They smirk at me as they leave me alone with my thoughts, which invariably circle back to Isabella. To her perfect composure tonight. To the flicker of hurt I glimpsed before she hid it. To the way she walked away from me without a backward glance.
I make my way to my room, shedding my clothes and climbing under the sheets. But I can’t sleep. Instead, I lie awake thinking about how tomorrow, I marry Isabella Vitale.
The thought should repel me. Instead, I find myself picturing her face. Not the one she wore tonight, but the way she looked on that rooftop, breathless and wanting. The way she laughed when I first kissed her. The way her body fit against mine, as if designed specifically for me.
She will be mine. My wife. For the rest of my life. The enormity of that reality settles over me.
Sleep claims me just before dawn, granting only a few fitful hours before my alarm goes off. Before I know it, I'm standing at the altar, watching the doors for my bride's arrival.
When they open, a hush falls over the crowd. Isabella appears on her father's arm, a vision in white lace that makes my breath catch. She's beautiful. Stunningly so. But as they make their slow procession toward me, I can see the tension in her shoulders, the blankness in her eyes.
When Marco places her hand in mine, I feel the frosty stiffness in her fingers, the way she barely touches me even as she takes my arm.
I did this. With every cold word, every dismissive glance, I built this barrier between us. She’s giving me what I want, but that realization doesn’t bring me relief. It highlights just how bad this marriage is going to be.
This isn't going to be a marriage of passion and desire like I briefly allowed myself to imagine. It's going to be a prison for both of us, filled with distance and mistrust.
Maybe Luca is right. Maybe my best defense isn't pushing her away but pulling her close. Making her loyalty mine instead of her father's. The more I think about it, the more I believe it could work. She was putty in my arms on that rooftop. Not just her body, but also her heart.
If I play this right, she can be my pawn instead of Marco’s.
15
ISABELLA
This should be the happiest day of my life. Instead, I feel like I’m being led to a lifetime prison sentence.
I think back to when I first met Alessandro. How my stomach had dropped at the sight of him. Not from dread as I'd expected, but from something else entirely. He wasn't the old, cruel monster I'd imagined. He was magnetic and intelligent, and while I wouldn’t have said he was open emotionally, he offered enough to make me think we might have a marriage built on respect and passion, if not love.
Then came that night on the terrace. The stars above us. His hands on my skin. His body moving inside mine. I'd given him everything, believing foolishly that it meant something.
We’d barely finished when he’d withdrawn emotionally. From the moment we’d left the rooftop, he’s done his best to avoid me and ice me out. At the rehearsal, he looked through me rather than at me, each word clipped, each gesture dismissive.
What changed? Was it something I did? Was he disgusted by my inexperience? Or was it simply that once he'd had me, the chasewas over? Or maybe even worse, he disrespected my father, my family. Had that been his goal?
It doesn't matter now. The reasons are irrelevant when the result is the same. Alessandro Dante has decided I'm not worth his time or attention, and I refuse to waste another moment wondering why. If he wants this to just be a business arrangement, so be it. I still won’t allow him to turn me into my mother, but I’ll stay out of his way if that’s what he wants.
I walk alongside my father as hundreds of New York's elite and powerful watch me walk toward my future as a Dante.
"Smile," my father hisses, his grip tightening painfully on my arm. "Look like you want to be here."
I manage something that probably resembles a grimace more than a smile. I lift my gaze toward my betrothed.
Alessandro stands at the altar, his tall frame dressed in a perfectly tailored tuxedo that accentuates the breadth of his shoulders. His dark hair is slicked back, revealing the sharp angles of his face. Even from here, I can see the intensity of his gaze as it locks onto mine.
My heart stutters painfully in my chest. How cruel that he should look so beautiful on the day he's condemning me to a lifetime of cold indifference.
The memory of our night on the rooftop comes back to taunt me. To tell me what a fool I was. To remind me not to believe in fairy tales.
The closer I get, the more I can see the hardness in his expression. His jaw is set, eyes unreadable. He looks like a man going to his prison sentence as well.
My father places my hand in Alessandro's, and I'm struck by how warm his fingers are. As if warmth can be inside such a cold man. I search his face for any hint of the man who held me under the stars but find only cool indifference.
"You look beautiful," he says, the words meant for my father and the priest, not a truth he’s saying to his bride.
I want to scream, to demand answers about what changed, to ask why he's throwing away the connection we shared. Instead, I straighten my spine and meet his gaze with equal coolness.
"Let's get this over with," I whisper back.
