Page 11 of Bones of Revenge and Reckoning

Hey, are you going to the Mancini party tonight? I know your family would go crazy, but we could go together, and I doubt any of the elder Mancinis would recognize you if you dress different and wear some party clothes. I have an invite. Shall we go? See what your birthday boy is up to?

Party? He’s having a party? The hurt is swift and sharp, tiny nettle-like barbs of pain all over as my skin prickles and burns with shame. Hot, burning shame.

He never mentioned having a party. He said his family were hosting a dinner to celebrate.

I get why I wouldn’t be the guest of honor, but he lied to me. He could have told me the truth, and I’d have accepted it.

Who is going to be there? I text Jilly back. Her family is old money and linked to so much of the social scene here.

Everyone who is someone.

I know she doesn’t mean it the way I take it, but that statement cuts me a little deeper. I am someone. I’m a damned Andretti.

I’ll get ready and meet you at the coffee shop on the corner. I’ll tell Mamma we are studying. Tell yours the same.

She sends a xx back, which means yes in our code, and I fall back on the bed, my stomach churning.

Why wouldn’t he just admit he couldn’t invite me? Instead of lying about having a party?

Hopefully, he won’t be mad when he sees me there, but if he is, then I’ll know he’s ashamed to be with me, and I don’t think my heart is prepared to take that right now.

He needs to grovel, I decide, as I hug my pillow to me.

Yes, Matteo Mancini needs to earn my forgiveness.

Chapter 5

Renata

The Mancini mansion makes our home look ordinary. We probably have a bit more power than them when it comes to the old school methods employed by families like ours. They have more wealth, though. Then again, they need it. There’s so many of them. Aldo Mancini is the head of the family, and he has a daughter, Bianca, and a son, Clifford. Then there’s his brother, Alberto, and he has Matteo and his sister, Sophia. The other three brothers have a variety of kids whose names I can never remember.

Aldo and Alberto run the business, though, and it is Matteo and Clifford who will be set to take over one day. Not Bianca, because she’s a girl, so like me, she’ll be expected to marry some man to cement the family’s power. It’s so unfair.

Still, Mamma was right about one thing. She always said when I grew up, I’d be glad to marry when I found a man who made my heart sing. If Matteo asked me to marry him, would I say yes?

Then the reality of what that means comes crashing in on me, reminding me that I am an Andretti, and we aren’t allowed to even talk to the Mancinis, never mind dream about marrying one.

The party is in full swing when Jilly and I arrive. I clutch my present to my chest like a shield to hide the nervous tremors that roll through my body.

Jilly grins at the burly guards on the door and flashes her invites.

“Miss Rainmoor?” one of the guards reads off his list.

She nods brusquely. She acts like the stuck up rich bitch so hopefully she can sweep inside, no questions asked, with an Andretti at her side.

The guards don’t even bother to look at me. I get that I’m just a girl, but my father would have their balls for such lax security.

We step inside the vast space, and I glance around.

“They never met a gold ornament they didn’t love,” Jilly says with a soft giggle.

Her family home is the kind of thing my father wants for us, understated but steeped in history. The trouble is you can’t buy that history. It isn’t for sale, and our family will always be outsiders to the British elite they admire.

Music comes from the den, and we peek our heads in. There are teenagers dancing to a song I don’t recognize. It sounds old.

“Ooh, classic eighties. Your guy has good taste.”

I can’t see my guy, as she calls him. He’s not in the crowd. Matteo is tall, and he’d be easy to spot. I wander down the hallway and stop at the doorway to the formal drawing room that the family rarely use. Matteo showed me it once and said they only use it for large events.

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