23. Dante
TWENTY-THREE
Dante
N onno always said that words had power, and hence, one should be careful about what we say.
I wish I’d paid more attention to that because I had spoken way too many times without thinking, and now my wife looked at me not only with distrust but with a certainty that I would hurt her.
“Remember the time when you found out that Elika overheard you say shit about her to me?” I asked Dean.
“Yeah.”
“Well, remember when I was talking to you in Nonno’s library about?—”
“You’re kidding me,” Dean exclaimed over the phone.
“I wish. A week after that, she gave me divorce papers.”
“Fuck!”
“ Si .”
“Wait a minute. You said that’s what you wanted, so why don’t you sound happy about it?”
“Remember how you realized you were in love with Elika and you were being a jackass by?—”
“So, you’re in love with your wife, and she won’t give you the time of day?” Dean surmised.
“ Si .”
I heard him laugh softly.
“Fucking hell! One would think you learned from me.”
“One would be wrong.”
“I’m assuming you’re fighting tooth and nail to get your wife back?” Dean correctly guessed.
I stood on the balcony of my suite, the cool night air brushing against my face as I stared out at the city lights of Rome.
I had my earbuds on, and my phone lay on the table in the seating area next to a glass of port.
“Fighting being the operative word, amico ,” I said sardonically.
“Right! She’s not living with you, I assume.”
“No. She left the flat and I’m staying in a suite at the Palazzo. I just…can’t?—”
“Be at home without her?” Dean surmised.
“ Merda! Why didn’t I see it before she left, Dean? What the hell is wrong with me?”
“Sometimes we have to lose what we have to see its value.” Dean’s deep voice crackled slightly through the long-distance call.
Dean now lived in Hawaii, though he used to live in Hong Kong.
After he got his head out of his ass and managed to convince Elika to give him the time of day, he settled with her in Kauai.
The Giordano Hotel Group had a resort there where Elika now worked with our art director while she completed her bachelor’s degree in art history.
“It’s not just that she heard what I said. It’s…how I’ve been with her. Hot and cold. If I felt we were getting too close, I ran away.” I rubbed a hand over my face.
“And I lied to you when I said the sex was merely okay.”
“That was obvious.”
“That I was lying?”
“Yeah,” Dean quipped.
“I think my telling you that she loves you freaked you the hell out.”
“I didn’t believe it then, but now....” I trailed off, gripping the balcony railing.
“Now I think you were right. She did love me, and I ruined it.”
Dean let out a low hum.
“Probably, but love doesn’t just disappear. If I had to guess, she probably still loves you.”
I shook my head, even though he couldn’t see me.
“I don’t know, Dean. She doesn’t trust me, and I can’t blame her for that. I wasn’t the husband she deserved.”
“But how were you supposed to know? Did she ever complain or ask for more or…anything? ”
“I can’t lay any blame on her.”
“It’s not about pointing fingers, Dante. It’s about communication. Being in a committed relationship has taught me one thing, if we don’t talk about how we feel, we’re doomed.”
“Twenty-twenty hindsight?”
“You can talk now,” Dean suggested.
“We’re trying. She told me how I used to make her feel and Christ, Dean I made her feel like shit. I’m an asshole.”
“True,” Dean agreed.
“But you’re her asshole.”
I laughed.
“I don’t think she’d agree that I was hers.”
“You’re not going to give up, are you?”
“No, I’m not…I can’t.” I picked up my port and took a sip of the fortified wine.
“But how do I fix this? How do I make her believe that I’ve changed when I’m not even sure I know how to change?”
Dean chuckled.
“You don’t change...you evolve, you learn, you become a better version of yourself. Look, man, I get it. I was the same way. My brothers and I—we were all workaholics, burying ourselves in the family business because it was what we knew. Because we were good at it. But you know what? Our partners taught us there’s more to life than work. They showed us how to slow down. That’s the kind of love Elysa has for you, Dante. You just have to show her you’re willing to fight for it.”
“I hope she’ll let me,” I muttered.
“Make her let you,” Dean said firmly.
“Win the fair maiden, amico . Do the work, be honest, and don’t back down. If you love her, then show her. She deserves that, and you do, too.”
“Just because you got your fair maiden, you think you’re an expert,” I joked.
“Well, yeah,” he said, feigning arrogance.
We talked a bit longer, and when the call ended, Dean’s words lingered in my mind.
I wasn’t a workaholic, per se, but I did work long hours—always had.
And yet, I had made time to be home with Elysa.
That alone should have been a glaring hint, but I hadn’t seen it.
Hadn’t seen that I’d never made that kind of effort for any other woman.
But for her I had, and that should have told me everything.
I decided that to make my marriage work, I needed to dedicate more time to Elysa and us .
If she forgave me, maybe we should have a belated honeymoon or go on a wine-tasting trip.
She’d talked to me about how she’d had to put my needs before hers, and that had made me feel guiltier for the kind of husband I’d been.
“Do you know that I wanted to travel with distributors so I could see the vineyards the wines I sourced came from?”
“No, I didn’t know,” I said.
“Why didn’t you?”
“Because every time I made a plan, you ordered me to attend some party,” she spat out .
I looked at her, bewildered.
“Why didn’t you tell me? I would’ve ? —”
“What? Would you have said it was okay? Hell no, Dante. You’d have made fun of my job and told me to play Mrs. Giordano.”
