Chapter 10 Lucia
LUCIA
“If you call a lapse in judgment the best thing that’s happened to him, then yes, I suppose I’ll see my way to taking it as a compliment.”
The words leave my mouth smooth and steady, which is a small miracle considering my pulse has gone feral and Isabella Bellandi is standing three feet away with the serene cruelty of a woman who has never been told no.
The room holds its breath.
Giovanni’s hand slides into mine before anyone can react, his fingers warm and unshakeable, the kind of grip that anchors rather than restrains.
“My wife,” he says calmly, lifting my knuckles to his mouth and pressing a kiss there that is unapologetically intimate, “has a talent for identifying excellence. I’ve found that listening to her instincts has improved my life considerably.”
His gaze lingers on me just long enough to make the meaning unmistakable.
Isabella’s smile tightens. Only for a heartbeat.
But I see it.
The faint crack in composure, the flicker of something sharp and displeased that she smooths away with polished grace.
Salvatore Bellandi turns his attention to Giovanni at last, his expression cool, appraising, and entirely unconcerned with politeness.
“This dinner is long overdue,” he says. “You disappeared. People noticed.”
Giovanni meets his gaze without blinking. “I didn’t disappear. I had priorities.”
Salvatore’s mouth twitches. “That so?” His eyes flick briefly to me, then back again. “Absence creates instability. Especially when a man’s household is… unsettled.”
A couple of the men nearby go very still.
“My household is settled,” Giovanni replies evenly. “Anyone who thought otherwise misunderstood the situation.”
Salvatore studies him for a moment longer than courtesy requires. “New York doesn’t like misunderstandings. It prefers consistency.”
Giovanni’s hand tightens around mine, the pressure deliberate. “Then tonight should reassure everyone.”
Salvatore exhales through his nose, half amusement, half irritation. “We’ll see.”
Giovanni snaps his fingers and a waiter materialises at his side like a neat magic trick.
On the tray sits vintage Krug for Isabella, and no, I’m never drinking that label again, exactly as noted, and beside it a single glass of Masseto, deep and velvety and ruinously expensive, the only red Salvatore Bellandi has ever been known to drink.
The older man’s brows lift a fraction, and Giovanni’s mouth curves slightly. “People notice many things,” he adds evenly. “I prefer to notice people.”
The words land softly.
Precisely.
The evening begins in earnest then, and the scale of it becomes impossible to ignore.
The guest list reads like a ledger of power: men who move markets with a phone call, politicians who pretend they don’t know exactly whose houses they’re standing in, financiers whose smiles don’t reach their eyes, and a handful of faces that make my instincts prickle even before Giovanni quietly murmurs names and affiliations at my ear.
This is a flex, and a brutal one.
My husband wants the head of the La Fratellanza Nera to see exactly how wide his reach extends, how comfortably he occupies rooms like this, how easily the city bends around him.
I feel it in the way conversations orbit him, in how people defer without being asked, in the subtle choreography of deference and calculation that plays out across the room.
Salvatore Bellandi never looks impressed.
He looks mildly entertained, stopping and starting conversations with a simple wave of his hand. And as one hour ticks into another, my belly churns with the knowledge that while Giovanni might be powerful, this man also wields considerable power of his own.
Enough that should he decide to wage a full-out war, neither side would escape unscathed. Hell, both sides could sustain Godfather-level anarchy and bloodshed.
I maintain an iron grip on my composure as dinner unfolds with impeccable manners and sharpened undertones, the kind of politeness that carries a blade just beneath the surface.
Isabella steers conversation with surgical precision, her questions wrapped in silk and poison.
“So fascinating,” she says lightly, turning her attention back to me, “how… unexpected backgrounds can sometimes produce such ambition.”
I smile. “My background isn’t unexpected,” I reply evenly. “It’s Queens through and through.”
A few heads turn.
I keep going. “I grew up there. I love it there. And I don’t apologise for it.”
Giovanni’s hand tightens briefly on mine.
Salvatore’s eyes flicker.
Isabella’s mouth curves. “How… proud.”
She dismisses me with another venomous look, and while her barbs didn’t land as accurately as she’d hoped, it still landed somewhere that stings. Somewhere that reminds me that in this room full of polish and poise and power, I wield the least.
I feel my spine sagging a little at that thought, feel my resentment at Giovanni build. If he’d left me on the island like I wanted, I wouldn’t be dealing with this bullshit dinner party with its bullshit dinner party guests, two of whom would prefer me not breathing.
