She glances around at an old room that means nothing to her. “Yeah, Mom told me. We always keep this door closed.”
Since she seems to want me out, I leave. She follows, closing the door behind us. I imagine in some cases she would want to show me, her older sister, what her bedroom looks like, since I’ve never seen it and we’re already up here. She expresses no such desire, and we make our way downstairs without another word.
My discomfort only grows from here. I follow her to the kitchen where my mom has already started on the wine. I wonder why she didn’t share. Wine would probably make me more pleasant company, even though she’s drinking red and I strongly prefer white.
When I come in, instead of offering me any, she plugs the wine and puts it away.
“To chill,” she says. “We’ll have some with dinner.”
“Is that ever happening?” I ask.
Pietro, Paul, and whomever else they have locked away in there haven’t emerged.
Taking a leaf from my book, she ignores me and flits away to pretend to do something at the other end of the counter.
Then, reconsidering, she turns back. “Please be pleasant tonight. Pietro has had a bad week and the last thing this family needs is you making things worse.”
I’m suddenly glad she didn’t give me wine, because the glass would shatter in my hand right now and a perfectly good serving would be all over the ceramic Tuscan tile.
If looks could kill, my mother would join her first husband right now.
I turn and quit the room.
I’m angry. So angry. Furious. My face is hot with it and there’s a strangled cry of fury trapped in my throat.
I hate her.
I hate all of them.
Just as I?
?m fixing to storm outside and, I don’t know, run home, the study door opens.
I catch a glimpse inside. The once red walls are blue now. The door closes and Pietro is looking at me.
It always feels like a stare-down when I don’t adequately avoid his gaze. Once we’ve made eye contact, I won’t look away, no matter how much I want to. Won’t let him think there’s any part of me that submits to him.
“Annabelle,” he says, pleasantly enough.
I don’t return the greeting. My jaw locks, my teeth smashing together. In the jumble of frantic heartbeats I notice my breathing is getting irregular. I try to bring it down a notch, since this is how my panic attacks start. It’s been probably a year since I’ve had one, but all the ingredients for one are certainly here tonight.
My stomach feels tight. Sick. I won’t have an attack in front of him. He’ll see it as weakness, and as far as he’s concerned, I’m motherfucking Sparta.
In my mind, at least.
I don’t really care what I look like in his.
But then the bastard takes a step toward me and drapes an arm across my shoulder like he did Paul’s earlier. I’m too stunned to react and somehow I’m being led down the hall along with him.
“I hear you’ve been a bad girl.”
He says it lightly enough, but I don’t trust it. My mind blanks before racing through all the things I’ve done lately that he could object to. I don’t know how to respond because I’m not sure what he’s referring to.
“You’re gonna have to be more specific,” I shoot back, as if unruffled.
He laughs, and the sound makes my skin crawl. His arm still draped around me probably helps.
After a moment, when I don’t offer anymore or respond, he says, “Good wives don’t cuckold their husbands.”