5. Chapter 5
Lucy
By the time another glass of champagne appears in front of me, I should know better. I really should. Sitting at a table full of Morettis, I’m beginning to question whether champagne is actually a beverage or simply poor judgment with bubbles.
I stare at it. It sparkles innocently. Everything treacherous sparkles first. Champagne. Diamonds. Luca’s eyes when he’s amused.
“Drink,” Bianca says from across the table. “You look like you’re thinking too much.”
“I am thinking exactly the correct amount,” I tell her.
Luca’s hand is still covering mine. That is not helping. Not because I want him to move it. No, my problem is that I don’t want him to move it at all. Apparently tonight, I am determined to collect problems the way some people collect seashells.
His thumb shifts once against the side of my hand.
Not a stroke exactly. Not enough for anyone else to notice. But I notice. My entire nervous system notices. I reach for the champagne with my free hand.
“Careful, Lucia,” Nonna says.
I freeze with the glass halfway to my lips.
“I’m sorry?”
Her expression is calm. Too calm. I’m starting to understand that when Luca’s grandmother looks calm, someone else should probably feel alarmed.
“Champagne makes honest women more honest.”
Bianca smiles. “And dishonest women more interesting.”
The entire table looks at me. I put the glass down.
“Generally,” I add.
Luca makes a low sound beside me. It might be a laugh. It might be a warning. With him, I’m beginning to suspect those are the same thing.
Nonna lifts her own glass, studying me over the rim. “Then you have nothing to fear.”
That is exactly the kind of sentence people say right before you have several things to fear. I take a small sip anyway. Because I am brave … or doomed.
The champagne is crisp and expensive enough to make me feel underqualified. Around me, conversation begins to spread again, overlapping in that easy family way where everyone talks at once and somehow still hears every insult, compliment, and suspicious pause.
Sofia asks me more about Celia. Alessandro asks whether my family is local.
Bianca wants to know what color bottle kits sell best, then immediately announces that ocean blue should be my signature color because I have “the eyes for it.” Isabella asks whether I have ever made a revenge bottle, which I pretend not to hear, mostly because I start designing one in my head immediately.
Tiny black glitter.
A little broken heart.
Maybe a miniature trash can.
For Derek. Not that I am thinking about Derek anymore. That’s the strange part. I should be.
He was the reason I marched across the reception like a woman possessed and kissed a man whose family seems capable of turning a dinner conversation into a deposition. But now Derek feels oddly far away. Like someone else’s problem. Someone else’s bad decision.
Luca, unfortunately, feels very much like mine.
He sits beside me with the kind of effortless control that should be annoying. It is annoying. It is also attractive, which makes the annoyance worse. He answers his family when he chooses to, ignores Isabella when necessary, and still somehow keeps part of his attention on me the entire time.
Every time my glass gets too close to empty, he notices.
Every time one of his sisters corners me with a question, he watches.
Every time Nonna says my name like she has already moved me three steps deeper into her family and possibly had stationery printed, his mouth almost curves into a smile … almost.
The man is stingy with smiles. Which is rude, because the few he has given me have already done significant damage.
Music shifts across the room, something slower and warmer spilling from the speakers. Couples begin moving back toward the dance floor. The bride and groom are still glowing in the center of everything, and for a moment I remember where I am.
My cousin’s wedding. A celebration of love and commitment and other concepts I am currently pretending to understand while sitting beside a man I met roughly an hour ago.
Celia catches my eye from across the room. Her brows lift. I smile.
She mouths, Are you okay? I nod too quickly. She narrows her eyes.
Cousins are inconvenient that way. They know when you are lying with your entire face. Before she can come rescue me, interrogate me, or make the situation worse by doing both, Luca leans closer.
“Dance with me again.”
His voice is low enough that it slides beneath the noise of the room and settles somewhere under my ribs.
I turn to him. “Is that a question?”
“No.”
“At least you’re honest.”
“When it suits me.”
“That should not be as appealing as it is.”
His eyes darken with amusement. My mouth closes. Wonderful. I am now flirting out loud.
Luca stands and offers me his hand. The table goes quiet again, though not as dramatically this time. They’re getting used to us. Or maybe they’ve simply decided this is the evening’s entertainment and they don’t want to miss a second act.
Bianca clasps both hands under her chin. “Look at him being romantic.”
“For Luca, that counts,” Adriana says.
Sofia sighs softly. “Girls.”
Alessandro looks at Luca. “Try not to look like you’re escorting her to a negotiation.”
Luca’s expression doesn’t change. “I always look like this.”
“That’s the problem,” Bianca says.
I should be overwhelmed by them. Maybe I am. But I’m also fighting a smile as I put my hand in Luca’s and let him lead me away from the table.
Luca guides me onto the dance floor just as the song settles into a slow rhythm.
His hand finds my waist, and mine rises to his shoulder.
It should feel awkward now that the performance has served its purpose.
Derek isn’t staring from ten feet away. No one needs convincing.
