LEO’S POVWhen the Morettis sauntered off to see Bianca and her friend, I was tempted to follow them. After all, Bianca and I were cool, and I wanted to see if she was okay too.I followed behind them—not close enough to intrude, but close enough for Bianca to see me and say hi.However, when the first thing I heard was Bianca’s angry voice, I immediately made a U-turn. I had never walked back so fast in my life. At that moment, it was truly confirmed that Bianca had a five-year-old boy. Her tone was so eerily familiar with what my mother used to use before she gave me an ass-whooping for being so stubborn as a child.I sympathized with Alessandro; it was his cross to bear, and I hoped he bore it like a champion. I couldn’t help but wince at the thought that I would go through worse with Charlie. I sat at the home bar again, poured myself a shot of whatever wine Giovanni had added to his cereal, and imagined how it was going to go.I’d be standing outside my door, a bouquet of flowers
DARREN’S POVI had to admit, when Bianca asked me to come along with her to see Alessandro in his main Moretti house, I had been extremely reluctant.I still hadn’t called or reached out to Giovanni in any form. I didn’t know if it was nerves or just the fact that he had held a gun to Bianca the first moment he saw her, but I wasn’t exactly sure I wanted anything to do with someone so aggressive.However, Bianca’s stupid ex-husband had defamed her all over social media, and I absolutely didn’t want my best friend to head over to her boyfriend alone with his disappearing act. She needed emotional support. I suspected that the real reason she wanted me to follow her was so she could monitor me to prevent me from letting it leak that half of Matteo’s businesses were a money laundering front.She was too damn nice—that was why people tried to pull silly strings. Linda was coming over to Italy soon, and I would summon the rest of our friend group. We had a bastard with the Ricci last name
DARREN’S POV “Any woman that has the strength and forces to get past the guild members and cross into the other side would ruin us all if we don’t kill her on sight,” he said, as if any of his words made any sense at all. What kind of enemies would they have? Unless my best friend’s new boyfriend was involved with a fucking mafia, I didn’t think that kind of precaution was necessary. “What do you mean, strength and forces? What is going on in your family?! Why is shooting a random woman normal to you?” I yelled. In this current conversation, I was the only one yelling. I hated yelling. “That’s not my story to tell, not until Sandro approves of I—” He was trying to weasel out of the conversation, and I was trying to weasel out of liking the aggressive brute. “That is a shitty answer, and you know it! You can’t start that kind of conversation and not continue it!” “We have enemies! We have people who would LOVE to see every single person in my family six feet in the ground! If
BIANCA’S POVMemory loss? What had he done to lead to memory loss?“How did you lose your memory?” I asked, my expression guarded. I wasn’t sure what was going on again, but it was beginning to look like Alessandro wasn’t the man I thought he was.“According to Leo, a building fell on me,” he said casually as if that were something that happened to regular people all the time. Worry permeated me, and I turned to look at him closely, searching for any visible injuries.They were there—small scrapes and cuts on his head and the rest of his body that I hadn’t seen before. They were minute in size but plentiful in number, as though one had moved their phone screen against a rough piece of rock.“When?! How? What happened?” I asked, stopping beside a giant, gorgeous tree with purple and red flowers. We had walked a small distance from the entrance, but I could still see it. This garden truly was ethereal. Almost as ethereal as Alessandro himself. He looked so casual, and we were walking th
BIANCA’S POVHe seemed pleased that Luca looked like him, but he didn’t say anything to confirm or deny what I had just said.“I feel like I need to shove a paternity test in his face,” I said again. The waters I was trying to test were not moving in my favor yet.“I’ll make a public statement for him to back off our Luca,” Alessandro assured me, moving to remove his phone from his shorts’ pocket. I stopped him. He had lost his memories, and Matteo was a cunning piece of shit. If Alessandro joined the fray as he was right then, he had the chance to be manipulated.“Wait, let’s not go after Matteo until you get back all your memories,” I said, bringing his hands forward. It seemed a little excessive, but I had him swear not to. It wasn’t actually excessive since it was Alessandro—he was as stubborn as a mule.“Do you remember when we had Luca?” I changed the subject with a smile. If my suspicions were correct, then he was my one-night stand five years ago. I had thought Luca was Matteo
ALESSANDRO’S POVGetting used to being with Bianca was far too easy for me. I responded to her touch and her voice without even thinking about it. And when my body gave me time to think about it, I always held myself back from smiling, wondering how I could have forgotten what led to us being so intimate.It had been a week since Bianca came over to the Villa, and I would be meeting Luca again later in the evening. I had gotten the staff to prepare what Bianca said he liked, and on the whole, life was going pretty well.The only person that seemed as happy as I felt was Giovanni. Frankly, he was getting on my nerves. I supposed he thought he was too grown for Spain, but if he continued, I would find a way to ship him off.According to Bianca, Giovanni and her friend Darren had literally only met once before they decided to get down together. I didn’t know what kind of cruel joke life was trying to play on me, but making my brother so cool that he got his crush the second time he met h
BIANCA’S POVGetting Luca ready to go out was always such a hassle because he never liked whatever outfit he first put on.“Mommy, I haven’t seen Daddy in a bajillion years! I can’t wear black!” he said snootily, sounding exactly like Darren. I supposed letting him hang around the office when people were bringing new designs for us to implement was my fault. Ever since I fired Maria, I had a lot more time with my baby. But he was a sponge, absorbing all the things around him and coming back to spout them at his mama like an adorable little brat.Fashion week was coming up, and my designers had been working around the clock trying to get this year’s line out. As a general company rule, the line model was always the person with the most perfect body for trying out the outfits and the sharpest mouth for critiquing the flaws before making the ones the actual models would wear.Darren was that person in the main branch. As such, Luca got a front-row seat to Darren at his sassiest. He insul
LUCA’S POVMommy had told me that Daddy was sick and couldn’t remember all the times we’d hung out together. I was super worried, but she told me he would get better if we hung out again. She said he was still the same Alessandro, but I knew I couldn’t call him Daddy until he felt better, so I wouldn’t scare him away.I was super nervous about what to wear. Mommy dressed me up most times, and she said I looked cute no matter what I was wearing, even if it was a silly yellow raincoat, so I could not trust Mommy’s opinion.Uncle Darren wasn’t here yet, and I didn’t want to bother him while he was still dressing up. What if that made his fashion disappear? I couldn’t risk it. I really wanted to impress Daddy so he would want to be my Daddy again forever as he promised.Daddy and I used to talk a lot about important business. One time, he asked me if my dinosaurs were different from real evil dinosaurs that ate humans, and I told him no. Later, I thought about it too hard until I became s