Page 88 of Brutal Husband

As we talk across Mom, she grows angrier, speaking louder and louder until she slams her hand on the table and shrieks, “You will listen to your mother.”

Everyone in the restaurant stops talking. We both watch Mom in silence. Slowly, conversations pick up here and there around us, but most people are still staring.

“You’re both making a huge mistake. You—” she hisses, pointing to Isabel, “are being headstrong, as usual. But you—” She points at me. “You have no idea the dangerous game you’re playing. I don’t imagine your husband is enjoying your new backbone. He wanted a submissive, stupid little wife who would do as she’s told. I thought of you right away, and that’s what I promised him.”

Mom’s barbed words arrow toward my heart, but they fall harmlessly aside. The things she says can’t hurt me anymore. She doesn’t know it, but she talked with Luca, not Nero.

“My husband loves me just the way I am. He pulled me out of the dark. He adores me, and I adore him, and we’re going to be so happy together.”

The confidence with which I speak saps some of Mom’s energy, but only for a moment. “How naive of you to believe that man could possibly…”

A dark shadow crosses the table.

Mom looks up to find Nero looming over her, his expression flinty as he glares at her.

“Could possibly what?” he asks coldly.

Mom fumes in silence. Nero isn’t easily controlled like her daughters, and she knows it.

“I’m married to the woman of my dreams. A beautiful, clever, brave woman who has been through hell and back, but she’s still smiling. And by some miracle, she loves me.” Nero caresses my cheek with his knuckles, and I smile up at him. His wedding ring feels warm against me. “I’m the luckiest man in the world.”

I gaze up at my husband and smile, feeling so much love in my heart.

I get to my feet, and so does Isabel. It feels good knowing that after today, I won’t have to be afraid of Mom or speak to her ever again.

“Mom, you said once that I deserve Nero Lombardi, and I think that’s the only time you’ve spoken the absolute truth. I used to be afraid of the dark because that’s where you put me. I’m out in the light now, and I’m not afraid of anything anymore.”

Nero holds out his hand, and I take it, letting his strong, warm fingers close around mine. With Isabel on my other side, we turn our backs on Mom.

“Rieta. Get back here right now. Isabel? Don’t you dare do this to me, Isabel. After all I’ve done for you.Bothof you.”

Mom screams, picks up a glass, and hurls it at the wall.

The last thing we hear as we leave the restaurant is the manager frantically calling the police.

The two meneye each other suspiciously. Though their body language is overtly relaxed, tension crackles between them. Laz has both arms folded and his body propped against the back of the sofa while a muscle in his jaw tics. Nero has one hand in his pocket while he tousles his hair, but his hard eyes are on Laz.

“I’m not sure how I feel about you in my house,” Laz says finally. “I never liked you.”

Mia and I share a tense look. We’ve been anticipating the moment our husbands confront each other without any pleasure. Hopefully, we’ll all be able to sit down and enjoy the meal Mia has prepared without punches being thrown, but right now it seems fifty-fifty which way it will go.

I’m holding my niece Mirabella in my arms. The little girl is so cute with her curls and her big eyes. One day soon, Mirabella and my baby are going to be playing games with each other—assuming their fathers can find a way to get along.

Nero watches Laz warily. He seems to be sizing up an opponent rather than anticipating breaking any ice between them. “I haven’t been very likable, but to be fair, a lot of the time it wasn’t me. You and I barely know each other.”

Laz tilts his head to one side and narrows his eyes. “Oh? Who came to brunch uninvited recently and picked up my daughter without asking?”

Nero hesitates. “Well, that was me.”

“Who abandoned Rieta at her wedding reception?” Laz asks.

“Ah, yeah, also me.”

“Who got her pregnant and disappearedagain?”

Nero swears under his breath and looks to me for help, but it’s Mia who comes to his rescue.

“Laz, you’ve hardly been a beacon of goodness and morality yourself.”

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