“And you’ll let that horrible woman Chiara line up interviews with every major wine, finance, and business magazine about how you appointed the first female head winemaker at one of the largest wine houses in Europe.”
“Even if she’s my daughter?” he muses aloud.
“No, Papà,” I correct him. “You’ll say she’s an award-winning winemaker who was trained by Matteo Rinaldi, who announced her as his successor and who has been running the flagship Bolgheri Alighieri estate, Tenuta Pietra Alta.”
He taps his hand on the desk and thinks about it for nearly five minutes.
Five endless minutes where I wonder if I’ve overplayed my hand—and what the hell I’ll do if he tells me he won’t change his mind. The ugliness of what I’ll have to do, what Alba and Toni will have to do if that happens, isn’t something I’m comfortable with.
Finally, with a slow, irrevocable nod, Papà announces, haughtily, “Very well. Nico remains. You are appointed.”
There is no apology. But I wasn’t expecting that.
I rise. “Grazie mille, Papà.”
When I’m at the door, he says to my back, “You’ve learned politics.”
I pause, my hand brushing the cool stone jamb. I half turn to look at him. “No, Papà. I always knew it. And as someone who understands it better than anyone, you know that in politics, timing is everything.”
I don’t wait for his response. I step into the corridor, steady in my choices—and in his.
42
NICO
Rio Russo calls as I’m getting ready to leave my office—possibly for the last time.
Tomorrow, at an emergency board meeting Cesare thinks I don’t know he’s called, I will lose my job—and with it, my place at the Palazzo.
I almost let the phone ring out. I’m in a hurry to get back to my apartment.
My wife just texted to let me know she’s there, and I want to get to her. I want to tell her about the storm that’s coming.
I need to pack up my place, figure out where I’m going to live, and decide what comes next. There’s a lot to dismantle. A lot to rebuild. And somewhere in the middle of all that, I’m hoping I’ll get to make love to her.
If someone had told me I’d be smiling at the prospect of being fired from my coveted role as CEO of the House of Alighieri, I wouldn’t have believed them.
Then again, that was before I fell madly in love with Alessia Alighieri.
“You packed up your office, yet?” Rio asks.
“Si.” I look at the two boxes. Both contain books. The rest, they can throw out for all I care.
“I suggest you unpack.”
I short-circuit for a second. “Come again.”
“She went to him. Threatened to revoke her and her sisters’ proxies.”
I swallow. “She?”
I don’t have to ask, but I do anyway.
“Your wife.”
Right!
I close my eyes and draw in a slow breath, tasting the faint tang of paper and ink in my office.
