Page 21 of Promised to the Don of Naples
"The only one I have."
I set the letter on the desk between us and pushed it toward him.
"You know what I think, Luca? I think you know exactly who doctored that letter. I think you brought me here last night because you knew Bianca would send me back today. I think you're smarter than you pretend to be, and that last night you didn't tell me half the story—you told me the part that would make me trust you just enough not to try to run again."
"You think that?"
"I do."
He came around to the side of the desk where I was. Slowly. Not the shortest way—around the edge, circling, the way big men walk when they want to look bigger. He stopped a foot and a half from me, and I looked up—because he was too tall, and because pretending he wasn't would have been a tactical mistake.
"Valentina. If I wanted to deceive you," he said quietly, "I wouldn't have left the envelope sitting on the table for you to open."
"Maybe that's exactly what you wanted—for me to open it."
"Maybe." The corner of his mouth went up, but it wasn't the smile from before. It was a thin smile, dangerous, with no warmth. "But then explain something to me, bella. Why are you so afraid to believe me?"
"I'm not afraid of anything."
"You are."
"I'm not."
"You're afraid I'm telling the truth. Because if I am, you don't have anyone left to hate."
I raised my hand. I didn't know if it was to push him or to hit him, but I never found out—he caught my wrist in the air, without force, before I could decide.
"No," he said. "Go to your room, before we say something neither of us can take back."
I left and crossed the corridor without looking back. I heard the office door close behind me, and right after, the muffled sound of something glass hitting a wall. I went up the west wing two steps at a time and into the room, locking the door from the inside for the first time since I'd arrived.
I went to the desk. I took paper and a pen and sat down. Then I wrote at the top of the page, in block letters:
WHAT I KNOW.
Underneath, in a column:
My father lied about the war starting in 2019.
My brother disappeared from Capri in 2015.
Someone doctored a letter to change 2015 to 2019.
Bianca wants me to distrust Luca.
