18. Massimo
MASSIMO
Corrado's office smelled like espresso and old paper. I stood at the door for a minute, hand still on the handle, wondering if I should've called first. The glass nameplate on the door said Corrado Pisani, Avvocato in gold letters that were starting to peel at the edges.
He looked up from a stack of contracts spread across his desk. "Massimo."
I shut the door behind me. The click sounded too loud in the quiet room. "Do you have time?"
"For you?" He set down his pen and leaned back in his chair, the leather creaking under his weight. "Always."
I crossed to the chair across from him and sat.
My hands felt restless so I gripped the armrests.
The office was small, cramped even, with bookshelves lining two walls and a window that looked out onto a narrow street.
Corrado had turned down three offers to move to something bigger.
He liked this place. Said it kept him honest.
I rubbed my face with both hands. God, I was tired. I hadn't slept. "I fucked it up."
"The wedding?"
"All of it." The words stuck in my throat like I was swallowing stones. "Vittoria let something slip. On the wedding night."
Corrado's eyebrows went up. Just slightly. That was all.
"She said she didn't work this hard with my family to let it fall apart now." I could still hear her voice, the edge of anger in it when I'd refused her.
"She was in on it," I said. "The whole thing. The annulment, the proof, the marriage. She worked with them from the start."
Corrado nodded once. "I know."
I studied him. My chest tightened. "You know?"
"I've known." He picked up his espresso cup, half-empty and probably cold by now, and took a sip anyway. His face didn't change. "You're just catching up."
That hit me harder than it should have. Jesus Christ. I was the last one to see it and I'd gone ahead and married her. I'd stood in front of Padre Ignazio and said the words while my actual wife was in Rome with our daughter, and I hadn't even been sure.
"The Rome proof was a lie," I said. "Wasn't it?"
"Probably." Corrado set the cup down. "Did you ask Professor Benedetti about it?"
"No." My jaw clenched. "I should have. I should've called him myself, gone down there. I didn't do any of that."
"Why not?"
"Because I—" I stopped. My throat felt tight. "I believed it when Mamma showed it to me. Halfway, anyway. Enough to go through with the wedding."
Corrado just watched me. He didn't say anything. Didn't need to.
"On the wedding night I couldn't do it," I said. "Couldn't go through with the rest. I refused her."
"Good."
The single word landed like absolution I didn't deserve. I let out a breath I didn't know I'd been holding. "Laney's in Rome with Sofia. She told me to let it end. Let us end."
"And you don't want that."
"No." The word came out flat and hard. "I want to fix it. I have to fix it."
Corrado leaned forward and folded his hands on top of the contract he'd been reading. "How do you plan to do that?"
I'd been thinking about this all night. Every hour I hadn't slept, I'd turned it over in my head, working through the steps like I was putting together a business deal.
"I'll pay for whatever she wants. A house in Rome if that's what it takes, her own place with her name on the deed.
I'll fund her career, get her back into the university, pull whatever strings I need to pull.
I'll put her name on her work, all of it, make sure she gets the credit she should've had all along.
And I'll find a way to undo the marriage to Vittoria and get the first one reinstated.
I don't care what it costs or how long it takes or who I have to?—"
"Massimo." Corrado's voice cut through the list like a blade. "Stop talking."
I stopped. My heart was pounding in my chest.
He watched me for a long moment, his expression unreadable. Then he asked, "What do you know about Laney?"
The question threw me completely. "What do you mean, what do I know about her?"
"You've been married to her for ten years," Corrado said. His tone was perfectly even, no judgment in it, just the question sitting there between us. "What do you actually know about her?"
"I know her." My voice came out defensive and I hated the sound of it. "She's my wife. She's Sofia's mother. She's?—"
"What does she do?"
"She takes care of Sofia. She runs the household when Mamma isn't interfering. She—" I stopped. My hands curled into fists on the armrests. "She works at the dig."
"Doing what?"
I opened my mouth. Nothing came out. My mind went blank.
Corrado waited. He was good at that. He could outwait anyone.
"She's tracing the family line," I said finally. The words sounded weak even to me. "Back to the Roman era. Trying to prove the connection."
"For what purpose?"
