19. Liana
— ? —
Liana
The Cove was busier than I expected for a Tuesday afternoon.
Gina had insisted on lunch.
“You need to eat something that isn’t reheated leftovers.” She had pushed past me into the kitchen and started gathering my purse and jacket. “And you need to talk to an adult who isn’t Dominic or Rina or the lady at the pharmacy.”
“I talk to adults.”
“The school secretary doesn’t count.” She handed me my jacket. “Come on. Lunch. My treat. You can tell me all about how much you hate your life and I’ll nod sympathetically and order us dessert.”
So here I was, sitting at a table by the window with a glass of wine I hadn’t touched and a menu I hadn’t opened, watching Gina watch me with barely concealed concern.
“You’re not even pretending to look at the food.” She tapped her finger on my menu. “At least fake it so I don’t feel like I dragged you here against your will.”
“You did drag me here against my will.”
“For your own good.” She picked up her own menu and scanned it. “The salmon is supposed to be amazing. I read about it online.”
“I’m not hungry.”
“You’re never hungry anymore.” Gina set down her menu and fixed me with a look. “You’ve lost weight. Your face is thinner than I’ve ever seen it, and you’ve got circles under your eyes that could pass for bruises.”
“Thank you for that lovely assessment of my appearance.”
“Someone has to say it.” She reached across the table and took my hand. “When’s the last time you slept through the night without waking up at three in the morning to stare at the ceiling?”
I pulled my hand back and picked up my wine glass, taking a small sip just to have something to do.
“That’s what I thought.” Gina flagged down a waiter and ordered for both of us. “The salmon, twice, and keep the wine coming. We’re going to be here for a while.”
The waiter disappeared and Gina leaned back in her chair, studying my face with the particular intensity of a younger sister who had spent her whole life watching me hold everything together.
“Talk to me.” She said it softly.
“Everything is not fine.” I turned the wine glass in my hands. “But I’m handling it.”
“Are you?” She tilted her head. “Because from where I’m sitting, it looks like you’re drowning and refusing to ask for a life raft.”
“What would you have me do, Gina?” I set the glass down harder than I meant to. “Move back in with him? Pretend he didn’t call me a payment in his own office? Pretend he didn’t spend a year treating me like furniture while another woman took over my life?”
“Of course not.” She shook her head. “But you don’t have to carry all of this alone. You have me. You have Rina, even though she technically works for him. You have people who love you and want to help.”
“I know.”
“Do you?” She leaned forward. “Because you’ve barely called me since you moved into that house. You send texts saying you’re fine and then disappear for days. I had to literally show up at your door this morning to get you to leave the house.”
“I’ve been busy.”
“You’ve been hiding.” Gina’s voice was gentle but firm. “You’ve been curling up inside yourself the way you always do when you’re hurt, building walls so high that nobody can see over them.”
The food arrived and I poked at my salmon without enthusiasm while Gina kept talking, telling me about her job and the terrible date she went on last week with a guy who spent the entire dinner talking about his ex-girlfriend.
“He actually showed me pictures of her.” Gina shook her head in disbelief. “On his phone. During dinner. Like I was supposed to be impressed by how pretty his ex was.”
“Please tell me you left.”
“I made him pay for my meal first.” She grinned. “Ordered the lobster and two desserts, then told him I had to use the bathroom and walked out the back.”
I laughed, surprised by the sound of it coming out of my mouth.
“There she is.” Gina pointed at me with her fork. “I knew you were still in there somewhere. I was starting to worry Dominic had finally broken you for good.”
“He didn’t break me.” I took a bite of my salmon and found that I was actually hungry after all. “He just… bent me in ways I didn’t know I could bend.”
“That’s almost dirty.”
“Shut up and eat your fish.”
Gina was right. I had been hiding. I had been so focused on surviving each day that I had forgotten how to actually live in them.
“So tell me about the house.” Gina pushed her empty plate aside and reached for her wine. “Is it weird living somewhere that isn’t the compound?”
“It’s quieter.” I considered the question. “Smaller. But it’s nice. Bianca has her own room that looks out to a tree. So she’s happy.”
“Kids have priorities.”
“She has a whole list of them.” I smiled despite myself. “Yesterday she informed me that we need to get a cat because all the best families have cats and we’re a best family.”
“She’s not wrong.” Gina grinned. “A cat would be good for you. Give you something to take care of that isn’t a five-year-old or your own broken heart.”
“I don’t have a broken heart.”
“It’s okay to be sad.” Gina reached across the table and took my hand again. “It’s okay to miss him even when you’re furious with him. It’s okay to love someone and not be able to live with them at the same time.”
“When did you get so wise?”
“I learned from watching you.” She squeezed my hand. “You spent your whole life being strong for everyone else. Maybe it’s time to let someone be strong for you.”
A shadow fell across our table.
I looked up and Andrew Grassi was standing there with his hand on the back of my chair and a smile on his face that made every muscle in my body go tight.
“Liana Costa.” He said my name slowly, savoring each syllable. “Or is it Serra again these days? The whole coast has been talking about you.”
“The whole coast should get a hobby.” I kept my voice flat, bored. “What do you want, Grassi?”
“Just saying hello to an old friend.” He didn’t remove his hand from my chair. “Can’t a man stop by and offer his condolences? I heard about the separation. Such a shame.”
“We’re not friends.” I turned back to my wine. “And your condolences aren’t wanted.”
Gina had gone rigid beside me, her hand frozen around her glass. She didn’t know who Grassi was, not the details anyway, but she could feel the wrongness of him the way animals feel a predator nearby.
“You know, I always thought Dominic didn’t deserve you.” Grassi leaned down, bringing his face closer to mine, close enough that I could smell his cologne. “All those years, watching him parade you around like a trophy while he worked late with that blonde woman. Must have been lonely for you.”
