Chapter Twenty Five
Victoria
By Monday morning, I have convinced myself of nothing.
Which is inconvenient, because I sit at my desk in my office in his building, dressed, pretending to be a competent professional woman with a calendar full of meetings and not a woman who spent most of Sunday spiraling into an internet hole about the man she slept with two nights ago.
The man I let take me to his house.
The man whose bed I slept in.
The man whose bag of lingerie is still sitting in my bedroom because I cannot bring myself to unpack it, return it, hide it, or look directly at it for more than three seconds at a time.
Mario Conti.
I stare at my computer screen without reading a word of whatever report is in front of me.
On Saturday night, I had been shaken.
For a while, badly shaken.
Then, by late Saturday evening, I had talked myself down.
Because I am a rational person. A rational person who had been exhausted, overstimulated, underfed, oversexed, and then stupid enough to read an old article from what was basically an Italian gossip rag.
Of course I had panicked.
Of course my brain had taken one ugly suggestion and sprinted with it straight into catastrophe.
By the time I went to bed Saturday night, I had dismissed it.
By Sunday morning, I was laughing at myself.
How could I even think something like that about him?
Mario?
No. Absolutely not.
It was ridiculous.
Gross, even.
The man had been nothing but careful with me. Intense, yes. Demanding, yes. Infuriatingly arrogant, obviously. But not cruel. Not careless. Not the kind of man who would hurt a woman.
Not his wife.
Not the mother of his children.
I told myself all of that while I made coffee Sunday morning.
I told myself all of that while I ignored the nausea twisting in my stomach.
I told myself all of that while I opened my laptop to catch up on actual work.
And there it was—the article.
Still open.
The mysterious death of Anna Conti.
I should have closed it.
I almost did.
My finger hovered over the button, and I told myself, out loud, “No. Absolutely not. You are not doing this.”
Then I did it anyway.
A new search.
A much more… pointed one this time, involving Anna Conti’s death and the rumors surrounding it.
And then there was more.
Not just one awful article this time.
Some garbage, yes. Some obvious gossip. Anonymous sources. Thinly veiled accusations padded with enough question marks to dodge defamation.
But not all of them were like that.
Some of them looked legitimate.
Older newspapers. Reports. Not wild claims with dramatic, clickbait headlines. But they all held the same careful gaps, the same restrained language. The same strange absence where the cause of death should have been.
Anna Conti died unexpectedly at the Conti residence.
The family requested privacy.
No cause released.
No further comment.
No further comment.
No further comment.
I read article after article after article until the words stopped looking like words and started looking like evidence.
Or not evidence at all, because I know better than this.
I do.
Maybe I’m not a criminal attorney, but I know speculation is not evidence. A death being private and mysterious is not evidence of murder. Wealthy families keeping personal tragedy out of the press is not shocking. It is not even particularly suspicious on its own.
But all of it together?
The way the articles all seem to tap dance carefully around the same words?
I could not stop.
Mario messaged me later. Just a casual message checking in.
I stared at it until my heart started pounding so hard my hands went cold.
I did not answer.
I couldn’t.
What was I supposed to say?
Hi, yes, I ate and rested, and also I spent the morning reading about your dead wife and wondering if you killed her?
Obviously not.
That would be insane.
I am insane.
There is no way the man I spent Friday night with could do something like that.
No way the man who fed me breakfast in his garden Saturday morning, who touched me like I’ve never been touched before, who understood me in a way no man ever has before, could be the same man those articles were talking about.
Those people did not know him.
Those articles did not know him.
Those rags did not know anything.
Not the way I do.
Except.
I don’t know him.
Not really.
I know pieces.
Dangerous pieces. Intimate pieces. Professional pieces. Pieces I keep mistaking for the whole man because my body trusts him faster than my brain can object.
I know what his hands feel like.
I know the sound of his voice when he is amused, angry, close to losing control.
I know he drinks espresso in the morning.
I know his house smells like flowers and food.