“You don’t know that,” I protested.
I wasn’t sure how I would’ve reacted but the truth was I never asked her if she had other plans, assuming she was there for me and to fulfill my needs, whether they be personal or societal.
She looked at me sadly.
“I didn’t think you’d care, so I didn’t say anything.”
It hurt to see myself through her eyes.
She saw a selfish man who didn’t think of anyone but himself.
That wasn’t who I was, but that was who I’d been with her.
“Don Giordano told me you were the best man he knew,” she threw at me.
“I…didn’t see that man, Dante.”
I closed my eyes, replaying her exact words—the ones that had shattered something deep inside me, leaving me hollow.
Nonno would’ve been disappointed, if he had known how I had treated my wife while he was alive.
He would have looked at me with quiet disapproval, which always made me straighten my spine and reassess my choices.
But Elysa never told him.
Hell, she hadn’t even told me.
I wished she had.
Maybe it would have jolted me awake—made me see what I was doing before it was too late.
But I couldn’t lay that blame on her.
I never invited her to share her feelings with me.
This was on me.
Only me!
The following day after a new sleepless night, I sat across from Tommaso Biancardi, the Giordano Hotel Group’s Chief Operating Officer, in the boardroom of our offices in a wing of the Palazzo.
Tommaso had been with the company for over two decades, working his way up from the bottom, and I trusted him more than anyone else in the business, as my grandfather also had.
He was sharp, capable, and had a knack for managing people that I’d never quite mastered.
“Everything’s in place for the new resort launch.” Tommaso flipped through a PowerPoint presentation, showing me the project plan for the launch.
“The marketing team has finalized the campaign, and the construction team says they’ll meet the deadline. We’re ahead of schedule.”
“Good,” I said, nodding.
“That’s good.”
Tommaso paused, his sharp eyes narrowing slightly as he studied me.
“You’ve been distracted lately. I know how much you cared for Don Giordano, so I understand.” He turned off the PowerPoint presentation.
“Do you think maybe you should take some time off?”
“It’s not just losing Nonno.” I sighed, running a hand through my hair.
“Elysa wants a divorce. ”
Tommaso’s expression softened.
“I’m shocked to hear that.”
“Really? Why?” I asked, curious.
“Ah…your wife adores you. Everyone can see it.”
“I may not have seen it,” I tell him with a humorless laugh.
“ Si , sometimes we men are blind,” Tommaso agreed.
“Did I tell you about the time Chiara took the kids and left me?”
I was shocked.
Tommaso had married his childhood sweetheart, and they’d been together since they’d been fifteen years old.
Now, twenty-five years later, they had three kids spanning the ages ten to fifteen—and a marriage that seemed stable and content.
“I didn’t know.”
“It was ten years ago. The kids were little. I was working all the time. Chiara was getting tired of me missing dinners, birthdays—all of it.” Tommaso swiveled slightly in his chair, a distant look in his eyes.
“Then, one day, she’d had enough.”
“I know how that goes.”
He let out a dry chuckle.
“I was a mess without her. Don Giordano took me out to dinner, sat me down, and asked me what the hell was going on. So, I told him.”
“And?”
“And he called me an idiota .” He shook his head fondly.
“Then he told me to take a month off and fix my damn marriage.”
I frowned, remembering.
“I recall you saying you had personal issues when you took that leave.”
He grinned.
“Yeah, well, my wife left me and took the kids—doesn’t get more personal and more of a damn issue than that.”
I exhaled sharply.
“And that one month off fixed everything?”
“No.” He shrugged.
“But it was a start. I showed her she and the kids were the most important things in my life, that I was more than my job, that I could put in the effort. And she told me that was all well and good, but what happens when I go back to work? Would it be the same cycle all over again?”
“Was it?” I asked.
Tomasso worked hard and I’d never had a single complaint for how he did his job.
He exhaled.
“No. I proved to her—and to myself—that I wouldn’t fall back into my old ways. It took six months before she moved back home. I won’t lie, it was scary as hell, because I thought I’d lose my job and then what would we do. But as the days passed, I realized something—I was happier, less stressed…just feeling good . I found balance between work and family, and, in the end, it made me better at both.”
“So, you’re saying I need to take some time off?”
He laughed.
“I’m saying that marriage is hard work, and you do the work because you love your family, and it’s worth it. I’m also saying that all marriages have ups and downs. There’s no right way to be married, and there are no perfect marriages.”
I tapped my fingers on the table as I considered what he’d told me.
Tomasso was a private man, so I knew he had told me something so intimate because he felt I needed his help and advice.
“I realize that Elysa and I didn’t communicate well…she didn’t tell me when I pissed her off, and I didn’t tell her that I was blaming her for things beyond her control.” I settled against the back of my chair.
“Our problems are not about me working all the time—ours are rooted in me not respecting her.”
“Usually, that is the root cause.” Tommaso gave me a reassuring smile.
“See, when I didn’t show up for dinner or my daughter’s piano recital, I was disrespecting my family.”
“ Si !” Hindsight may have given me clarity, but it also left me feeling helpless.
“I think I’m going to take the same advice Nonno gave you. Take a month off and fix my marriage.”
“Take all the time you need,” Tommaso encouraged.
“You’re a brilliant leader, Dante, and you have put together an excellent team. Go, bring your wife home, and we’ll take care of business.”