“You don’t know anything about my marriage.”
“I know enough.” He reached out and touched a strand of my hair, letting it slide through his fingers. “I know you’re living in that cute little house on Maple Street now. Drop off at school every morning at eight-fifteen. Groceries at the market on Harbor Street on Thursdays.”
My blood went cold. He had been watching me. Watching my daughter.
“I also know that I would never make the mistakes Dominic made.” His smile widened. “I would never let a woman like you feel invisible. I would make sure you knew exactly how valuable you were, every single day.”
“You’d just find new mistakes to make.” I kept my voice steady even though my heart was racing. “Now take your hand off my chair and walk away before you do something you’ll regret.”
“What are you going to do?” He laughed softly. “Call your husband? Last I heard, he’s not yours to call anymore.”
My hand was already moving toward my bag, toward the knife I kept there, the one Dominic had given me years ago. I had never needed saving. I had never been a woman who waited for rescue.
But I didn’t have to save myself this time.
I didn’t see where he came from. One second Grassi was leaning over me with that predator smile, and the next second Dominic was standing behind him.
“Take your hand off her chair.” He said it quiet, almost gentle, and it was the quietness that made the tables around us go silent. “Or I’ll take the arm.”
Grassi straightened slowly, that easy smile still on his face, unbothered by the violence radiating off Dominic in waves.
“Costa.” He turned to face him. “I was wondering when you’d show up. Don’t you have a business to run? Ships to move? Wars to fight?”
“Take your hand off her chair.” Dominic didn’t raise his voice. “I won’t ask again.”
Grassi held his gaze for a long moment, two predators measuring each other, and then he lifted his hand from my chair and took a step back. The smile never wavered.
“Careful, Costa.” He adjusted his jacket with deliberate slowness. “Rumor has it she’s not yours to bleed for anymore. Last I heard, she’s the one who signed the papers.”
Dominic didn’t move. Didn’t blink. His eyes stayed fixed on Grassi with the cold flat stare I had seen him use on men who didn’t survive the conversation.
“I’ll bleed for her until the day I die.
” His voice was soft, almost tender. “Papers or no papers. Signature or no signature. She’s mine.
She’s always been mine. And if you ever come near her or my daughter again, I will bury you in a place so deep that not even God will be able to find the pieces. ”
Grassi held up his hands in mock surrender.
“No need for threats.” He stepped around Dominic, moving toward the door. “I was just being friendly. Welcoming her back to the market, so to speak.”
He paused at our table and tipped an imaginary hat at me.
“Think about what I said, Liana.” His eyes held mine for a beat too long. “You don’t have to settle for a man who forgot what he had. There are other options.”
Then he was gone, strolling out of the restaurant with the unhurried confidence of a man who believed he had already won.
Dominic stood there for a long moment, his back to me, his shoulders rigid with barely contained fury.
The restaurant around us slowly returned to normal, conversations resuming, silverware clinking, the bubble of tension that had surrounded our table gradually dissolving.
When he finally turned around, his face was a mask of controlled rage.
“Are you okay?” He crouched down beside my chair, his hand finding mine. “Did he touch you? Did he hurt you?”
“I’m fine.” I pulled my hand back. “I had it handled.”
“You shouldn’t have to handle men like Grassi.” His jaw tightened. “He had no right to come near you. No right to touch your hair or say those things or look at you like…”
“Like what?”
“Like you were something he could take.” The words came out rough, scraped raw. “Like you were available for the taking just because you’re not living in my house anymore.”
“I’m not available for anyone’s taking.” I met his eyes. “Not yours. Not his. Not anyone’s.”
“I know.” He stood up slowly. “I know you’re not. But Grassi doesn’t see it that way. Grassi sees an opportunity, and I need you to understand that he’s dangerous. More dangerous than you realize.”
“I’ve always known he was dangerous.”
“Not like this.” Dominic glanced toward the door where Grassi had disappeared. “He’s been circling for months, waiting for a moment of weakness. And now that you’re separated from me, he thinks he’s found one.”
Gina cleared her throat from across the table, reminding us both that she was still there.
“Should I be worried?” She looked between me and Dominic. “Because that guy seemed extremely creepy and I’m starting to think I should be worried.”
“You should be careful.” Dominic turned to her. “Both of you. Don’t go anywhere alone until I figure out what Grassi is planning. Don’t answer the door for strangers. Don’t let Bianca out of your sight.”
“You don’t get to give me orders anymore.” I stood up from my chair. “We’re separated, remember?”
“I haven’t signed anything.” His eyes locked onto mine. “And I will never sign away my right to keep you safe. That’s not something that changes just because you moved out.”
The old thrill ran through me. Being the thing this man would burn the world over.
I hated that it still worked on me after everything.
“I need to get back.” I grabbed my purse from the chair. “Bianca will be home from school soon and I don’t want her walking into an empty house.”
“I’ll drive you.”
“No.” I shook my head. “Gina will drive me. You should go figure out what Grassi is planning, since apparently he’s been watching me for weeks and you didn’t think to mention it.”
“I didn’t know.” His face darkened. “If I had known, I would have told you.”
“Would you?” I held his gaze. “Or would you have just handled it yourself and kept me in the dark the way you always do?”
He didn’t have an answer for that.
“Come on, Gina.” I started toward the door. “Lunch is over.”
My sister scrambled to grab her things and follow me, leaving Dominic standing alone in the middle of the restaurant with that violent energy still crackling around him.
I didn’t look back.
But I felt his eyes on me all the way to the car, and the weight of his gaze stayed with me long after Gina pulled out of the parking lot and drove me home.