novelxo Toxic Love: Chapter 10
Just as I thought, Gabriel and Alistair require zero convincing to believe that I dipped out of my own engagement party. I think they’re even a little amused.
The amusement fades a little when Gabriel realizes I put twelve hundred dollars for a two-and-a-half-hour Uber back to Manhattan from Dante’s Hamptons estate on my “strictly emergency use only” Crown and Black credit card.
Damn surge pricing.
My hand really is fine. And after hiding from them for a few days, I’m able to ditch the bandage and explain the cuts with a bullshit story of tripping down some subway steps. Gabriel and Alistair buy it. But every time I look at the little cuts on my hand, I’m reminded of that engagement party.
I mean, yes, throwing myself between Bianca and that asshole ex-boyfriend of hers was dumb. Smashing the glass against his head was insane.
But the part that I keep returning to is the moment I came to after that dizzy spell where it felt like I was going to pass out for a hot second.
…in Dante’s arms.
I’m choosing to forget how awkwardly I explained, or rather didn’t explain, my little attack. How I brushed it aside instead of casually explaining that my kidneys are slowly shutting down and that frequently even the idea of food makes me retch.
Dante probably thinks I’m anorexic or bulimic or something. Whatever. He can think what he wants.
Doesn’t stop me from replaying that moment when I opened my eyes and looked up into his, over and over again.
I have no idea why.
A week after the engagement party, I have to get back into character as Dante’s fiancée for two events. The first, almost tongue-in-cheek thing, is that Taylor is insisting on taking me out for a “bachelorette party” along with Elsa and Fumi, two of the top lawyers at Crown and Black who I’m pretty chummy with.
The idea of going out to “celebrate” my arranged marriage to the devil himself is actually nauseating to me. So even though Taylor won’t take no for an answer to her idea, she’s agreed to my stipulation that we all wear black.
Like a funeral. Cute, right?
The second event is a “ladies’ bridal luncheon”, which sounds fucking awful. I’d skip it, except, well, I’m the bride, so…yeah.
On the plus side, though, Bianca is coming too. She ends up picking me up at Gabriel’s and my place in her car, driven by Dante’s head of security, Lorenzo. Then we drive out into the Bronx to Arthur Avenue, home to dozens of super old-school Italian restaurants and bakeries.
The luncheon itself is at this somewhat dated but cute place called Da Pietro’s, in their private dining room on the second floor. Bianca’s told me no less than three times that the cannoli here are “to die for” and has been coaching me on the way here about what to expect, but I can still feel my nerves jangling as we get out of the car.
“You’re not at all Italian, right?”
I shake my head. “Nope.”
“Did you ever go to a Feast of the Seven Fishes, or one of the saint’s days?”
“Negative.”
Bianca chews on her bottom lip. “No big family or anything, either?”
“I don’t see how this is supposed to help my nerves.”
She makes a face. “Sorry. Just trying to prepare you. These ladies can be…”
She trails off, and I wince as I glance up at the facade of the restaurant. Already, I can see a dozen or so older Italian women gawping at me from the second-floor dining room window and murmuring with each other.
“Cold, nasty bitches?”
“Well,” Bianca’s mouth twists. “Yeah. Some of them, at least. A lot of them are married to seriously powerful heads of families, and some of them basically are the heads of families behind the scenes. It’s all very Game of Thrones. Some of these women are friends, meanwhile others want to kill each other through their smiles.”
“So, play nice, or one of these ladies will have me whacked before dessert?”
Bianca giggles. “It’s not that bad. Just… Yeah, play nice.”
“Hey, I did wear my bestest black jeans.”
It’s the one piece of my outfit I’ve kept as “me”—my own little act of defiance for this dumb luncheon. Gabriel already hinted pretty heavily I shouldn’t come dressed like I’m going to a punk show.
So, I’ve paired the black skinny jeans with a silky dark maroon top that comes down to my mid thighs, and a pair of black chunky heels borrowed from Bianca. Which I think looks pretty sharp until we walk in, and I’m the only woman in the entire place not wearing a dress.
Great.