I know he can be gentle.
I know he can be ruthless.
I know he has violence in him.
And I know almost nothing else.
What am I supposed to do with that?
Ask him?
How?
How does a person ask a man if he murdered his wife?
There is no version of that conversation that does not destroy whatever tentative thing we have.
If he did not do it, and I ask, he would be offended.
No.
Hurt.
Maybe furious.
Whatever trust there is between us would fracture instantly, and I would deserve it.
And if he did do it?
My stomach churns hard enough that I press a hand against it.
The nausea rolls through me again, sudden and sharp.
I close my eyes and breathe through my nose.
That is another thing.
The sickness.
I have not been able to shake it.
I woke up Sunday morning feeling off, queasy and lightheaded, my stomach unsettled before I even got out of bed. I blamed the rich food because I’m not used to it. Then the nerves.
Then I blamed the articles.
I swallow hard and keep my hand pressed to my stomach, praying for it to pass.
It does not.
I lower my hand from my stomach and look at my computer.
The report is still open.
Quarterly something. Internal something. Words I should absolutely care about because they are probably important and I am being paid an obscene retainer to care about them.
Instead, I open a new tab.
I stare at the search bar for too long.
Then I type: Nausea, lightheaded, no fever, stress
I hit enter before I can talk myself out of it.
Immediately, a list of medical sites appears, each one promising either reassurance or death depending on how alarmed I feel like being.
I choose the least offensive one.
Stress. Anxiety. Gastrointestinal upset. Lack of sleep. Dehydration. Rich food. Hormonal changes. Viral illness.
Not too bad. All relatively normal.
I scroll.
The screen swims slightly, and I blink hard.
I refine the search.
Nausea in morning, anxiety
More results.
I read some more and start feeling a bit reassured.
Stress can trigger nausea. Anxiety can cause stomach upset. Emotional distress can affect digestion.
About what I figured.
I am not sick. I am not dying. I am not having a reaction to my self-induced stress. Just some regular anxiety.
A reasonable conclusion, considering I spent yesterday asking the internet whether the man who made me come so hard I saw the heavens might also be a murderer.
I close that tab.
Then reopen it.
Because apparently, I hate feeling peaceful and reassured.
I type another search before I can stop myself.
Morning nausea, no fever, woman
The results this time are vastly different.
My pulse trips over itself.
I stare at the screen.
No.
Absolutely not.
No, no, no.
I click nothing because I do not need to click anything.
I know what the internet is going to suggest, because the internet has exactly one answer for someone with nausea, lightheadedness, and a uterus.
Pregnancy.
The word is not even fully visible yet, just bolded in a preview halfway down the page, and my whole body goes cold.
Ridiculous.
Completely ridiculous.
I sit back from the computer as if the search results might reach out and grab me by the throat.
No.
I am careful.
Usually.
My mind flashes, traitorous and immediate, to Friday night. And last Friday night.
My bed. His bed. Ripped lace.
His voice in my ear. His hands on my hips. His weight on my back.
The stretch of him inside me.
I press my fingers to my closed eyes.
No.
No, I am not doing this.
I am not adding that to the list.
I am not going from dead wife conspiracy to pregnancy panic in the same forty-eight-hour period like a woman trying to speedrun a nervous breakdown.
I lower my hand and force myself to breathe.
This is nausea from stress.
That is all.
Stress. Rich food. Bad sleep. Not enough food. Not enough water. Too many articles. Too many ridiculous questions that have no basis.
Not pregnancy.
Not that.
Still, my eyes drift back to the screen.
The word sits there, smug and awful.
I close the tab so hard my mouse jumps.
I can’t sit here.
The thought arrives suddenly, fully formed, and once it does, I cannot unthink it.
I cannot sit in this office, in this building, surrounded by Conti Enterprises reports and Conti Enterprises contracts and Conti Enterprises people, while Mario Conti and his family are down the hall or roaming around.
I cannot run into him like this.
