Chapter 24
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Dante
"I'm going with you."
Bianca looks up from her coffee, surprise clear on her face. "What?"
"To see your mother. I'm going with you." I lean against the kitchen counter, already dressed for the day. "You mentioned you’d visit her today. I'm coming."
"Why?"
"Because people are going to be watching us. They'll ask questions. And if I don't know basic things about your mother—like what she looks like or where she's being treated—it'll look suspicious."
It's a reasonable explanation. The kind of thing I'd normally do.
It's also not the whole truth.
The whole truth is that after our conversation in the car, after learning what her mother means to her, after understanding that this woman is the reason Bianca agreed to any of this—I need to see her. Need to understand the leverage I'm using.
Need to face what I'm holding hostage.
"Fine," Bianca says finally. "But you let me do the talking. She doesn't know about the arrangement, of course. I told her I had started seeing someone."
"Then we're dating." I grab my keys. "Let's go."
The drive to St. Catherine's takes thirty minutes. Bianca is quiet, worrying that gold pendant between her fingers like she always does when she's nervous.
"She's going to ask questions," she says as we pull into the parking lot. "About how we met. How long we've been together. She's... observant."
"I can handle observant mothers."
"Can you handle lying to dying women?"
The question is sharp, accusing. Fair.
"If I have to."
"Of course, you can." She unbuckles her seatbelt. "Just... don't be yourself. Be someone she'd actually like."
"I'm charming when I want to be."
"You're calculating when you want to be. There's a difference."
St. Catherine's is nicer than I expected. Private, well-funded, the kind of place where cancer patients get actual care instead of being warehoused. The lobby is bright, clean, smells like flowers instead of disinfectant.
My money is paying for this.
The thought sits heavier than it should.
Bianca leads me through familiar hallways, past nurses who greet her by name, to a room on the third floor. She pauses outside the door, takes a breath.
"Ready?" she asks.
"Are you?"
She doesn't answer. Just knocks and pushes the door open.
"Mom?"
Elena Mancini is smaller than I expected. Frail, almost translucent in the hospital bed, with Bianca's hazel eyes and a smile that lights up her whole face when she sees her daughter.
"Bianca, honey." Her voice is weak but warm. "I wasn't expecting you until this afternoon."
"I wanted to come earlier today. And I..." Bianca steps aside. "I brought someone."
Elena's eyes shift to me, and I see the exact moment she registers what this means. The surprise. The hope. The immediate assessment of whether I'm good enough for her daughter.
I'm not. But I'm here anyway.
"Mrs. Mancini." I move forward, offering my hand. "Dante Vitale. It's a pleasure to meet you."
Her grip is weak, but her gaze is sharp. "Dante. Bianca's mentioned you."
"Has she?" I glance at Bianca, who looks like she wants the floor to swallow her.
"A few times. Vaguely." Elena's smile is knowing. "But the fact that you're here says more than any phone call."
"Mom—"
"Sit, sit." Elena gestures to the chairs beside her bed. "Tell me everything. How did you two meet? How long has this been going on? And most importantly—" Her eyes find mine. "What happened to Adrian?"
Bianca goes very still.
"Adrian and I broke up," she says carefully. "A few weeks ago."
"Good." Elena's response is immediate, firm. "I never liked him."
"Mom—"
"I didn't. He was always too polished, too smooth. Like he was selling something instead of being genuine." She looks at me. "You seem calmer, more yourself."
"I try to be honest about who I am," I say, which is technically true even if the context is a lie.
"And who are you?"
"Someone who cares about your daughter."
"That's vague."
"It's accurate."
Elena laughs, which turns into a cough. Bianca immediately reaches for the water cup, helps her mother drink, and the tenderness in the gesture makes something in my chest constrict.
"So how did you meet?" Elena asks once she's recovered. "Bianca's been very mysterious about it."
I look at Bianca, letting her decide how much truth to tell.
"Through work," she says finally. "Dante was handling some business with Adrian, and we... crossed paths."
Not exactly a lie. But not the truth either.
"Love at first sight?" Elena teases.
"More like irritation at first sight," I say, which makes both women laugh. "Your daughter is extremely stubborn."
"She gets that from me." Elena's smile softens. "But she has a good heart. The best heart. She deserves someone who sees that."
"I do."
And it's not a lie anymore.
Somewhere between the contract and the clothes and the poker night, I started seeing it. The fierce protectiveness. The genuine care for her students. The way she'd sacrifice anything for the woman lying in this bed.
"Good." Elena settles back against her pillows. "Because if you hurt her, I'll haunt you. Cancer might be killing me, but I'll find a way."