But pretty soon, I’m just lost in the blur of new faces. Bianca introduces me to a Mrs. D’Amico, who’s first cousins with Vito Barone and who organized this entire thing. She warmly welcomes me with a big smile, embraces me, pats my thin waist, and tells me to order two entrees.
And honestly, the luncheon ends up being not too terrible. I end up sitting with Bianca and a few other women who are genuinely nice. The only weird thing is that they insist on gushing over Dante’s and I “relationship” and wanting to know the details of our “courtship”.
I end up making up a story involving both of us walking around a corner at the same time and spilling coffee and orange juice on each other, which I one hundred percent stole from Notting Hill, but whatever. My table full of new lunch friends buy it and think it’s the sweetest story ever.
I’m taking a break from lying my ass off to worry down sweet potato gnocchi when Bianca leans close with a low snicker in my ear.
“So, should I call you Julia from now on?”
“Shut up. I had to think fast!” I hiss back. “I didn’t expect all of these people to seriously think I was in love with your brother!”
Bianca snickers. “I mean, they do and they don’t. Most of these women married for arrangements, so they get it. But there’s also this weird element of group denial, and they all want you to play along.”
“That’s…fucked up.”
“Tell me about it—”
“Why don’t you tell me what exactly happened to my son’s face, you sleazy little bitch?”
We whirl at the sharp words. Behind us, backed by a sneering little crowd of women who were giving me the stink eye earlier, is a stern dark-haired woman in an aggressive shade of teal. She glares at us down the bridge of her nose like we’re dirt on her carpet.
I went to an all-girls’ private school. I also grew up hanging around the Crown and Black offices, watching female interns, paralegals, and junior partners eat each other alive for coveted promotions.
I can smell mean girl energy a mile away. This woman reeks of it.
I’m about to ask her what the hell her problem is, when I notice the scared look on Bianca’s face. Then what this woman just said really clicks. I smile sweetly as I stand to look her dead in the eye.
“Oh, you mean the little creep who doesn’t realize no means no?”
The woman sneers at me. “Ahh yes, the blushing bride.” She drags her gaze up and down my outfit with a look of utter distain on her face before she turns to glare at Bianca again.
“My Silvio was sweet enough to feed me a white lie about falling through a window after too many drinks.”
I roll my eyes. More like Silvio was pussy enough to lie about a girl smashing a glass into his face when he was being a creep.
“You’d have been lucky to get Silvio, you little bitch,” she spits venomously at Bianca.
The mean girl posse behind her murmurs and mutters, nodding in agreement. I mean Jesus, have any of them even met this woman’s prolapsed asshole of a son?
“Mrs. Bonpensiero,” Bianca mumbles, now looking white-faced and scared. “I—I’m sorry, I just…your son and I…”
“She doesn’t want to be with your son because he’s a gigantic douchecanoe with all the personality of a hemorrhoid.”
Dead silence. Silvio’s mother narrows her eyes at me.
“I beg your pardon?”
“Here’s an idea,” I mutter. “How about teaching your son to treat women as human beings instead of objects, and maybe he won’t get highball glasses smashed into his face anymore.”
Her eyes go wide. “How do you know about—”
“It was my glass.”
Silvio’s mother stares at me in pure horror as the gaggle of witches behind her gasp and murmur to each other like a Greek chorus.
“I would have hoped,” she finally hisses quietly, “that Dante would have ended up with a woman with some class.”
I smile. “And I’d hoped to eat lunch today without having to deal with a cunt like you.”
Mic. Drop. Silvio’s mother looks caught somewhere between shocked and livid as she stares at me, mouth agape. Finally, without a word, her mouth closes. Her eyes narrow to lethal slits before she turns on her heel and marches out the door, head held high, her little mean girl crew scurrying after her.
“You know how I said it wasn’t that bad when you worried about someone having you whacked before dessert?” Bianca murmurs quietly to me as the rest of the room pretends they weren’t totally watching all of that go down.
“Yeah?”
She swallows. “It…may have just gotten that bad.”
