Chapter 15 Ruby
RUBY
After a brief Italian breakfast with Dante, which is admittedly delicious, I’m on my own.
I pluck up the courage to message my mother a long and mainly fictional account about my new marriage, telling her what Dante suggested.
I receive a “congratulations, I hope it works out well” in response, which leaves me a bit flat.
So I hang out in the enormous lounge that opens onto the garden, and read some of the old paperbacks on the shelves, feeling vaguely guilty for not being at work.
But it’s only about an hour until there’s a knock at the door.
I’m preparing to say that I’m good with the cup of tea I have, when an unexpected face peeks in.
“Hey!” Lucia, the bride’s mother from the wedding, and Dante’s sister, grins at me.
She’s wearing jeans and a top, and her hair is in a messy ponytail. There are a few little signs that she isn’t twenty anymore, but she looks amazing given she’s had a kid. I’m instantly starstruck. She’s too cool to be interested in hanging out with me.
“Hi! Come in! It’s so nice to see you!” Wait, what am I doing? I cringe at myself acting like this is my house. It’s far more Lucia’s than mine. “I mean, if you want to.”
“I do!” She flies to my side as I get up from the sofa awkwardly, discarding the old paperback with a bodice ripper cover that I was reading. Hopefully Lucia won’t see it.
“I hear I have a new sister-in-law. Can I give you a hug?”
“Uh.” What, I was so sure she’d be scornful and unimpressed that I’d somehow caught her brother, but she’s acting pleased?
“Sure,” I agree.
“Mm!” She catches me up in an embrace, and unlike hugging girls my age, she’s soft at the edges, no angular elbows. “I’m so happy you’re going to be part of the family!”
Emotion wells up in me, an unexpected wave.
“Ohh, yeah.” I hug Lucia back, because how can I not when she’s being so lovely? “It’s not quite like that,” honesty compels me to say.
“Let me look at you.” She draws away to hold me by the shoulders and look at me, smiling at me with what seems like genuine warmth. “Just as gorgeous as I remember.”
I make inarticulate noises of discomfort and disbelief, that amount to, “I dunno about that.”
“No wonder Dante fell for you.” She keeps my hand in hers, and it’s weirdly nice as she draws me down to sit back onto the sofa next to her.
“Well, that’s definitely—” I begin, but she interrupts.
“I know what Dante said about this all being a mix-up, but I am a total romantic and I believe, so allow an old lady her dreams—”
“You are not an old lady!” I object.
“But you have to tell me all about yourself, because I’ve waited decades for Dante to marry, and now he has, I want to fully enjoy having a sister.”
She’s such a whirlwind of sunny warmth, even more so than at the wedding, and I can’t get an objection in sideways, however hard I try.
This used to be her home, but she acts as though it’s my house, and defers to me as she ensures we have lunch together.
Then we spend the afternoon in the lounge, her asking me about what I like to read and telling me that the books in the lounge belonged to her mother.
And we’re still there hours later when the hairs go up on the back of my neck. Out of the corner of my eye, I see something or perhaps I feel him.
Because almost behind me, Dante is leaning in the doorway to the kitchen, his suit jacket discarded, and his shirt sleeves rolled up, revealing black tattoos and dark arm hair that I wish I had the right and the courage to pet. It looks soft, like a bear’s fur.
His expression is part exasperation and part indulgent patience.
His green eyes travel over my face, and I wonder how long he’s been standing there, watching me. Us, I correct myself. But my body doesn’t feel as though he noticed his sister.
I could get lost in his mossy, dark-green eyes, like a forest of scented Italian cypress trees.
His hands are in his pockets, and his thumb is hooked out, and that detail sends shockingly feral ideas into my head. Of his thumb on my lips. In my mouth. Stroking my neck. Pushing my knees apart and pressing into the place between my legs that no one has touched.
I flare with inappropriate heat, and my thighs squeeze together instinctively.
“Hi,” he mouths, a smile tugging at his lips.
Pleasurable shivers go down my back. It’s only been a few seconds of me staring at my accidental husband, but it’s long enough to light me up.
“Dante!” Lucia exclaims, noticing that she’s lost my attention.
“I hope my sister hasn’t been too unbearable.” Dante raises one eyebrow, still looking at me.
“Oh pish!” Lucia shakes her head with mock outrage. “You left her all alone.”
“I don’t mind!” I say, oddly protective of Dante. “I told him to work as usual.”
Lucia throws her hands up. “Fools, both of you. I will leave you to it.”
She’s a blur of perfumed hugs and promises that she’ll see us again soon, then she’s gone.
There’s a beat of silence.
“How was—” I begin.
“Would you like—” he starts simultaneously, and we both break off, a crackle of awareness between us.
Maybe he’s remembering how cold my feet were last night. He’s going to suggest socks. Or divorce.
“You go first,” I say, even though I’d rather ask him about his day and try to help in that way.
“I saw there’s a book signing at an independent bookshop,” he says. “I thought you might like to go. Perhaps get some inspiration for your book cover business idea.”
My surprise must show on my face. A bookshop visit? Of course I’d like that. A signing? I mean, yeah, for sure. The only issue is that this isn’t what Dante wants to do, is it?
“I’d have asked Lucia to take you, because I know she loves books, but…” He gives a wry smile and waves his hand at the door to indicate that his sister left like a cartoon character who realises their nemesis has entered the room. “You’ll have to make do with me, instead.”
“I’d love to,” I say too quickly, and I swear there’s something like relief in Dante’s eyes. “But I don’t want to put us in unnecessary danger. You said—”
“I did, but this bookshop is run by the wife of one of the London Maths Club. It’s perfectly safe.”
“Oh, well. Thank you then. I should go and change—” I scramble eagerly to my feet.
“Don’t. You’re perfect as you are.”
“I don’t want to embarrass you in front of your mafia colleagues.” I indicate my shorts and T-shirt. I’m not even in a cute dress as I was yesterday.
“You could never,” he replies simply, and is this what it is to be accepted? After my mother clicking her tongue and sighing at my appearance all my life, it’s more than a bit unexpected that Dante—a man who wears a suit like he was born in it—is fine with me looking casual.
“Do you still have those examples of your work on your phone?” he continues.
“Oh, oh. Yeah.” I blush because the memory that pops up for those pictures is when I showed them to him then tried to put my tongue down his throat until he managed to peel me off forcibly like I was an octopus with tentacles covered in glue.
Okay, maybe it wasn’t quite that bad, but for my first kiss and first seduction attempt, it was pretty mortifying.
“Good. Give them to me.”
What?