“Exactly.” Lucia’s smile softens. “And you,signorina, would be?—”
I roll my eyes.
“A Cabernet Franc,” she says triumphant. “Quiet. Elegant. Everyone underestimates it until it’s too late.”
I snip a cluster and let it drop into the bucket with a soft, heavy sound.
“If everyone underestimates me, it’s because I’ve earned it.”
Lucia’s eyebrows lift. “Ah. That’s what we’re doing today? Self-punishment for lunch?”
“No, punishment was Alba, who I just ended a call with,” I joke.
“Is she upset about something?”
“Hmm.”
“This about the pictures on the House of Alighieri Insta?”
I look at her and frown for a moment, and then it lands.
Ah, pictures of Nico and Chiara. My husband is certainly putting it out there—my humiliation—for everyone to see.
But then the murmurs started when our wedding was announced.
The handsome, sophisticated Nico Alarico is marrying the plain, dull, ugly duckling of the Alighieri family—he will obviously keep a mistress.
Usually, those who do have mistresses are discreet—but not my husband. He warned me as much when we met at Palazzo Corsini to discuss the engagement.
It had been a reception for someone or something, I wasn’t sure—I’d been summoned by my father.
I’d walked the marble floors, under the frescoed ceilings, past waiters gliding around with white wine I made at Tenuta Pietra Alta—but not as the lead winemaker. I was told I’d get that job after I married the future CEO of the House of Alighieri.
I didn’t fit in—I never had at these events where women wore silk they couldn’t sit comfortably in, and men spoke in low, confident tones as if nothing had ever been denied them.
I arrived straight from Pietra Alta, hair pulled back too tightly, hands scrubbed raw but still faintly stained. I’d changed clothes, of course—but you can’t erase who you are with a professional Ferragamo outfit, which Alba had insisted I should have.
Nico didn’t have to do much to fit in. He was born for this.
He waited on the terrace for me. I watched him for a long moment—a thrill running through me that this beautiful man would be my husband.
While I dressed for speed, this man even had a haircut so precise it would be called coiffed.
He wore a tailored navy suit that fit him like it had been poured on and an expression of mild amusement, as though the event were a performance staged for his benefit.
He was beautiful. There was no point pretending otherwise.
Not in a delicate way that invited gentleness. He was the kind of handsome that announces itself before you open your mouth—sharp jaw, easy smile, posture relaxed because the world has always adjusted itself around him.
Women noticed. Men deferred.
And then my father put a hand on my shoulder and said, “Alessia, come.”
I walked toward Nico knowing—knowing—that whatever league he belonged to, I was not in it.
He looked at me the way people do when they’re polite but distracted, his gaze flicking briefly over my dress, my face, already filing me into a category that did not require further thought.
“This is my daughter Alessia,” my father said.
