"Bellini's."
Of course.
"I'll wear something appropriate." I stand, smoothing my hands over my jeans. "Anything else?"
Pietro shakes his head. "Just... be civil."
"I'm always civil."
"You told Marco Benedetti his cologne smelled like desperation."
"That was an observation, not an insult. And I was right—he got divorced six months later."
I'm almost to the door when Nico speaks again.
"Vittoria."
I pause, hand on the doorframe. "What?"
"If Rogers says or does anything that makes you uncomfortable, you tell Dante. Immediately."
Something in his tone makes me turn around. Nico's face is still unreadable, but there's a protective edge underneath the ice. The same edge all my brothers carry, buried beneath their various layers of damage.
"I can handle James Rogers."
"I know you can. That's not what I said."
For a moment, we just look at each other. Then I nod.
"I'll tell Dante."
I leave before either of them can add more conditions, more warnings, more reminders that I'm the Sartori princess who needs protecting.
Bruno waits in the hallway.
His wheelchair blocks the path to the stairs, positioned like he planned it. Maybe he did. His eyes track me as I step out of Pietro's office, and I can already see the storm brewing behind them.
"What happened in there?"
I keep my voice light. Casual. "Nothing important."
"Nothing important." He repeats the words like they taste rotten. "Then why wasn't I called?"
"Bruno—"
"Everything is important." His voice rises, bouncing off the marble floors and high ceilings. "Every fucking discussion that happens in this house involves me. I should be in that room. I should know what's being decided."
"It was about my dinner plans. That's it."
"Bullshit."
The word cracks through the air like a whip. Bruno's hands grip his wheelchair armrests, knuckles white against the leather. Two years ago, those hands could break a man's neck. Now they just grip and release, grip and release, searching for something to control.
Pietro's office door opens behind me.
"What's going on?" Pietro steps into the hallway, Nico a shadow at his shoulder.
Bruno wheels himself around to face them. "What's going on is that I'm being excluded. Again. From my own family's business."
