Chapter 2

Matteo came home after two in the morning, still wearing the tuxedo in which he'd proposed to Bianca.

I sat at the dining table with my personal design portfolio open in front of me. The television above the fireplace showed Bianca holding up my ring.

Matteo stopped when he saw the portfolio. "What are you doing?"

"Finding the work that belongs to me."

"The engagement isn't real, Elena. It's publicity for the Salvatore partnership."

"A partnership needs signatures, not a proposal."

He removed his cuff links. "Bianca's father wanted the public to believe both companies were fully committed. The board agreed it would stabilize the expansion."

"And you agreed to look like you were in love with his daughter."

"I agreed to protect Rinaldi House."

"Does Bianca know you're already married?"

He set the cuff links on the table one at a time. "She knows the engagement supports the partnership."

"That isn't what I asked."

"This arrangement will end after the agreements are final."

He still hadn't answered me.

"You changed the meaning of my ring."

"I gave the public a story it could understand."

"You gave another woman ours."

Matteo reached for my hand. I pulled it away.

"Nothing between us has changed," he said.

The words might have comforted me once. Now they sounded like a warning. He intended to keep Bianca in the light, keep me in the dark, and call that unchanged.

"Go to bed," I said.

"We shouldn't make decisions while you're angry."

"You made enough decisions for both of us tonight."

He stared at me, then carried his cuff links down the hall and shut the guest-room door.

At nine the next morning, the concierge called from the lobby. Bianca had arrived with two assistants and several boxes from the Rinaldi atelier.

Matteo let them upstairs before I could respond.

Bianca entered in a cream suit, my ring resting against the portfolio in her hand.

"Good, Elena's here. We can settle the bridal set."

Her assistants covered my dining table with styling references, stone selections, and sketches built around the two crossing bands.

Bianca touched the necklace at the center. "I want the same motif carried through every piece. Matteo said you understand it better than anyone."

I looked at him. "Did he?"

"The house design team can finish these," I said.

Bianca smiled. "Matteo wants you to handle them personally."

An assistant showed me the schedule. The chapel, photographer, and press announcement had already been approved. Bianca spoke as if the wedding were a company launch moving neatly toward its deadline.

"Matteo confirmed the date last night," she said. "I need the finished designs by Friday."

"There won't be a problem," Matteo said. "Elena understands what's at stake."

He didn't ask me. He told Bianca what I would do while standing in my home.

Five years earlier, my tools had been packed for a design program in Florence. Days before I was due to leave, Rinaldi House lost the designer responsible for an important collection.

Matteo asked me to stay long enough to rescue it.

I missed the enrollment deadline. Then his company needed a new signature line, the board needed proof that he could revive the brand, and Matteo needed me for one more season.

A few weeks became five years of creating jewelry beneath the Rinaldi name.

Now he expected me to turn the symbol of our hidden marriage into a wedding set for his public fiancee.

Bianca gathered her phone and gloves. "I'll see you at the fitting."

After she left, Matteo closed the portfolio and pushed it toward me.

"There won't be a wedding. Just finish the designs."

I pushed the portfolio back. "No."

He frowned. "No?"

"I won't design Bianca's wedding jewelry."

"Don't punish the company because you're angry with me."

"You proposed to another woman with my ring and brought her wedding into our home. What did you expect me to do?"

"I expected you to understand why this matters."

"I do. That's why I'm done making it easier for you."

I removed the atelier key from my key ring and placed it on Bianca's sketches.

Matteo stared at it. "Put that back."

"I'm leaving Rinaldi House."

"You can't resign in the middle of the anniversary collection."

"The company has a design team. You said so every time someone asked whose work they were buying."

His mouth tightened. "We can discuss your title and credit after the partnership is secure."

Another promise that began with after.

"No."

He reached for the key, then stopped. "Elena, you're talking about your career."

"I'm talking about the part of it I still have time to save."

I picked up my phone and called the family-law firm whose number I'd saved that morning.

Matteo remained beside the table while I requested an appointment.

When I ended the call, he said, "You're filing for divorce over one night?"

"No. I'm filing because tonight showed me what the last five years meant to you."

The atelier key lay between the crossed lines of Bianca's wedding necklace.

"The divorce papers are coming," I said.

For once, Matteo had no decision left to make for me.