Nick took the envelope, turned on his heel and walked out.
“Two days, Alessia,” Prince Vittorio Antoninni said. “That is all I ask.”
Alessia Antoninni kept her gaze on the moonlit grape vines that stretched toward the softly rolling Tuscan hills. It was fall and the vines, long since stripped of their fruit, seemed lifeless.
“I told you, Papa, I have work waiting for me in Rome.”
“Work,” the prince scoffed. “Is that what you call running around with celebrities?”
Alessia looked at her father. They stood on the verandah that spilled from the rear of the centuries-old villa that was her ancestral home.
“I work for a public relations firm,” she said evenly. “I do not ‘run around,’ I deal with clients.”
“Which means that handling public relations for your very own father should take you no effort at all.”
“It is not a matter of effort. It is a matter of time. I don’t have any.”
“Perhaps what you do not have is the wish to be a dutiful daughter.”
There were endless answers to that but the hour was late. Alessia decided to let the gauntlet lie where her father had thrown it.
“You should not have agreed to a visit from
this American if you knew you would not be available for it.”
“How many times must I explain? Something’s come up. I cannot be here for Signore Orsini’s visit and it would be impolite to cancel it.”
“You mean, it would be dangerous to disappoint a gangster.”
“Cesare Orsini is a businessman. Why believe the lies of the tabloid press?”
“Your staff can handle things. Your accountants, your secretary—”
“And what of the dinner party I arranged?” The prince raised an eyebrow. “Would you have my housekeeper assume the role of hostess?”
“I have not been your hostess for years. Let your mistress play the part. She’s done it before.”
“Signore Orsini was born in this country.”
“He was born in Sicily,” Alessia said, with all the disdain of a Tuscan aristocrat.
“And Sicilians often cling to the old ways. Being entertained by my mistress might offend him.” The prince’s eyes turned cool. “Did you expect me to deny that I have a mistress? You know of your mother’s condition.”
Alessia looked at him in disbelief. “My mother is in a sanatorio!”
“Indeed.” The prince paused. “A very expensive sanatorio.”
Something in her father’s tone sent a chill down Alessia’s spine. “What are you saying?”
The prince sighed. “Without an infusion of capital, I am afraid I will have to make some difficult choices. About your mother and the sanatorio.”
“There are no choices.” Alessia could feel her heart pounding. “There is the sanatorio, or there is the public hospital.”
“As you say, my dear. There is the one—or there is the other.”
Alessia shuddered. She knew he meant it. Her father was a man with no heart.
“I see the condemnation in your eyes, daughter, but I will not lose what has been in our family for five centuries.”