The men retire to the drawing room after dessert, which I note with internal commentary sharp enough to draw blood.
Giovanni leans in and murmurs something about tradition, about conversations best conducted without an audience, and I respond with a look that makes him laugh under his breath.
Instead of joining the gaggle of women who would love nothing better than to tear me to pieces while smiling serenely, I drift towards the terrace instead.
The night air is cold enough to steady me, the city glittering beyond the balustrade like it’s watching, waiting.
That’s when I hear Isabella’s voice.
“…the whore from Queens and a crosswalk she was probably too dumb to read,” she says, not bothering to lower her tone enough to hide the intent.
Laughter follows.
“And the only credible thing about that Pretty Woman fantasy,” Isabella continues smoothly, “was the whore part.”
Something in me snaps cleanly.
I turn away before my body betrays the urge to break glass with my bare hands and stab stab stab the bitch, stalking across the terrace until the lights blur and my breathing turns sharp.
Giovanni finds me before I make it ten steps. “Lucia.”
I whirl on him, fury blazing. “Your parties have a charming way of segregating women like ornamental furniture. Is this your idea of modernisation? Serving our purpose before being patted on the head and dismissed to go gossip?”
He studies me, expression unreadable. “No. But some old-school ways change with gentle coercion, not C4.”
“Well, just so you know, I’d rather throw myself off this balcony than rejoin that Mean Girl circus,” I add, the words tumbling out fast and hot.
“I’d rather you didn’t,” he replies dryly. “I don’t have my cape handy, and the paperwork would be a fucking nightmare.”
My lips twitch despite myself, and then the anxiety floods back in.
“They all know I ran on our wedding night,” I say quietly. “They suspect we didn’t… you know.”
Giovanni shrugs. “I don’t care about suspicions. Only what people try to do with them.”
I lick my lips, thinking fast. “Maybe,” I say slowly, “we should stop glaring daggers at each other for tonight. Present a united front.”
His brow lifts. “You mean weaponise affection?”
“I mean lessen the danger.”
A corner of his mouth curves. “I like it when you think tactically.”
Before I can respond, his gaze shifts over my shoulder. “I believe someone wants to make friends.”
He steps forward, brushes a kiss over my mouth that steals my breath, then smiles at the sound I fail to suppress.
“Be good, mia bella mugghieri,” he murmurs, and walks away.
I turn to face a young woman who looks about twenty-five, maybe younger, hovering near the edge of the terrace with uncertainty written all over her. She was seated next to an imposing man at the far end from me at the dinner table.
“Hi,” she says. “Mind if I join you? I’m Ella.”
“Not at all. And I’m Lucia,” I reply, then hesitate. “Dragoni.”
She waves it off. “No need to introduce yourself. Everyone knows who you are. Not least because we’re in your house, marionettes in your husband’s play,” she finishes with a dry laugh.
At my grimace, her hand flies to her mouth. “Sorry. That came out wrong.”
“How did you mean it?” I ask, sharper than intended.
Her face falls. “I’ve offended you. That wasn’t my intention.”
I sigh. “You didn’t catch me on my best night.”
She nods, then steps closer. “I heard what those feral bitches said…” She stops herself, eyes widening at her own swearing, and I snort before she turns beetroot. “Shit.”
Okay. I like her.
“Want to sit for a minute, get some fresh air?”
Her smile bursts free and I blink once. She’s hiding an ethereal beauty under a drab bushel. “I’d love to.”
We sit. We talk quietly, carefully, and when she mentions she’s here with her father, her hesitation tells me everything she doesn’t say.
Another woman enduring beneath the control of a powerful man, even if in this case, I suspect the man is her own father.
I try to shut out the ever-increasing decibel of Isabella’s laughter as she commands the women who seem to lap up her every word. I try to concentrate on Ella as she leans forward to touch my arm.
“If it’s not too forward, I’d love us to meet for a coffee sometime, when you’re in the city?”
I’m long overdue a visit to my uncles. Giovanni wasn’t the only one I cut off when I was on the run. I’m sure they’ve been frantic with worry. The thought of returning to my childhood home buoys me up and I nod.
“I’d love to.”
She takes my number and we agree to text to set a date.
And having something to look forward to suddenly feels like oxygen straight to the bottom of my lungs.
After Ella heads back in, I rally, drawing a steadying breath, pulling my spine straight and my expression into something deliberate, and I walk back into the drawing room with purpose stitched into every step.