Rosa turned the phone toward me.
Marco moved so quickly his chair scraped against the hardwood floor.
“Ma.”
It was the first time I had ever heard fear in his voice.
Not anger.
Not irritation.
Fear.
Rosa ignored him.
On her phone was the Ricci family group chat.
I didn’t need to read every message to recognize Marco’s name appearing again and again beside mine.
Rosa scrolled back.
Two years.
That was how far it went.
The first message had been sent three weeks after I started working for him.
Emily fixed the Milan problem.
Stop calling me about it.
A month later:
Emily says the restaurant you want is booked.
She found another place you’ll like better.
Then:
Does anyone know a good mechanic near Chelsea? Emily’s car is making a noise and she refuses to replace it.
I stared at the screen.
I remembered that car problem.
Marco had walked past my desk one morning, heard me arguing quietly with a repair shop, and said nothing.
The next afternoon, the garage manager had mysteriously called to say they could fit me in immediately.
I had assumed Marco’s driver had recommended the place.
Rosa kept scrolling.
Emily’s father is in the hospital.
Move Sunday dinner.
I’m staying in the city.
My breath caught.
That had happened eighteen months earlier.
Marco had told me he stayed because of a late meeting.
There had been no late meeting.
I looked at him.
He was standing at the head of the table with one hand braced against the chair, watching me see pieces of my own life rearrange themselves.
“Enough,” he said quietly.
His mother finally looked at him.
“No.
You had two years.”
One of his sisters folded her arms.
“Actually, he had more than two years.
We started taking bets after Christmas.”
Marco closed his eyes.
I should have laughed.
I couldn’t.
I felt exposed in a way I had never felt in his office.
All the moments I had dismissed as professional courtesy were suddenly standing around me with different faces.
The extra car that appeared when I worked late.
The soup delivered to my apartment when I had the flu, supposedly ordered by the office.
The meeting he cancelled after a client insulted me.
The ridiculous imported tea that started appearing in the kitchen after he once saw me drinking the same brand from a cheap paper cup.
I had noticed every one of those things.
I had simply never let myself give them the meaning I wanted them to have.
Because wanting Marco Ricci was dangerous enough.
Believing Marco Ricci might want me back had seemed impossible.
