Chapter 7 - The Woman He Almost Married
I had survived gun threats, tabloids, an ex-fiancé, a kidnapping, childbirth, and Salvatore attempting to install biometric locks on a nursery.
None prepared me for Sofia Romano.
She was beautiful.
Not young-beautiful.
Better.
The kind earned through decades of knowing exactly who you were.
Salvatore took her into his study.
I followed.
Naturally.
“Why are you here?” he asked.
Sofia looked at me.
“Your wife doesn't know?”
“Know what?”
I looked at Salvatore.
He rubbed his forehead.
“I knew Sofia before Elena.”
“How well?”
Sofia smiled.
“Very.”
Oh.
Interesting.
My husband gave her a murderous look.
She laughed.
“I've missed irritating you.”
“I haven't.”
I folded my arms.
“You were engaged?”
Salvatore sighed.
“For six months.”
“And somehow this never came up?”
“You never asked whether I had been engaged to Sofia Romano in 1984.”
“Excellent defense.”
Sofia laughed again.
I liked her.
This was inconvenient.
The truth was less scandalous than my imagination.
Salvatore and Sofia had been childhood friends.
Their families arranged an engagement when he was twenty-three.
They tried to make it work.
It didn't.
Sofia wanted Europe, art, freedom.
Salvatore was already becoming consumed by family responsibilities.
They ended amicably.
Years later, he met Elena.
“So why now?” Salvatore asked.
Sofia's smile disappeared.
“Matteo.”
The room chilled.
Matteo had been convicted months earlier.
But before his arrest, he had moved money into accounts under Sofia’s charitable foundation.
She had discovered it during an audit.
Millions.
Dirty money designed to implicate her.
“I need help.”
Salvatore helped.
Of course he did.
For the next month, Sofia was everywhere.
Meetings.
Dinners.
Lawyers.
The penthouse.
And I discovered something deeply embarrassing.
I was jealous.
Not teenage jealousy.
No screaming.
No accusations.
Just a quiet little demon that appeared whenever Sofia and Salvatore laughed about something from 1987.
One night, I entered the library and found them sitting together.
An old photograph lay between them.
Young Salvatore.
Young Sofia.
Both laughing.
He looked happy.
Carefree.
Young.
Something twisted inside me.
I quietly backed away.
Salvatore found me twenty minutes later on the balcony.
“You disappeared.”
“I’m here.”
He studied me.
“What's wrong?”
“Nothing.”
“Lily.”
I hated that he knew me.
“She's beautiful.”
“Yes.”
Wrong answer.
My face changed.
His eyes narrowed.
Then understanding arrived.
And the bastard smiled.
“You're jealous.”
“No.”
“You are.”
“You were jealous of Ethan.”
“Extremely.”
“This isn't funny.”
“It is a little funny.”
I glared.
His smile disappeared immediately.
“Come here.”
“No.”
He came to me instead.
“I loved Sofia once.”
My stomach dropped.
“As a friend,” he continued. “We attempted something else because our families expected it. It failed spectacularly.”
“You looked happy in that photograph.”
“I was twenty-three and drunk in Florence. Everyone looks happy at twenty-three and drunk in Florence.”
I tried not to laugh.
Failed.
He touched my cheek.
“Lily, listen carefully. I loved Elena. Part of me always will.”
“I know.”
“And I will never lie to you by pretending my life began when I met you.”
“I don't want you to.”
“But you are the woman I chose after I thought choosing anyone again was impossible.”
My eyes burned.
“You gave me a life I had already decided I was too old to have.”
“People keep saying you're too old.”
“People are frequently idiots.”
I smiled.
He kissed me.
Slowly.
“Better?”
“Maybe.”
“I can send Sofia to another hotel.”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because then she wins.”
From the doorway came Sofia's voice.
“I already like her more than you.”
Salvatore closed his eyes.
I burst out laughing.
Sofia became my friend.
That might have been the strangest twist.
She helped investigators trace Matteo's accounts and cleared her foundation.
Then she stayed in New York.
Not for Salvatore.
For Luca.
Apparently the two had been flirting behind everyone's backs.
Watching sixty-two-year-old Luca become tongue-tied around Sofia provided me with months of entertainment.
Life settled again.
Elena learned to walk.
Then run.
Then terrorize a penthouse containing priceless art.
Salvatore became the world's most indulgent father.
“No sweets before dinner,” I said.
“Of course.”
Five minutes later Elena appeared holding chocolate.
I looked at Salvatore.
He looked at the ceiling.
“Traitor.”
“She negotiated aggressively.”
“She is two.”
“She has potential.”
Then came another surprise.
When Elena was eighteen months old, I became pregnant again.
A boy.
Salvatore stared at the test.
Then sat down.
Again.
“Are you going to do that every time?”
“Yes.”
We named him Anthony James.
For Salvatore’s father and mine.
By then Salvatore was sixty-eight.
Gray had overtaken silver.
There were mornings his knee hurt.
Nights he fell asleep before movies ended.
And moments when I caught him watching our children with an expression I understood.
He was counting.
Birthdays.
Years.
Time.
One night, after putting Elena to bed, I found him writing at his desk.
“What are you doing?”
“Letters.”
“To whom?”
“Our children.”
My smile faded.
“For when?”
“Later.”
I sat opposite him.
He looked almost embarrassed.
“I want them to know me if…”
“Don't.”
“Lily.”
“Not tonight.”
He reached for my hand.
“Loving someone younger does not make me younger.”
“I know.”
“I need to prepare.”
I hated it.
But he was right.
So I helped.
We wrote letters for graduations.
Weddings.
Heartbreak.
First jobs.
Bad decisions.
For Anthony's eighteenth birthday.
For Elena's thirtieth.
I cried through almost every one.
Then I wrote letters too.
Salvatore frowned.
“Why are you writing them?”
“Because youth isn't immortality.”
He stared at me.
Then nodded.
“Fair.”
That became another rule.
We would not fear time.
We would respect it.
But six months later, time reminded us who was in charge.
Salvatore collapsed during breakfast.
One second he was arguing with Elena about whether pancakes counted as a vegetable.
The next, his coffee cup shattered against the floor.
“Salvatore?”
He didn't answer.
I dropped beside him.
May you like
His face had gone gray.
And suddenly every joke anyone had ever made about his age stopped being funny.