I cannot be normal.
I cannot smile and raise my eyebrows playfully at his tone and pretend everything is all right.
Because he will know.
Not the details, but he will take one look at me, and he will know something is wrong. He will see it in my face, in my posture, in the way I fail to hold his gaze.
And then he will ask.
Or maybe not.
Mario does not ask when he already suspects he can get the answer another way.
He will corner me with that calm, terrifying patience and wait me out until I either lie badly or tell him something I have no business saying without verified facts.
I need facts.
Yes, that’s what I need.
I press my palms flat against the desk and stare at my closed browser like I can still see the word in front of me.
Pregnant.
I push back from the desk too fast, and my chair bumps lightly against the credenza behind me.
The sound makes me flinch.
I need to get out of here.
I need to breathe. I need to think.
I need to buy a test and stop sitting here with one more unanswered question.
Because if I am not pregnant, then at least one crisis has been averted.
If I am pregnant—
No.
My hand goes to my stomach again before I can stop it.
If I am pregnant, then this is not a spiral.
This is my life splitting open.
And if the other thing is true too?
If the articles are not just rumors?
If Mario did kill Anna?
My breathing goes short and shallow.
Then what?
What do I do?
How do I carry a child that could be his while wondering if his wife died because he…
The thought is so ugly I gag on it.
Then I simply slide to the floor in front of the trash can and empty my stomach.
Not that there’s much there to begin with—just a few bites of toast and some tea I forced on myself yesterday. But that kind of makes it worse and more painful.
My body does not care.
It rejects all of it.
When I’m done, I sit back.
What the hell do I do now? I just vomited in my trash can like an overwhelmed intern on her first day.
If I was worried about being unprofessional before, that concern has officially been escorted from the building.
There is no saving this morning now.
There is no returning calmly to my chair, smoothing my blouse, and reviewing internal reports.
I grasp for the tissue box on top of my desk and swipe at my mouth, then I grab my briefcase, thankfully on the floor close to me, and rummage for my emergency mouthwash. I swish some of it in my mouth and spit it in the trash can. Not like I can salvage it at this point.
“Get up,” I whisper.
My voice sounds thin.
I reach for the edge of the desk and pull myself to my feet, legs shaky, stomach still clenched.
I need water.
I need to get out of this building before anyone knocks on my door.
I shove everything into my briefcase because it would be suspicious if I walked out without it, then my phone.
There is still no message from him this morning.
Of course there isn’t. Why would there be? I ignored the one he sent yesterday like a coward, and Mario Conti does not strike me as a man who sends a second message when the first one goes unanswered.
I open my calendar with shaking fingers and stare at the blocks of time that require me to be present.
Only an operations follow-up at 10:30.
10:30. Operations follow-up.
I can move it.
I am allowed to be sick. Because I am sick. Possibly in several different ways, but sick enough.
I send Benjamin a message before I can talk myself out of it.
Not feeling well. Please cover the 10:30. I’ll explain later.
Then Ainsley.
Need to work from home today. If anything urgent comes in, text me.
I stare at the words.
They look normal.
Professional.
I hit send.
My stomach rolls again.
I swallow it down, grab my purse, and stand very still for a moment, listening.
The hallway outside my office is quiet.
Good.
I can get to the elevators. Down to the lobby. Out the doors. There is a pharmacy two blocks away. I know because I passed it this morning and thought about stopping for antacids, then told myself not to be dramatic.
Apparently, I should have stopped.
I take one step toward the door.
Then another.
My hand is on the knob when my phone buzzes.
My entire body locks.
For one stupid, terrible second, I know it is him.
I know it.
I look down.
Ainsley: Are you okay?
I almost laugh.
No.
Absolutely not.
I type back with fingers that do not feel entirely attached to my hand.
Me: Fine. Just nauseous. Probably something I ate.
I put the phone in my briefcase, send out a little sorry to the janitorial staff for the mess I left, open the door, and step into the hall.