‘I’m sorry,’ she said to Dante. ‘I just...’
‘I get it,’ Dante said, and gave her a hug. ‘Ariana, I know how confusing this has all been, but there’s something you need to hear, both you and Stefano...’ He turned to their mother. ‘It’s time, Mamma,’ he said.
This was big.
Gian knew that, because even as he tried to focus on his weekly planning meeting with Luna, little pings from his computer had him looking over. The press were gathered outside Romano Holdings, where an extraordinary meeting was being held, and in an unprecedented move Angela Romano was seen entering the building.
Gian watched as Ariana duly arrived in a silver car and he scanned the short piece of footage for a clue, a glimpse, as to what lay behind the mask she most certainly wore.
Her parting shot to him yesterday had seriously rattled him and he had spent most of the night simultaneously disregarding and dwelling on her words.
You keep your cold black heart and I’ll carry right on.
Yet he was struggling to carry on, knowing that Ariana must be suffering now. For the first time, Gian wanted more information on the details of a woman’s private life. He was fighting with himself not to call Ariana to see what was going on, how she was coping, what she knew...
Her brief appearance told him nothing. She was immaculate. Ariana really should be on the stage, for there was no hint of tension in her body language.
She wore a navy linen suit and her hair was smooth and tied back in a slick ponytail. She even paused and smiled her gorgeous red-lipped smile for the cameras.
‘This can wait,’ he told Luna, and wrapped up their morning meeting so he could focus on the news. ‘If you could just bring coffee.’
‘Of course.’
Throughout the morning, the little pings became more and more frequent for there was drama aplenty. Dante Romano and Mia were engaged to be married! Gian could not imagine that going down well with a certain hot-headed lady, but there Ariana was, still smiling for the cameras as she left the building and climbed into a car.
Ariana would come to him.
Of that Gian was certain.
Despite their exchange yesterday, Gian was quietly confident that Ariana would arrive in his office, because whenever there was drama in Ariana Romano’s life, inevitably Luna announced she was at his door and a mini-tornado would burst in.
‘Any messages from Ariana Romano?’ he checked with Luna.
‘None.’
‘If she arrives here,’ Gian said, ‘please send her straight through.’
Ariana did not arrive, though, for she refused to run to him.
The car was mercifully cool and, rather than stare ahead, Ariana looked out of the window and smiled at the cameras as if the drama surrounding Dante and Mia hadn’t affected her in the slightest. In fact, their engagement was the merest tip of an iceberg that had just been exposed to her in all its blinding glory. Ariana was having trouble taking it all in.
‘Home?’ the driver checked.
‘No...’ She hesitated, not quite ready for the emptiness of her apartment and the noise of her own thoughts. ‘Just drive, please.’
She took a gulp of water from a chilled bottle the driver handed to her and tried to come to terms with the fact that her life, her childhood—in fact, all she had ever known—had been built on a lie. Her parents’ marriage, of which she’d been so proud, had been a sham. They’d both had other partners and the marriage had been in name only, so much so that she and Stefano had been IVF babies.
It felt as if she was the very last to know.
They drove for ages. It was rush hour in Rome, all the workers spilling out, some rushing for transport, others taking their time for a coffee, or to sit in a bar.
She felt like an alien.
A stranger in her own body.
As they passed La Fiordelise she had never been more tempted to ask the driver to pull in, to push through the brass doors and escape to the cool calmness of Gian’s office and unburden herself, as she would usually do. Except, thanks to their argument yesterday, that refuge was denied her now.
Instead, Ariana asked to be dropped off where they had walked that lonely night. She wandered there, too shocked and stunned for tears. It was a sticky late spring day and she drifted a while, ignoring the buzz of her phone.
Finally she glanced at the endless missed calls.
He came first and last.
Gian.
Mamma.
Gian.
Gian.
Mamma.
Gian.
Stefano.
Gian.
She had nothing to say to any of them, at least not until she had gathered her thoughts. Eventually, drained from walking and with a headache creating a pulse of its own, she wandered listlessly home.
‘Hey,’ she said to the doorman, who was dozing behind his cap. She took the elevator up, jolting when she saw a very familiar face. Gian was leaning against the wall, but came to his full height as she approached.
Her heart did not lurch in hope or relief. In fact, it sank, for right now Gian felt like another problem to deal with, another person to hide her true self from.
For her true self was hurting and dreadfully so—and her emotions were clearly too much for him.
‘What are you doing here, Gian?’
‘You didn’t respond to my calls...’
‘No.’ She didn’t even look at him. ‘Because I was not in the mood to speak to anyone. How did you get up here?’ She let out a mirthless laugh as she answered her own question. ‘I really am going to fire that doorman.’
‘I told him we were friends.’
‘Friends.’ She let out a mirthless laugh at his description of them. ‘Well, however you described yourself, the doorman shouldn’t have let you up.’ She opened her door and her words dripped sarcasm as she
