Page 114 of Ache for You (Slow Burn 3)
God, please just kill me now.
I squeeze the bridge of my nose, but it doesn’t help the stabbing pain in my forehead. “Matteo’s rich. He lives in a castle, for God’s sake. Their family owns a castle. They can’t be that hard up for money!”
Dominic looks at me as if I’m incredibly dim-witted. “Castello di Moretti is owned by the family only in name. The government has a lien on the property. Back taxes, my dear. The upkeep on the place is astronomical.”
The wind has been knocked out of me. I should sit down before I fall. But first I have to ask one final question before I abandon all hope. “Lorenzo has such a high opinion of her. He seems like such a smart guy, and he’s been with her for so long, how could he not see what she’s really like?”
> “Isn’t it obvious?” Dominic says gently. “He’s in love with her.”
Yes, now that you mention it. It’s as obvious as day. I had it pegged right from the beginning. I had everything pegged on the nose.
“Right,” I whisper as the world crashes down around me.
I barely make it to the trash can under the register before my lunch comes back up in a Technicolor stream.
Dominic exclaims in surprise, hurrying over to hover over me like a mother hen. I wave him away as I retch, embarrassed and humiliated, wanting to get rid of him, Clara, and the other ladies as quickly as possible.
I need to be alone with Matteo. I need to look into his eyes when he comes out of that dressing room. I need to make him tell me the truth to my face.
“Sit, sit, you’re as pale as a ghost!”
Gripping my arm, Dominic helps me onto the stool behind the counter. I collapse onto it, gasping and faint, wiping my mouth with the back of my hand. The peperoncini in the salad I had for lunch tasted much better going down. Now they’re searing my throat and the inside of my nose and making my eyes water.
Yeah, that’s it. The water in my eyes is from the peppers.
Dominic hands me his hankie. “Are you sick?”
Heartsick. Soul sick. Sick of men and their endless supply of bullshit. “I think I ate some bad fish at lunch,” I say dully, though it was a vegetable salad. I can’t have Dominic thinking my projectile vomiting has anything to do with the story he told me. I might have terrible taste in men, but I still have a shred left of my pride.
God, he’d be so disappointed to know what I was doing before he walked in the door.
“Let me take you home, Kimber. You should rest.”
“I’m fine.” I’m desperate to be rid of him. I can feel the burning presence of Matteo behind the dressing room curtain. I have to get Dominic out of the shop before something bad happens. I’m surprised Matteo hasn’t burst out already, but that probably only means he’s buying time to formulate his response.
“You’re not fine,” he presses. “You vomited. That’s the opposite of fine.”
I have to spend another five minutes convincing him I’m well enough to be left alone. He doesn’t like the idea of me taking a taxi home, but I reassure him by saying Clara will drive me. After he extracts many promises from me that I’ll call him later, he finally leaves. When I close the shop door behind him, my hands are shaking.
When I turn around, Matteo is standing outside the dressing room door.
He looks as sick as I feel.
“You believe him.”
His voice is quiet, level, but an undercurrent of rage runs through it. That and his expression give me hope that everything that happened between us earlier was something more than a clinical business maneuver.
“I don’t want to.” I admit it openly, not trying to hide how upset I am, letting him see all the confusion and hurt I feel.
“But you do.”
I can’t deny it. Nor should I. Whatever’s really happening here, it’s best for everyone involved if we put all our cards on the table right now. “Put yourself in my shoes. How would you feel? What would you think?”
“Dominic has hated my mother for a very long time.”
“Why?”
“She married another man.”
