Chapter 16
NICO
My father wanted me to have a sensible car. I chose the Mustang.
Sophia was my longest relationship before Alessia. That one lasted eight whole months, including a month of winter break when we were apart.
Now, I miss Alessia almost as much as, if not more than, I missed Sophia because then, I was thinking with my dick, but with my wife, it’s more than my penis.
I want her, yes.
The sex is amazing between us.
We’re in tune with each other.
It gets hotter each time.
But then I’d fuck her and be done with it.
Oh no, that’s not enough for me.
I want to talk to her.
Be with her.
Smell her.
Watch her work.
Hold her hand.
Sleep with her.
Kiss her.
Motherfucker! I’m so gone for my wife, it’s ridiculous.
“Do you know every time you get a text message, you smile?” Renzo drawls, enjoying himself.
“Fuck off,” I say as I type a response to Alessia’s message about pouring wine for a famous American football player who came for a wine tasting. She didn’t know who he was until after he was gone, and Edam, who is a big-time American football fan, told her.
“You never look at your phone in meetings…or rather, you used to not, but these days?” Renzo shakes his head in mock-annoyance. “You’re on the damn thing like it’s surgically attached to you. But then, when you’re in Bolgheri, and I reach out, I get crickets.”
I set the phone away and lean back in my office chair. “You done?”
He smirks. “You’ve fallen for your wife,” he states.
I smile. “Yeah. Big time.”
Of all the people in my life, Renzo is one I’ve never needed to lie to. With him, I don’t need walls or defenses.
“I miss her,” I confide. “I’ve never missed anyone in my life before, and I miss her. It’s very strange and yet feels very right.”
Renzo’s gaze turns gentle. “Love does that to you.”
“Speaking of falling in love”—I give my friend a long, pointed look—“are you seeing anyone, because I have a feeling you are.”
He shrugs. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“You’re fucking lying to me.”
He glances at me, the corners of his mouth tugging up in pure contentment. “It’s just…a good time.”
“Hmm.” I am not convinced, but I don’t push him. When he’s ready, he’ll tell me.
I look out of the window of my office and exhale. “I can’t sustain this.”
“You mean, living here and in Bolgheri?”
I nod. “But I can’t not be in the headquarters. Not when everything is still so fragile and new with the merger.”
Florence feels heavier each time I have to leave Alessia.
The Palazzo Alighieri closes around me the way it always has, marble and history pressing in, reminding me where power lives and how it’s exercised.
I spend two nights here now, sometimes three, before escaping to Bolgheri, where mornings begin with sun and soil and…my wife.
There’s a knock on my office door, and it opens when I assent to the intrusion. It’s my executive assistant.
“The Duca wants you in his office.”
I frown. I just had a meeting with Cesare yesterday, and we don’t have anything on the books.
“He says it’s urgent,” she insists. “Ah…and he wants you there as well, Signor Vitale.”
Renzo stands up. “Well, the Duke summons, so we’d better get going.”
Cesare is at his desk, and I’m struck once again by how he carries himself so differently from Alessia. He’s arrogant and has a very high opinion of himself. Most people who meet him don’t like him much. Alessia is the exact opposite.
He gestures for us to take a seat, and we do in the two comfortable leather guest chairs across from him.
“I have just…I have just received a call from Matteo Rinaldi.” His voice shakes a little. I’ve never heard that before.
We both wait.
He looks away from us and at the city of Florence that shines outside the large windows of his office. “He’s dying.”
Fuck!
Alessia will be heartbroken is my first thought. She thinks of Matteo as a father, and from what I've seen, he’s been more of that to her than Cesare ever has.
“Matteo and I…we’ve known each other for over thirty years.” Cesare turns now to look at me, and there’s pain etched on his face. “He’s my brother in every way other than blood.”
It’s incongruous to see a man like Cesare so emotional.
“What’s wrong?” Renzo asks.
Cesare takes a deep breath. “Pancreatic cancer. He…they found out two months ago and…they don’t recommend treatment. It’s spread. Treatment will…it’s too late.”
His hands are clenched.
“Alessia knows?” I ask because I’m pretty sure she doesn’t. If she did, she’d have called me.
He shakes his head. “He hasn’t told anyone but me.” He bangs his hand hard on the table. “Accidenti! Damn it!”
“Madonna santa,” Renzo mutters. “Holy mother of God!”
“His wife passed away from breast cancer three years ago. It crushed him. At least”—he pauses as if it’s too hard to speak—“she isn’t there to see him…wither away.”
“Cesare, I’m so sorry,” I murmur. “So very sorry.”
There’s a stretch of silence, and as if something snaps in him, Cesare sits up and clears his throat. “He’s going to reduce his hours. We’ve talked about it. He will wait a month or so and tell others.”
I close my eyes and take a deep breath.
Is Alessia now an “other” to Matteo? No, I don’t believe it.
If he isn’t telling her, it’s because he loves her and doesn’t want to burden her.
I decide then and there that I’ll convince him to talk to her.
Alessia will be heartbroken if she finds out later, and I can’t tell her, not until Matteo gives me permission to do so.
“How can we help him?” I ask.
Cesare shakes his head. There’s a hollow ache in his eyes when he looks at me. “Not even God can help him. The House of Alighieri needs help. We need a plan.”
“For his replacement,” Renzo deduces, as do I.
“Yes,” Cesare says, his voice heavy with grief.
He and Matteo are friends and have been for a long time. I can only imagine how devastated I’d be if I found out such news about Renzo.
