Page 27 of The Roman's Woman (A Singular Obsession)

“This is Dr. Saddler,” Gio explained, pointing to the short balding man. “He’s a top pulmonary specialist. I’d like him to examine you.”

Sophia stared at him for a second and then started to laugh. But it turned into a hacking cough, undercutting all the arguments he knew she was about to make.

The cough was deep. It rattled in her chest, multiplying his guilt ten-fold. His face tightened, and he gave the doctor a little shove.

Kelly was smart enough to get out his way. She stayed for the examination, but once the doctor prescribed an inhalant to soothe Sophia’s irritated lungs, she tactfully went to the bedroom. The doctor took his leave, and he and Sophia were finally alone, staring at each other.

She held up the inhaler in her hand. “The EMTs already gave me some of this. A house call was unnecessary, Mr. Morgese.”

He closed his eyes for a long hard moment. This was excruciating.

“It really is Gio.”

One fine brown brow raised. “Seriously?”

Sitting in an armchair across from her, he nodded emphatically. “It’s what my friends call me. And most of my family. That’s why I thought you recognized me.”

Her eyes bored into him, her hostility palpable. “It should have been obvious after a few minutes that I didn’t.”

“It was…I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I didn’t mean to lie.”

Inhaling sharply, she turned away, but not before he saw the glitter of tears in her eyes. He felt like an asshole.

“This is the worst thing I’ve ever done,” he said. “Even now, I can’t believe that I did it. You are the last person I wanted to lie to. But things were bad for me and they were getting worse. And then you thought I was someone else. It was an insane impulse, but I couldn’t stop myself from going along with it. I regretted it immediately. I swear I did. Every day I meant to tell you the truth. However, my situation kept deteriorating. I believed that if you knew who I really was I’d never see you again.”

Her fine brows pulled together. “I don’t understand.”

Exhaling, he leaned back. “I guess you didn’t Google me…”

She shrugged. “Kelly did.”

“So you know about my ex-wife?”

It was a relief, or it should have been, but Sophia was frowning in confusion.

“What about her?”

Sighing audibly, he rubbed his face. “She’s slandering me in the press. We’ve been divorced for years, but she got in trouble recently. For some reason she decided the best way to get out of it was to throw me to the wolves.” He rolled his shoulders in frustration, gesturing with his hands as he went on. “It’s a pack of disgusting lies, what she’s insinuating. But one of my old friends is enabling her—they’re sleeping together. To twist the knife, Maria-Gianna also has one of my young and stupid cousins wrapped around her finger. He’s joined in the defamation, so I cut him off.”

Her eyes widened, but she stayed quiet. “Well, you can’t choose your family, but it sounds like you need better friends,” she said eventually.

He smiled sadly. “I do have some good ones. One of them, Alex, is the one who finally told me the truth about my wife. He decided I needed to know after she tried to get him into bed. And he wasn’t the first. She pulled the same thing with my friend, Calen, too. He was still trying to figure out how to tell me when Alex beat him to it.”

Breaking eye contact, he looked down. He hated talking about that whole sordid mess. But she needed to hear it all or she wouldn’t understand why he had made such poor decisions.

“It was the holidays, and they were visiting. Maria Gianna was having one of her fits, and I was already sick of the drama. She didn’t like that I didn’t react the way she wanted. She needed to be indulged, but I wasn’t in the mood. I had just realized how immature and spoiled she was. I’d known her since childhood—she’s my father’s goddaughter. But it turns out I didn’t know her at all. I only saw the glittery exterior. What was underneath was very ugly.”

Sophia took a pillow and hugged it to her stomach, sitting back on the couch. “I’m waiting for the part where all that led to you lying to me.”

Seeing an open bottle of wine on the coffee table, he nodded and poured what was left into one of the empty glasses next to it.

“I know, it’s simply that I wanted to tell you everything for the longest time,” he said before letting his eyes unfocus, remembering the ignominious end to his marriage. “As I was saying, not all of my friends were that loyal. There was that one who was sleeping with her, Vincenzo. Every time she was angry with me, she went to him—and she was angry with me a lot toward the end. Vinny and I grew up together…I never realized how much he hated me until the divorce. There were probably others too, but unlike Vinny, they’re too ashamed to admit it.”

He checked for her reaction.

“Go on,” she said.

“Did I mention that Vincenzo’s father owns several tabloids?”

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