a world I had been born into, and I had no choice but to stay in it. With that thought, I left my room to perform my duties by signing the document and meeting Alessio in the solarium for breakfast, per his request in the note.
A guard at the door of the office nodded at me and opened it.