“We need to be realistic,” Cesare continues. “Matteo is not going to be here for very long. We cannot afford sentimentality.”
I can’t sit still any longer because I have this itch to call my wife and talk to her. I want to comfort her and be comforted myself. But this isn’t news I have a right to share.
I walk to the window, my hands tucked in my suit pants, and look out at the Arno, shimmering on this first day of September.
“We have to handle this carefully.” I hate that I have to talk business at this time, but the show, as they say, must go on. “Losing our head winemaker is going to cause waves in the industry.”
“We need a successor to be announced before everyone finds out about Matteo,” Cesare says in agreement. “Renzo, I asked you to start whittling down the list of candidates I gave you.”
I don’t have to look at Renzo to know that he’s done that even if he hasn’t advertised it.
“I have five left on the list.”
“Is Elda on it?”
“Yes.”
I turn now. “This is Elda Costa?”
He's a very well-known winemaker from Vigneti San Bartolomeo, a winery in Piedmont that produces some of the best Barolos drunk in the world. He was mentored by the famous Frank Cornelissen from Mount Etna. He would be a feather in the cap of the House of Alighieri.
Cesare steeples his hands. “Yes. And Davide Fontana?”
Renzo shrugs. “Si.”
Cesare dips his chin thoughtfully. “I want someone with international credibility. Gravitas. Someone with a name that reassures the board and our distributors.”
Renzo folds his arms. “Have you considered Alessia?”
The room goes very quiet.
Cesare looks at Renzo like he’s sprouted a second head. “Are you out of your Goddamn mind?”
Renzo isn’t affected by Cesare’s harsh tone. “She’s one of the best winemakers in the House of Alighieri. And she’s an Alighieri to boot. What she’s done with Pietra Alta is pretty amazing.”
Cesare leans forward, looking very much like a predator staring down his prey. Not that Renzo scares easily or at all. “Pietra Alta is a favor I do for Matteo and to humor my daughter, that’s all.”
“Matteo thinks of her as his successor,” Renzo presses. “And she is—"
“That is indulgence,” Cesare cuts in. “Not succession.”
He turns to me then, fire blazing in his eyes. “And you?” he demands. “Do you think your wife should be considered?”
This is the moment.
I know it as it happens—the way the air tightens, the way Renzo goes still.
I think of Alessia two mornings ago, barefoot in the kitchen, handing me coffee and a kiss as she talked about all her plans for harvest, a new blend she’s been thinking about.
I think of her texts from earlier today: of grapes heavy on the vine and another of the light slanting through the pergola.
Alessia: Miss you. Come back soon.
I replied instantly: Two days, and I’m all yours, cara.
“Well?” Cesare snaps.
I hesitate, and I know that hesitation is going to cost me.
But defending Alessia might end up costing me and her a lot more.
I used to be reckless when I was younger, buying a ’69 Mustang, going on a road trip across the United States, trekking the Arctic…
but I’m not in my early twenties now. I’m a grown man.
A CEO. I have responsibilities that go beyond Alessia, and in fact, they go beyond me.
I have a business to take care of—ensure that the thousands of people who work for the House of Alighieri have the means to pay for their lives.
The boy could afford to be wild and impulsive, but not the man I have become, the one I want to be in the future.
“I think,” I say carefully, “that this is a larger conversation. One we don’t need to have today.”
Cesare nods, satisfied. He hears agreement where I offered evasion.
“Good,” he says. “Renzo, I want you and Nico to talk to the five candidates and bring me your two top choices. I will make the final decision.”
I grit my teeth and shoot Renzo a warning look. I know exactly what he’s thinking—because I’m thinking the same thing.
Cesare is the chairman of the board. Hiring a winemaker is not under his purview.
It’s under mine, as CEO of the company. But Cesare never truly let go of the reins, not even when another man held this title and ran the day-to-day before me.
My predecessor didn’t mind being managed from above. I do.
Still, I also know how this ends if I challenge him now.
I serve at the pleasure of the board, and until I’ve proven myself—until the numbers, the expansion, the strategy all bear my name—they’ll side with Cesare.
If I push this, I’ll be out of a job, and if that happens, I’ll never be able to elevate Alessia to head winemaker—no matter how much she deserves it.
So, I will wait.
Patience is the strategy—and the price—that will make my wife’s and my dreams a reality.
I nod at Renzo, and he gives Cesare a deferential smile. “Nico and I will meet with the candidates.”
The meeting ends shortly after.
I leave with the distinct sensation that something essential has slipped through my fingers—not because it was taken from me, but because I let it go.
That evening, after I finish working out to burn through my despair at the Palazzo’s well-equipped gym, Alessia texts me.
A photo of the sunset over the vines with a simple note: I wish you were here.
I type back: Me, too, dolcezza. I miss you desperately.
It’s true.
I miss sleeping with her—sharing a bed, mornings, and meals.
She trusts me with her body, her time, and her heart—and I reciprocate in kind. She’s become more important to me in the past weeks than anyone else in my life.
And yet, I’m aware that behind a closed door, just now, I chose peace over her. I chose patience over fairness.
Does Alessia deserve to be the head winemaker? Yes, and it’s not only because I love her, but it’s also what Matteo wants. It’s Cesare who’s being bullheaded about it.
She has no expectations from her father, but she believes in me, and I betrayed her today, not by action but with my silence. That truth rests more heavily on my shoulders than the weights I was lifting at the gym.