Chapter 4 - Breakfast Without a Wedding
Vanessa came downstairs at eight-thirteen wearing cream wool and no makeup.
That was how Luca knew she understood something was wrong.
She never appeared before staff without makeup.
The breakfast room smelled like coffee, toast, and the rosemary Mrs. Carter kept in a clay pot near the window. Snow had covered the back terrace during the night. The garden furniture looked buried and harmless.
Luca sat alone with an untouched plate.
Vanessa stopped in the doorway.
“You didn’t come upstairs.”
“No.”
“You slept in the study?”
“No.”
He had not slept at all.
She crossed the room slowly.
“Where is Olivia?”
The question was careful.
“In the blue room.”
“So dramatic.”
Luca looked at her.
Vanessa pulled out the chair opposite him.
“What?”
“Why did you contact Elena seven months ago?”
Her hand stopped on the chair back.
For one second, nothing moved except steam rising from the coffee.
Then she sat.
“I can explain.”
“That would be useful.”
She folded her hands.
“I asked her for your mother’s ring.”
“You told me the subject came up six months ago.”
“It did. Between us.”
“You had already contacted Elena.”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
Vanessa’s eyes hardened slightly.
“Because I knew you would turn it into this.”
“This.”
“A trial.”
Luca pushed his coffee aside.
“Olivia has a swollen face because you grabbed her when she tried to leave a room.”
“I did not hit her.”
“You lied about how she was hurt.”
“Because she panicked and ran into a door.”
“After you put your hands on her.”
Vanessa stared at him.
“I was scared.”
“Of the housekeeper.”
“Of you.”
That stopped him.
Not because he believed it excused anything.
Because he believed part of it might be true.
Vanessa continued. “Do you know what it’s like to be engaged to you? Every person in every room watches me for one mistake. Your staff watches me. Your associates watch me. Your family watches me. They compare everything I do to your mother, to Elena, to whatever version of a Moretti wife they’ve invented.”
Luca said nothing.
“You told me your mother’s ring was still with your ex-wife,” she said. “Then you acted like it meant nothing.”
“It was hers.”
“It was your family’s.”
“My mother gave it to Elena.”
“As your wife.”
“No. She gave it to her before the wedding and told her it was hers regardless.”
Vanessa looked away.
“You knew that?” he asked.
“I knew Elena claimed that.”
“Elena wasn’t claiming. I was there.”
Vanessa’s mouth tightened.
The door opened.
Mrs. Carter entered with a fresh pot of coffee, saw their faces, and stopped.
“Leave it,” Luca said.
She set the pot down.
As she turned away, Vanessa said, “Mrs. Carter, would you give us privacy?”
Mrs. Carter’s eyes moved to Luca.
That tiny glance told him more than he wanted to know.
“Stay,” he said.
Vanessa stared at him.
“Excuse me?”
“I said stay.”
Mrs. Carter remained near the sideboard.
Luca looked at Vanessa. “Why did she look at me before obeying you?”
Vanessa laughed once. “Because you’re her employer.”
“No. She looked at me because she wasn’t sure whose instruction mattered.”
“This is absurd.”
“Have you been giving staff instructions about what happens after the wedding?”
Vanessa went still.
Mrs. Carter lowered her eyes.
Luca noticed.
“Margaret?”
Mrs. Carter had worked in the house for eleven years. He rarely used her first name.
Her shoulders shifted.
“Ms. Bellini has discussed some changes.”
“What changes?”
“Scheduling. Guest access. Which employees would stay on after the wedding.”
Vanessa’s face flushed.
“I was planning our household.”
“You were planning my household without speaking to me.”
“Our household,” she repeated.
Luca looked at Mrs. Carter. “Did she tell you Olivia would be dismissed?”
Mrs. Carter hesitated.
Vanessa stood.
“This is ridiculous.”
“Margaret.”
Mrs. Carter swallowed. “She said Olivia was temporary and probably wouldn’t be needed after the honeymoon.”
Luca turned toward Vanessa.
Olivia’s words from the night before returned.
I believed your fiancée could erase my ability to work in this city.
Vanessa had never needed that much power.
She only needed everyone to believe she had it.
“When?” he asked Mrs. Carter.
“Three weeks ago.”
Vanessa pushed back from the table.
“I’m not discussing staffing in front of staff.”
“You already did.”
She stared at him.
Then her voice dropped.
“You promised me this would become my home.”
“I did.”
“And you left every important decision exactly where it was before me. Elena has your mother’s ring. Margaret runs the house. Daniel answers only to you. Your family talks about your first marriage like I’m not in the room. I asked for one thing that would make it clear I was not a guest here.”
“The ring.”
“Yes.”
“And when I didn’t retrieve it quickly enough, you hired someone to watch me and lie to Elena.”
“I hired him to watch you because you met Elena without telling me.”
“That meeting was about the vacation house.”
“You could have told me.”
“I could have.”
He let the admission sit.
Vanessa looked surprised.
“That was wrong,” Luca said. “I should have told you. I should also have dealt with the ring question directly instead of saying eventually until you stopped asking.”
Her eyes filled slightly.
For a moment, he saw the woman he had proposed to. Proud. Controlled. Terrified of looking foolish.
Then he remembered Olivia’s face.
“But you do not get to turn my mistake into permission for yours.”
Vanessa’s expression closed.
“What are you saying?”
Luca reached into his pocket.
He placed the engagement ring box on the table.
Vanessa looked down at it.
Her face changed.
“No.”
“The wedding is off.”
She laughed softly, as if he had made a cruel joke.
“Because of Olivia?”
“Because of you.”
“You’re ending a marriage over a misunderstanding with an employee?”
“I’m ending an engagement because you lied to my former wife, hired a private investigator to manufacture a story, threatened an injured woman’s livelihood, and made plans for people in this house as if they were furniture.”
Her eyes flashed.
“I never told Mercer to manufacture anything.”
“He kept the messages.”
That silenced her.
Luca stood.
“You’ll stay in the east guest room today while your belongings are packed. Daniel will arrange a car.”
Vanessa did not move.
“You’re throwing me out.”
“I’m asking you to leave.”
“In front of staff.”
Mrs. Carter quietly stepped backward.
Vanessa looked at her.
“Don’t you dare leave now.”
Luca’s voice sharpened.
“Vanessa.”
She turned back.
For the first time, her control cracked.
“My mother spent twenty-three years being treated like my father’s second wife even though the first one was dead.”
Luca said nothing.
“She never got the family jewelry. Never hosted Christmas. Never sat in the chair his first wife used at dinner because everyone said it would upset the children. She died being introduced as ‘Richard Bellini’s second wife’ like it was a warning label.”
Her voice broke on the last word.
Luca understood then.
Not the excuse.
The wound.
Vanessa had not wanted an emerald.
She had wanted proof that she could not be displaced by a woman who was no longer there.
And she had chosen to obtain that proof by making everyone else smaller.
“You should have told me,” he said.
“You should have noticed.”
That landed too.
Vanessa stood.
She picked up the engagement ring box, opened it, and looked at the diamond she had worn for eleven months.
Then she closed the lid.
“I’m not leaving until I speak to Olivia.”
Luca’s expression hardened.
“That is not your decision.”
From the doorway behind Mrs. Carter came a quiet voice.
“It can be mine.”
They all turned.
Olivia stood there in borrowed pajamas beneath a house robe, one side of her face purple and swollen.
She looked directly at Vanessa.
May you like
“I’ll talk to you.”
