Chapter 41
ALESSIA
I leave Nico in Florence.
He doesn’t like it, but I don’t give him much of a choice.
Toni has gone back to school in Milan, so I don’t have to make excuses to her. And since Alba is on a plane to Sydney, I don’t have to tell her what I have planned, either.
This is a journey meant to unfold unseen, a path from which I would never want rescuers.
I talk to Matteo.
Obviously, in my head.
He agrees with me. He’s dead, so what the hell else is he going to do?
But I know he’d see the sense in what I’m doing. Matteo and Papà’s relationship was based on mutual respect—but there was also love. That didn’t mean they agreed on everything, but they did trust that each one was coming from a place of their truth.
I want to surprise Papà, which isn’t difficult since I know everyone who knows him—especially the staff.
He isn’t in the Palazzo or his favorite Suvereto.
He’s withdrawn to Poppi, to the old castle in the Casentino, where men like my father go when they want to feel history pressing at their backs instead of the present at their throats.
The fortress rises from the hill like a judgment.
Grey stone, scarred by centuries of wind and siege, its walls so thick they swallow sound whole. Narrow roads coil upward toward the gate, forcing even the smallest cars to creep forward, as if the place itself demands deference.
Dante once walked these corridors in exile.
Kings and counts plotted here.
Iron balconies jut from shuttered windows, vines spilling over rusted railings like silent offerings to memory and time.
Inside, the restoration stopped just short of warmth—here lies a husk of grandeur, all echoing corridors where each footstep reverberates, drafty archways that sigh with every gust, and courtyards so still they swallow your breath.
The drive to it skirts vineyards dewy with dawn, olive groves light with winter, and languid hills lined with cypress sentinels.
My heart hammers against my ribs, a restless percussion—then, gradually, my nerves cool into a blade-sharp focus.
I don’t rehearse my lines or bargain with shadows. By the time the wrought-iron gates swing open, every cell in me waits, ready to do what needs to be done.
“Signora, we weren’t expecting you,” his housekeeper rushes to me when she receives me at the door.
I smile at her. “I wasn’t meant to be expected.”
She takes my coat and looks toward the study. “He…should I tell him you’re here?”
I shake my head. “Why don’t I surprise him?”
She gives me a look that clearly says what she’s thinking, what I know: Duca Alighieri doesn’t like surprises.
Well, tough shit, Papà, I’m here, and I’m not leaving until we settle a few things.
I pat her shoulder. “It’s going to be alright.”
She grimaces. “If you say so, Signora.”
“Has he had lunch?” It’s past noon, and Papà is a creature of habit.
“Si.” She dips her head. “Just some zuppa. He’s…he’s been quiet since Signor Rinaldi passed away.”
Well, at least he won’t be hangry as the Americans like to call it. We Italians simply say it’s time to eat, because for us, hunger isn’t supposed to be emotional (even if it is)—it’s a clock issue.
I cross the hall to his study—a sanctum steeped in the scent of worn leather and history.
Dust motes swirl in a shaft of slanted sunlight that falls across a vast oaken desk, its surface burnished by years of decisive strokes and, I like to think, whispered conspiracies.
The walls, bare of family portraits or flourishes, offer no solace—only rows of unread volumes whose spines creak under their own weight, and chairs carved with spines meant to cow rather than comfort.
I knock on the open door of the study and step in without waiting for an answer.
Papà looks up, and his eyes narrow suspiciously when he sees me.
As the housekeeper said, he isn’t expecting me, didn’t think I’d have the balls to confront him.
But then Papà didn’t raise me as he was too busy with the company, so he doesn’t know me.
I remember what Nico said about Judith.
“She understands that power is something you take responsibility for—not something you apologize for.”
“Alessia,” he murmurs, but doesn’t move from his desk, makes no effort to stand and greet me.
A narrow beam of light from the open sliver of a curtain lances across his face, exposing the sharp angles of cheekbones and the hard line of his jaw.
“Papà,” I greet, sliding into the leather chair across from him.
He laces his fingers, elbows resting on the desk like talons. “Why are you here?”
To take my time and stage the conversation or….
“I hear you’re calling for an emergency board meeting this coming Friday.” Or jump right in.
He levels me with a thoughtful stare.
I inhale slowly, deliberately—so that even my breath betrays no tremor.
“Am I?” he challenges.
My fingers trail the smooth armrest, steadying my resolve.
“Yes, you are. You’re planning to announce the appointment of Davide Fontana as Matteo’s successor.”
He cocks an eyebrow arrogantly. “Am I?” he repeats.
He thinks he can intimidate me. I don’t blame him for that. I have been submissive with him, haven’t I? But he should know better than to mistake my respect for weakness.
“And if Nico goes against that terrible decision you intend to make, you will dismiss him as CEO.”
For a moment, his composure flickers—an ember of surprise in his eyes—then he masks it. “And how would you know any of this?”
I shrug. “Does that really matter now that I do know about it?”
His jaw muscles twitch.
“I’m here on behalf of my sisters and me,” I say, leaning forward.
Papà is no one’s fool, and he straightens. “Alessia, I warn you to think very carefully about—”
“We’re so past that, Papà,” I cut him off. I never do that. I’m not Alba or even Toni. I’m Alessia. The quiet one. The plain one who wasn’t supposed to be able to hold on to Nico Alarico.
He opens his mouth, but I press on before he can muster a defense. “Alba, Toni, and I are beneficiaries of the Alighieri trusts.”
Now, he knows what this is about, and he throws me a withering look.
In the past, I’d cower. But I’m not that Alessia any longer. I’ve grown this past vintage into who I am meant to be.
