Page 44 of The Mafioso’s Bride

“Enough.”

Luca stands beside me. His coat is gone. The silver tardigrade rests on his black lapel, all eight inaccurate legs pointed away from its body.

His palm rises toward my face and stops before contact. “Giada. May I touch you?”

I cannot put the sounds in the correct order.

“Look what you married,” Papa says. “Broken over a conversation.”

Luca turns toward him. His hands hang open. His body blocks most of the chair.

“What did he say to you?” Luca asks.

I count the legs on his pin. The count stays at eight each time.

“Giada.” He moves into my line of sight without touching me. “Tell me what he said.”

“You married me on an order.”

His mouth closes. “I did.”

“The marriage was strategic.”

“At the church, yes.”

Papa laughs again. “Even he admits it.”

Luca’s attention stays on me. “What else?”

“No man would choose me voluntarily.”

His fingers curl once beside his thigh. “He said that?”

“It is consistent with the available information.”

“No.” The answer lands hard. “It isn’t.”

“You stayed away after I asked you to leave.”

“You asked me to leave.”

The fluorescent whine grows sharper.

“Yes.”

“I gave you what you asked for.”

Mattia's shoe scrapes the concrete outside the door.

“Yes.”

The answers match. They do not repair anything.

Luca looks toward the guard at the stairs. “Take my wife upstairs. Stay outside her door.”

“I can walk without assistance.”

He looks at me again. “Of course you can.”