"To tie our name back to the old families. To prove we've been here since—" I stopped again. It sounded like bullshit. "To document it."
"Why would she care about that?"
I stared at him. I didn't have an answer. My stomach turned over.
Corrado tilted his head slightly. "What did you ask her about Rome?"
"What?"
"Professor Benedetti. Nate Prescott. The photograph." He paused. Each word landed with weight. "What did you ask Laney about any of it?"
My throat went completely dry. The answer sat in my chest like lead. Nothing. I'd asked her nothing.
"I didn't." The admission felt like pulling broken glass out of my chest, piece by jagged piece. "I didn't ask her anything."
Corrado didn't move. He just sat there watching me, and somehow that was worse than if he'd stood up and told me I was a fucking idiot.
I looked away. A trembling had seized my hands. Christ. "I should've asked her. I should've gone to her first, before I looked at anything Mamma showed me, before I listened to Vittoria, before I did any of it."
I pushed up out of the chair. I couldn't sit still anymore.
The office felt too small, the walls pressing in.
I walked to the window and stared down at the street.
People walking. A woman with two shopping bags.
A man on a phone. Cars crawling through the narrow road.
The whole world just going on like nothing had happened.
"How have you been treating her?" Corrado asked behind me.
I didn't turn around. "What kind of question is that?"
"A simple one. How do you treat Laney?"
"I take care of her." My voice came out harder than I meant it to.
"I protect her from the family. I keep Mamma and Enzo off her back.
I make sure she and Sofia have everything they need.
I've spent ten years keeping the peace so they don't go after her the way they go after everyone else who doesn't fall in line. "
"And has that worked?"
I spun to face him. "What the hell kind of question is that?"
Corrado's expression didn't change. He just looked at me, waiting for the answer I already knew.
The anger drained out of me as fast as it had come. My shoulders sagged. "No. It hasn't worked."
"Why not?"
"Because—" I stopped. The answer was sitting right there in my chest like a stone I'd been carrying for years without ever noticing the weight of it. "Because I've been handling her the way we handle everyone else."
Corrado nodded once. Slow. He didn't say finally, but I heard it anyway.
I sat back down. My legs felt weak. "I offer money. I smooth things over behind the scenes. I make arrangements without asking what anyone actually wants and then I expect them to be grateful for it."
God. I'd done this to her. Not Mamma. Not Vittoria.
Not Enzo or Papà or the rest of the family.
Me. I'd left my wife standing alone for ten years and I'd never once asked her what she actually needed.
I'd never defended her when Mamma made her little comments.
I'd never stood up and told them to back off.
I'd just patted her hand and convinced myself I was protecting her.
I'd been protecting myself. Keeping the peace so I didn't have to choose.
"What has she been doing at the dig all these years?" Corrado asked.
I looked up at him. My head felt heavy. "What?"
"The dig. The work she's been doing out there on the estate." He leaned back in his chair. "You said she's tracing the family line. What's she actually doing?"
I opened my mouth. Closed it.
I had no fucking idea.
The realization hit like a punch to the gut. I'd been married to this woman for ten years. She'd given up her career, her country, her entire life to marry me. She'd spent a decade working on something out there in the dirt and heat and I couldn't even tell Corrado what it was.
"I don't know," I said finally. My voice came out hollow. "I have no idea what she's been doing."
Corrado sat forward. His elbows rested on the desk and he looked at me the way he'd look at a contract with a bad clause buried in the fine print. "What does she do out there, Massimo? What does the work look like? What has she found? What does she need? What's the goal?"
Each question landed like a hammer. I had no answers. Not one.
"I don't know any of it," I said. My throat felt raw. "I've never asked."
The silence stretched out between us. Heavy. Damning. I could hear the clock on the wall ticking. Someone walked past in the hallway outside and their footsteps faded. A car horn blared down on the street.
She'd given up everything. And I'd never even bothered to find out what she was building in its place.
"I have to go see it," I said. "The dig. I have to find out what she's actually been doing out there. Not to check up on her or make sure the work is—" I stopped. Started again. "I just need to see it. To understand what I've been ignoring."
Corrado nodded slowly. "That's a start."
I stood up. My hands had stopped shaking but my chest still felt tight. "I need to go."