Page 61 of The Lies We Tell

“You deserve to be loved, piccola.”

She smiled, leaning her forehead against his. “That’s what my mother used to say.” Her fingers stroked down the side of his face. “Be your own man, Matteo. You’ll get better results that way.”

Brushing a kiss against her cheek, he released her to return to her seat. Be his own man. That’s what he thought he’d been doing. But maybe he hadn’t run as far outside his father’s shadow as he thought.

Chapter Twenty-Three

Tessa stood in her closet staring at the rows upon rows of new clothes Matteo had insisted on buying her. She’d sworn up and down she didn’t need anything else, that what she had at home was fine, but the man wouldn’t take no for an answer.

In fact, as soon as she’d agreed to go shopping on their final morning, he’d had them driven directly to a shop already waiting for them with champagne and items for her to try on. As if he knew he’d talk her into it eventually. Probably because he never failed to get his way.

It was nice to be dressed up by him. He knew what he wanted. And he wanted her. That might have been the best part. Being wanted after so many years of being discarded, forgotten, ignored.

She blew out a breath and stripped a pretty pink cable-knit sweater from the hanger, pulling it on and adjusting the sleeves. That was dangerous thinking.

They’d been back on the island for three days, and she still hadn’t heard from her father. Not even a text message hounding her for information. It was starting to make her twitchy.

She wanted to believe that no news was good news, but all it did was settle a sickly feeling of dread in her stomach. If he knew exactly where her mother was, what was taking him so long to connect them by phone?

Smoothing the shirt down over her hips, Tessa slipped her feet into a pair of simple black flats and crossed into the bathroom. A second towel hung on the rack next to the tub, and it welled a deep ache inside her.

She shouldn’t have let herself get this close to him. Aloof, detached, cold, unfeeling. That had been the goal, and it hadn’t even taken her all that long to fuck it up. A handful of nice words from him, a few good orgasms, and suddenly she was putty in his hands.

Brushing her teeth quickly, she rinsed and turned off the light, stalking across the room to where she’d left her phone on the nightstand. Scooping it up, she brought up her contacts, her finger hovering over the call button for one of only a handful of people.

Luna. Her father’s burner phone.

The name stared up at her, a taunt. One phone call. She’d demand a deadline to hear her mother’s voice. She had a big juicy carrot to dangle in front of her father’s face. Something better than how much Matteo loved his family, how vulnerable they made him. The airport in Belgium.

You didn’t borrow money from a guy like Laurent Theroux to buy a private airport somewhere so far away unless you were planning on using it for something important. She didn’t know what that important thing was, but her father would hardly care.

It was the perfect piece of information. The kind that would release her from this agreement with Salvatore Antonetti forever. Then she could pack her bags, get her mother, and never look back. That’s the only thing she’d ever wanted.

It used to be the only thing she ever wanted. She tossed the phone on the bed and flopped down beside it, dropping her head into her hands. Now she wasn’t so sure. Her desire to see her mother again warred with her want for Matteo until it was all a confusing jumble in her mind, and it was impossible to untangle the pieces for the truth.

Had she started to wonder if her mother was dead because of her feelings for Matteo or because it was the most likely outcome? If she let herself think about it too long, it became easier and easier to conjure up anger at her mother for not trying harder to find a way back to her instead of the intense relief she felt when her father first told Tessa her mother was alive.

That palpable relief had been a beacon of hope in a sea of darkness. Was that hopeful light fading because she was finally seeing the truth of her father’s manipulation? Or because it made her feel less guilty about her warring desires?

It was impossible to know. Not really. At least, that’s what she kept telling herself. She couldn’t know for sure one way or another until she spoke to her mother. She wouldn’t make any decisions until then.

Tucking her phone into her pocket, she headed downstairs for breakfast. Matteo had been up with the sunrise, raining kisses over her face and neck before leaving her to sleep. He likely wouldn’t be back until late. They didn’t ever talk about it, but she knew they were in the final planning stages of taking down her father.

It was an easy guess made even easier by the searching looks Luca would give her whenever he ran into her in the hallway, as if he was trying to see inside her soul and figure out if she was a traitor. She tried to avoid Luca as much as possible. Just in case she was becoming a little too transparent.

She heard a noise in the family dining room before she rounded the corner. If it was anyone at this time of day, it was Carina, who often stopped by the house if Alexei had club business close by she wasn’t interested in.

From what Tessa could gather, Carina only cared about club business if she got to participate with a blade in her hand. There was something Tessa rather admired about that.

But the smile on her face died when she saw Luca seated at the table. Alone. He glanced up with his own smile, expecting to see Sienna, no doubt, and it quickly faded into a scowl when he caught sight of her.

Tessa contemplated retreating and asking Giulia to bring something up to her room or skipping breakfast entirely, but the butler was already setting out a place for her. Luca’s eyes dropped to the extra place setting and then swiveled back to her face. He raised a brow, as if challenging her to be rude and leave now.

Dragging her feet across the floor, she sank into the chair the butler held out.

“Your usual latte and bombolone, signorina?” the butler asked.

“Yes, thank you, Taglia.”

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