“You two don’t look much alike,” he remarks, glancing between me and Ariana.
I stiffen. Of course we don’t. Ariana is Mom and Dad’s biological daughter. I’m the street rat they picked up to keep Damiano happy. But I can’t say that.
“No, we don’t,” I say coolly.
I say nothing more because it wasn’t really a question. His opinion matters to me less than that of far distant stars.
Dad addresses the room with a smile and holds out an inviting hand. “Let’s go in and eat.”
As everyone else walks into the dining room, Andreas stays where he is. “But you’re beautiful in your own way, aren’t you? Your parents sounded pretty desperate to marry you off. Have you been a bad girl, Lucy?”
Andreas is smiling, but there’s something strange about this man. Something calculating. The same calculating look I saw at the gala. I catch Mom’s eye, and it holds a warning. If I make a scene, this will all be over, and I’ll be dead. I bristle and keep my mouth shut.
“Or is it my name you so desperately want?” Andreas smiles. “I get it. The Montoni name is the most prestigious one in Malus, after all.”
His arrogance is astounding. I’ve never felt particularly strongly about being a Barone or the influence my name carries, but right now I feel the urge to snap back at him that a Barone daughter is ten times as prestigious as a second-rate Montoni cousin.
But Mom will be livid if she hears me talking to my future husband that way.
I school my face into blankness and walk into dinner, steeling myself to play the obedient Barone daughter that Mom and Dad want me to be, so that I can keep my head attached to my neck.
Dinner is torture.
The seating arrangement is strategic and cruel. I’m placed between Andreas and Dad, with Damiano directly across from me. Ariana is on Damiano’s right, with Cristiano beside her. Mom sits at the other end of the table, beaming like this is the happiest day of her life.
Every time I glance up, I catch Damiano watching me with such anguish in his eyes that I have to look away. His knuckles are white around his wineglass, and I know he’s barely holding himself together.
I also notice the tension radiating from him whenever Cristiano speaks. The alliance Damiano tried to build crumbled before it even began, and Cristiano knows Damiano went behind his father’s back to arrange that meeting.
I glance down the table at my sister. She’s barely touched her food, pushing it around her plate with trembling hands. Cristiano sits beside her with perfect posture, his expression unreadable as he cuts his meat with precise movements.
“You’ve barely eaten,” Cristiano observes quietly to Ariana. “Is the food not to your liking?”
“It’s fine,” Ariana says, her voice small. “I’m just not very hungry.”
“Nerves?”
Ariana’s eyes flash to his face, then away. “I’m not nervous.”
“No?” Cristiano takes a sip of his wine. “Then perhaps you’re simply unhappy about the prospect of marrying me.”
The table goes quiet. Mom’s smile falters. Damiano’s fork pauses halfway to his mouth.
“Cristiano,” Dad says with forced joviality. “I assure you, Ariana is delighted—”
“Are you?” Cristiano asks Ariana directly, ignoring Dad completely. It’s a power move. A don doesn’t need permission to speak to his future wife. “Delighted?”
My sister’s knuckles are white around her fork. For a moment, something raw flashes across her face. Fear, or grief, or rage, but she buries it quickly. When she speaks, her voice is carefully modulated and perfectly controlled.
“I’m honored,” she says. It’s not an answer to his question, and they both know it. “The Montoni name is very prestigious.”
There’s a long pause. Ariana’s fork trembles slightly in her hand, and she sets it down. She pastes on another smile for Mom’s benefit, tight and strained around the edges.
Damiano is watching this exchange with a frown. I wonder what he’s thinking. Does he disapprove of Cristiano? Or is he just uncomfortable watching his sisters being claimed by men he doesn’t trust?
Andreas, meanwhile, won’t stop talking to me.
“So, Lucy,” he says, leaning closer than I’d like. “I heard about the incident at the restaurant. Terrible business with the Sokolis. You must have been terrified.”