No one says anything at first when I sit back down. But I get more than a few grins and winks from some of the other ladies at the table. And pretty soon, we’ve all moved on to discussing whose offspring is betrothed to whose, whose son is in jail or out on parole, and having a lengthy gossip about some new Serbian-Russian Bratva bigshot who’s recently made New York his home that the ladies I’m eating with breathlessly assure me is God’s gift to the female gaze.
“What about you, Angelica?” one of the ladies at the table grins to another. “I think you’re due to add to your collection soon, aren’t you?”
The table, including Angelica, erupts into laughter. Bianca turns to me and holds up five fingers.
“On her fifth husband,” she mouths with an arched brow.
“I’d sooner collect husbands than cats, Teresa.”
Teresa clearly gets that it’s a joke as she pantomimes looking offended. “Don’t you dare talk ill about my kitties.”
“How about you, Tempest?” Angelica smiles. “Collect anything?”
I’m shaking my head no when Bianca giggles next to me.
“Dante does. He collects rings,” she blurts, and then immediately covers her mouth. “Oh, God,” she glances at me. “Please don’t ever repeat that. He’s super weird and secretive about it. He even keeps them hidden, no idea why.”
“Any particular designer?” Teresa asks.
Bianca shakes her head. “I don’t think they’re from a known designer. They’re not exactly the same, but they’re similar. Big chunky gold things with lion heads engraved on them.”
A cold sensation slices into the nape of my neck and drags down over every vertebra in my spine. The rest of the table keeps going on about rings and jewelry, and then moves on to other topics. I’m still gripping the tablecloth by my lap with white knuckles as the past jumps out of the darkness at me with a snarl.
The man who pinned me down, the gold band of his ring digging into my flesh. The men who did the same to Nina right next to me, knuckles glinting with the jeweled-eyed glare of golden lions.
“Tempest?”
I blink back to reality as I slowly turn to stare at Bianca. She frowns with worry.
“Are…are you okay?”
“Sure,” I mumble, swallowing the bitter lump in my throat. “Yes,” I force out with slightly more conviction.
She smiles. “The cannoli are here.” Her chins nods, and I look down in front of me, realizing the dessert has been brought out.
Dante collects rings.
Specifically, Dante collects the rings I see in my nightmares. And I’m not sure if that makes me more curious, or more completely fucking terrified.
When the whole thing is over, I walk over to Mrs. D’Amico and apologize for my language and for disturbing the peace earlier. She just smiles and shakes her head.
“First, just call me Maria, hon. Second, it’s no trouble at all. I’ve met Silvio a number of times…” She winks. “‘Hemorrhoid’ is a compliment compared to what I’d call him.”
Then she insists I take the box of to-go food she’s taken the liberty of ordering for me, because “if I’m too thin, I’ll snap when I walk down the aisle”.
I’m outside with Bianca and she’s calling Lorenzo for a pickup when I suddenly think of something.
“Hey—what are you doing tonight?”
She shrugs. “I’ve got rehearsal in an hour until six, but nothing after that.”
I’m not exactly great with friends. I mean you don’t need to be a therapist to get that I purposefully don’t encourage interpersonal relationships after what happened to Nina, probably as some sort of self-defense mechanism. Now, knowing that my timeline is shorter than anyone would imagine, it feels even more of a waste of time to attempt to make friends, because what’s the point?
But I don’t know. I like Bianca. She reminds me of Nina, or maybe of myself, when I was younger.
“You, uh, wanna come to my bachelorette party?”
Bianca’s brows shoot up. Her lips curl into a grin. “Whoa, seriously?”
“Yeah, I mean, don’t feel like you have to,” I shrug, my mouth twisting. “It’s not a fancy thing, just some girlfriends taking me out—”
“I would love to!”
I smile. “Yeah?”
“Definitely!”
“I mean…” I snort. “When I say girlfriends, I mean my brothers’ business partner and two of her employees.” I give Bianca a weak smile. “I’m not great with friends…”
“I would love to come,” she beams at me.
A happy spark—the kind that’s been pretty damn quiet since my diagnosis—flickers inside of me as I grin back at her.
Maybe I could use some more friends.
Even if they’re only temporary.