"Mom!" Bianca's face is red.
"What? I'm allowed to threaten potential son-in-laws. It's in the mother handbook."
"We're not—he's not—" Bianca stumbles over the words.
"Not yet," Elena says with the confidence of someone who thinks she's seeing a love story. "A mother can hope, can’t she?"
The certainty in her voice is uncomfortable. Because she's seeing what she wants to see. A happy ending for her daughter. A relationship built on actual feelings instead of leverage and blackmail.
We stay for an hour. Elena asks about my work—I tell her I'm in business development, which is technically true. She asks about my family—I mention Giulio briefly, skip over the scandal and my mother's death. She asks about our plans—Bianca deflects with mentions of taking things slow.
By the time a nurse comes in to do vitals, Elena is tired but happy.
"Come back soon," she tells me, gripping my hand with surprising strength. "Both of you. I want to see more of this."
"We will," I promise, and hate that it might be a lie.
In the hallway, Bianca is quiet.
"She likes you," she says finally. "She actually likes you."
"Is that surprising?"
"Yes. She hated Adrian. Was always polite about it, but I could tell." She stops walking. "She thinks we're real."
"Isn't that the point?"
"The point is fooling your family. Not mine." Her voice cracks slightly. "She's dying, Dante. And I just lied to her about something that makes her happy. About thinking I finally found someone who gives a damn about me."
"Bianca—"
"Don't." She starts walking again. "Just... don't."
We make it to the car in silence. I drive, giving her space to process whatever she's feeling but my mind keeps circling back to one thing.
"Why did she hate Adrian?" I ask finally.
Bianca looks at me. "What?"
"Your mother. She said she never liked him. Why?"
"Does it matter?"
"Yes."
She's quiet for a long moment. "She said he looked at me like I was an asset instead of a person. Like he was trying to understand what I could do for him instead of caring about who I was."
"She was right."
"I know." Bianca's voice is small. "I knew it too. Even when I was with him. But I told myself it didn't matter because he was helping with Mom's bills. Because he was stable and reliable and—"
"Safe."
"Yes. Safe." She laughs bitterly. "Turns out he was the least safe person I could've chosen."
"He betrayed you."
"Even worse, he sold me." She turns to face me. "There's a difference."
There is. And the reminder makes anger rise hot in my chest.
"Does it still hurt?" I ask, hating that I care about the answer. "What he did?"
"Yes. Not because I loved him—now when I think about it I don't think I ever did. But because I trusted him. Because I thought we had an understanding, at least. That he'd respect me even if he didn't love me." She looks out the window. "I was wrong."
"He's an idiot."
"He's a coward. There's a difference."
We're quiet for the rest of the drive. But something is churning in my gut that I don't want to name.
Jealousy.
Not because Bianca loved Adrian—she just said she didn't.
But because he had her first. Had her trust. Had her time and attention and the chance to be something real to her. Had her in his bed night after night. Had her kisses. Her smiles.
And he threw it away.
Like the worthless piece of shit he's always been.
"Dante?" Bianca's voice pulls me back.
"Yeah?"
"Thank you. For coming. For being..." She trails off. "For not being an ass to my mother."
"I can be decent when properly motivated."
"What's your motivation?"
You, I almost say. Making sure you don't hate me completely is becoming more important than it should be.
"Success," I say instead. "If your mother thinks we're real, she'll tell you to fight for us if things get difficult. Natural ally."
It's cynical, hence exactly the kind of thing she'd expect from me.
It's also not the whole truth. But some truths are too dangerous to speak out loud and I’m not ready to face this one just yet.
"Right," she says. "You and your strategies."
But something in her voice says she doesn't quite believe me.
We pull through the gates of my estate, and reality settles back in. Tomorrow is Giulio's party. Tomorrow we have to convince everyone that this is real.
I catch her arm before she can walk away. "Bianca? Tomorrow, when we're at that party, when my family is watching—we need to sell this. Completely."
"I know."
"That means touching. Kissing. Pretending we can't keep our hands off each other."
"I understand the assignment, Dante."
"Do you?" I pull her closer. "Because if you freeze up or pull away or look at me like you hate me, this whole thing falls apart. And if it falls apart—"
"My mother loses her treatment. I know." She yanks her arm free. "Trust me, I'm very aware of what's at stake."
She storms upstairs, and I'm left standing in the foyer, wondering when exactly I started caring more about her feelings than the plan.
When protecting her from my world became more important than using her to navigate it.
Matteo was right.
I'm compromised.
And I have no idea how to fix it.