“The board answers to me,” he states confidently.
“The land answers only to lineage,” I remind him.
He plants the palms of his hand on his desk with a thud. He can sense authority slipping like sand through his fingers. “I hold your proxy votes—”
“—at our pleasure.” I lower my voice to a steel thread. “But legacy, Papà, cannot rest on one man’s whim.”
Silence floods the room, thick as the dust on the unread tomes in the hallways and the library of this old house.
“You may fire Nico, Papà.” I keep my tone on the level. Papà is a predator, and if he even smells a slight weakness, he’ll attack to win. “But he will sue. Wrongful termination, retaliation, and hostile governance. I will side with him—not as spouse, but as trustee. As will my sisters.”
His fingertips drum against the desk, a staccato echo that betrays tension I have never seen him wear before, not with me, not because of me.
“The House of Alighieri cannot weather that storm,” I state placidly. “Especially as we merge with companies like Cantina Alarico and court institutional investors who recoil at family bloodletting.”
He rests back on his chair in an attempt to show he’s not rattled by me.
“I don’t have patience for this. Say what you have to say and get out.”
I am not surprised by either the venom or the hostility he displays. Papà doesn’t like being challenged.
I don’t let it bother me. I can’t.
“I, as the eldest Alighieri heiress, will create enough drama about my husband being fired for reasons that are less than ethical, that it will weaken your position as chairman of the board.” I smile now, not sweetly, but with determination. “You, too, Papà, rule at the pleasure of the board.”
He arches a brow, his stare dripping with disdain. “You think you can oust me?”
“Yes.”
His lip curls in bitter defiance. “You would do that to your own father?”
I hold his gaze with a winemaker’s patience and a judge’s certainty. “I would preserve the House of Alighieri. There is a difference.”
He lifts his chin.
But I’m not here to negotiate in good faith—so I lay out my terms with the precision of a contract.
“You retain Nico as CEO. You name me Head Winemaker of the House of Alighieri. You herald it as the first woman in our lineage to command the barrels and the vines, position it as you being progressive, visionary, and historic.” I pause, letting him take the time to recognize the knife I sharpen.
He clenches his jaw. “I don’t respond well to—"
I speak over him. “Or my sisters and I will revoke our proxy votes, publicly, at once. We’ll let the press feast on the schism in the family, let analysts sniff out the rot beneath the stones, let investors question what other skeletons lurk in the cellars of the House of Alighieri.”
“You dare—"
“You survive, Papà, and rule,” I cut him off without hesitation. “Or you become irrelevant.”
For the first time, I see fear—or perhaps mortality—flash across his face.
He studies me, grief and calculation warring in his gaze.
“You think you can win against me?”
I look into his eyes, let him see that I’m not fucking around. “Yes, I can, with my sisters. And you know it.”
A long silence settles.
“He cheats on you, and you fight for him?” he grits out.
I smile. “Papà, that kind of mendacity is beneath you.”
He looks away as if annoyed with himself. “You’re right. I have no idea if he’s been…wandering.” He throws his hands up in the air in a gesture that is intensely him. “But I do know that he loves you. At least he says he does.”
I tilt my head. “He is ready to step down as CEO. In fact, I think he’s packing up his office right now in preparation for the meeting this Friday, where he thinks he knows what you’re going to do.”
Papà looks at the papers in front of him. I don’t know what they are, and I don’t bother to find out.
He looks up at me. “I can make a case that he’s incompetent.”
“I know the data you have. I will counter it with ease.” I lean back in the leather chair and add lazily, "In the press.”
Fury flashes in his eyes. “You’d drag the House of Alighieri through the tabloid mud?’
“If you hurt my husband, yes.”
“Does the family name mean so little to you?”
“The Alighieri name will recover.” I give him a pointed look. “You won’t.”
In families like ours—monied, entrenched in legacy—there comes a moment when one generation understands its time is over, and the future, impatient and relentless, is already snapping at its heels.
For Papà, this is that moment.
He lets out a snort and looks out of the mullioned windows for a moment. Then, as if he’s made a decision, he turns back to me. “How will I spin this as a victory?”
I suppress a smile. Duca Alighieri is, at the end of the day, a survivor and, as Matteo would say, “A reasonable businessman.”
“By calling it continuity.”
He raises an eyebrow.
“And you’ll let that horrible woman Chiara line up interviews with every major wine, finance, and business magazine about how you appointed the first female head winemaker at one of the largest wine houses in Europe.”
“Even if she’s my daughter?” he muses aloud.
“No, Papà,” I correct him. “You’ll say she’s an award-winning winemaker who was trained by Matteo Rinaldi, who announced her as his successor and who has been running the flagship Bolgheri Alighieri estate, Tenuta Pietra Alta.”
He taps his hand on the desk and thinks about it for nearly five minutes.
Five endless minutes where I wonder if I’ve overplayed my hand—and what the hell I’ll do if he tells me he won’t change his mind. The ugliness of what I’ll have to do, what Alba and Toni will have to do if that happens, isn’t something I’m comfortable with.
Finally, with a slow, irrevocable nod, Papà announces, haughtily, “Very well. Nico remains. You are appointed.”
There is no apology. But I wasn’t expecting that.
I rise. “Grazie mille, Papà.”
When I’m at the door, he says to my back, “You’ve learned politics.”
I pause, my hand brushing the cool stone jamb. I half turn to look at him. “No, Papà. I always knew it. And as someone who understands it better than anyone, you know that in politics, timing is everything.”
I don’t wait for his response. I step into the corridor, steady in my choices—and in his.