Chapter 4 - Dante Moretti’s Secret
I left my wedding wearing the dress.
No luggage.
No passport.
No money.
Just a pair of borrowed hotel slippers beneath six thousand dollars of silk.
Dante drove.
Not a chauffeur.
Not a guard.
Him.
“Where are we going?”
“Somewhere nobody owns you.”
“That sounds dramatic.”
“You just canceled a Valtieri wedding in front of three hundred people.”
“Fair.”
We stopped outside a townhouse in Manhattan.
Dante handed me a key.
“What is this?”
“An apartment.”
“Yours?”
“No.”
“Whose?”
“Yours.”
I stared at him.
“No.”
His eyebrow lifted.
“No?”
“I’m done accepting expensive cages from powerful men.”
For several seconds, he said nothing.
Then he nodded.
“Good.”
He took the key back.
That surprised me.
“You’re not going to argue?”
“You said no.”
“So?”
“So I listened.”
That simple answer hit me harder than it should have.
“Then where am I sleeping?”
Dante looked at the enormous wedding dress.
“I know a hotel.”
I laughed.
Three days later, my father restored access to my personal accounts.
A week later, he returned my passport.
Two weeks later, federal investigators began asking questions about both families.
Cassian disappeared from public view.
And Dante stayed away.
That bothered me more than I wanted to admit.
Finally, I called him.
“Dinner.”
Silence.
Then:
“Is that an order?”
“Invitation.”
“Tonight?”
“Seven.”
He arrived at 6:58.
Same black suit.
Same tattoos.
Same impossible calm.
I didn’t waste time.
“Why did you come to my room?”
“I told you.”
“No. You told me why you stopped the wedding.”
I leaned forward.
“Why you?”
Dante looked at his glass.
Then he removed something from his wallet.
An old photograph.
My mother.
Much younger.
Standing beside Dante.
I stared.
“What is this?”
“Your mother and my sister were best friends.”
I looked up.
Dante continued.
“My sister married a man like Cassian.”
His voice changed.
Barely.
“She thought she could change him.”
“What happened?”
“She spent nine years trying.”
I understood without needing details.
“I’m sorry.”
Dante nodded.
“Before she died, she made me promise something.”
“What?”
“That if I ever saw another woman being pushed into the same kind of life, I wouldn’t stand there politely.”
My throat tightened.
“So you came for me.”
“I came to give you a door.”
“Why the wedding-night line?”
A trace of embarrassment appeared.
“It sounded better in my head.”
I burst out laughing.
Dante stared.
“You’re laughing.”
“It was terrible.”
“It worked.”
“I slapped you.”
“I included that possibility.”
I laughed harder.
Then his expression softened.
It changed his entire face.
“You should do that more often,” I said.
“What?”
“Smile.”
“Dangerous habit.”
“So are tattoos.”
His eyebrow rose.
I immediately regretted saying it.
Almost.
Then Dante leaned back.
“Sofia.”
“Yes?”
“I meant what I said earlier.”
“What part?”
“My feelings have nothing to do with your freedom.”
The humor disappeared.
He continued.
“If anything ever happens between us, it happens because you choose it.”
I swallowed.
“And if I don’t?”
“Then I finish dinner.”
“And?”
“Pay the check.”
“And?”
“Go home.”
I stared at him.
Nobody had ever made freedom sound so simple.
So I reached across the table.
And placed my hand over his.
“I haven’t decided yet.”
Dante turned his palm upward.
“But?”
“But you can stay for dessert.”
May you like
He smiled.
“Dangerous woman.”