Except maybe me. Because the second Luca pulls me closer, everything else falls away.
“You survived them,” he says.
“So far.”
“Impressive.”
“Please. I only met your family. It’s not like I wrestled an alligator.”
His mouth twitches. “In Florida, that can still be arranged.”
“That is not a romantic offer.”
“I wasn’t finished.”
“Please don’t finish.”
His hand tightens at my waist, and there it is again. That almost-smile. The one that makes him look less like a controlled, dangerous man and more like the kind of mistake a woman might make twice just to confirm the first one was, in fact, a mistake.
We move together more easily this time. The first dance had adrenaline, Derek, and pure stubbornness doing most of the work. This one has no excuse. Luca leads with quiet confidence, and my body follows like it signed a separate agreement without consulting me.
“You didn’t have to introduce me to your family,” I say.
“No.”
“You could have ended this after the first dance.”
“Yes.”
“But you didn’t.”
His gaze holds mine. “No.”
I wait. He gives me nothing else.
“Do you always answer questions like you’re trying to make women throw centerpieces at you?”
“Only when I want more interesting questions.”
“Fine.” I tilt my head. “Why didn’t you end it?”
Luca does not give away much. But I feel the difference in him. It’s the pause in his step, the slight narrowing of his attention.
“Because you surprised me.”
“That’s it?”
“No.”
My heart does a foolish little flip.
“And?” I ask.
“And I wanted to see what you would do next.”
“That makes me sound like a raccoon in a kitchen.”
“A very interesting raccoon.”
I laugh before I can stop myself, and his expression softens, almost. As if he didn’t expect the sound and now wants it again.
“Luca,” I say, because his name has started feeling different in my mouth, and that might be the most alarming development yet.
“Yes?”
“What happens now?”
His gaze drops briefly to my lips. My breath catches. The music continues around us, but all I hear is the low thud of my pulse and the faint rasp of his voice when he answers.
“Now,” he says, “I get some air with you.”
That sounds harmless. It does. In my defense, a woman cannot be expected to understand all possible meanings of air when speaking to a Moretti.
He leads me from the dance floor as the song ends, but he doesn’t take me back to the table.
Instead, we move toward a set of glass doors at the far side of the reception room.
Warm night air slips through as a server opens them, carrying the scent of salt, flowers, and something citrusy from the terrace planters.
Outside, the world is softer. The reception noise fades behind us, muffled by glass and distance. The terrace curves along the back of the restaurant, lit by lanterns and moonlight, with palms shifting gently in the ocean breeze. Beyond the railing, dark water glimmers under scattered lights.
The night is beautiful and the air feels cool against my heated skin.
Because Luca is still holding my hand, and I have no idea what happens when we run out of excuses for touching.
“This is some air,” I say.
He glances down at me. “You expected less?”
“I expected oxygen. This feels curated.”
“It’s a terrace.”
“It’s a terrace with mood lighting and boats.”
“Florida has boats.”
“That is exactly the kind of thing a man with a boat would say.”
He says nothing.
I narrow my eyes.
“Luca.”
“Yes, Lucy?”
“Do you have a boat?”
Silent seconds pass and he reaches into the inner pocket of his jacket and removes a cigar case.
I stare at him.
“Is this for dramatic effect?”
“For practicality.”
He opens the case, selects a cigar, then glances at me. “Do you mind?”
I should say yes. Or no. Or something normal.
Instead, I watch his hands.
Which is a mistake.
Luca’s hands are unfair. Long fingers, controlled movements, the kind of ease that makes even cutting the end of a cigar look indecently competent. He lights it with a small metal lighter that catches the glow of the terrace lanterns, and the flame briefly sharpens every line of his face.
Dark hair. Strong jaw. Eyes fixed on the cigar first, then on me. He takes one slow draw, turns his head slightly, and exhales away from me. The smoke drifts into the night air, faintly sweet and rich, disappearing over the railing.
I swallow.
“You look like you’ve done that before.”
His eyes return to mine. “Smoked a cigar?”
“Looked like trouble in expensive lighting.”
The corner of his mouth lifts with a real smile this time. Real enough to make my stomach dip.
“You should be careful,” he says.
“With what?”
“Compliments.”
I point at him. “You keep using my words against me.”
“I like your words.”
I turn toward the railing because looking at him has become too much work. Luca rests one hand near mine on the railing.
“You handled my family well,” he says.
“I’m not sure handled is the right word. Survived, maybe. Ricocheted through.”
“Nonna likes you.”
“Your grandmother renamed me against my will.”
“That means she likes you.”
“What does she do if she dislikes someone?”
“I shouldn’t tell you that.”
I turn my head slowly. “I can’t tell if you’re joking.”
“I know.”
He takes another draw from the cigar and again exhales away from me, considerate in a way that makes the gesture feel more intimate than it should.
I watch the smoke curl into the night and wonder if this is how people lose their minds.
Not all at once. Just by standing beside a beautiful man with a dangerous family while champagne makes brave little suggestions in their bloodstream.