Page 40 of Broken Trust

I can't. If I meet his eyes I'm going to fall apart, and I've already done enough of that since midnight to last me a lifetime. So I keep my eyes on the apron strings, and I get the knot wrong, and I have to start again, and on the third try my hands just give up and drop to my sides.

Matteo reaches out and ties it for me, quick and neat, like he's done it for a hundred line cooks.

“Sit,” he says, nudging a crate toward me with his foot. “Two minutes. The artichokes aren't going anywhere.”

I sit. He pours me a coffee from the moka pot, black with too much sugar, the way I like it when I'm in trouble, and puts it into my hands. Then he leans against the worktop, big tattooed arms folded, and waits.

“I went to see Dante last night,” I say.

His eyebrows go up, but he doesn't interrupt.

“I only meant to give him back the diaper bag. That's all. I was going to hand it to him at the door and leave.” I wrap my fingers around the mug to stop them shaking. “But I stood across the street from his building for half an hour first, hearing the baby scream, and when I finally went up, he looked so awful, Matteo. He's lost so much weight. He's living in one room behind the train station with a mattress on the floor, and there are bills everywhere, and he's doing everything for her all by himself. And she was asleep in her crib with her little fist in her mouth, and I just…” My voice cracks down the middle. “Then he told me I was beautiful, and I yelled at him, and then he kissed me.”

“Ah,” Matteo says.

“And I kissed him back.” I press the heel of my hand against my eyes. “I was like a crazy woman. I was all over him. If I hadn't stopped, I don't know where it would have ended. Actually, that's a lie. I know.”

Matteo is quiet for a moment. I can hear the stocks bubbling on the stove behind him, and the radio playing some old song about the sea.

“So you stopped,” he says.

“Yes. I told him no more, and I ran down four flights of stairs, and I cried all the way home.” I laugh, but it comes out soggy. “It's pathetic. He cheated on me with my twin sister. He lied to my face for a year. I filed for divorce, I built a whole restaurant, I've spent months telling everyone I'm fine, and one kiss in a crummy apartment and I'm right back where I started.”

“You're not divorced, Gia,” Matteo says gently.

I look up at him. “What?”

“You filed. You haven't signed anything final yet. On paper, you're still his wife.” He shrugs one enormous shoulder. “And from where I'm standing, in here, too.” He taps two fingers against his chest. “You can't sign your way out of that. Nobody can. It takes as long as it takes.”

The way he says it, so plainly, without any judgment at all, undoes me. My face crumples, and the coffee sloshes over the rim of the mug, and before I know it Matteo has taken the cup out of my hands and pulled me up off the crate and into his arms.

He's so tall that my head fits under his chin. He smells like garlic and woodsmoke and clean laundry, and he holds me the way my Nonno used to when I scraped my knees, with one big hand spread across my back and the other cupping the back of my head. He doesn't tell me not to cry. He just lets me.

“It's okay,” he says into my hair. “Let it out, boss. Better here than in the ragù.”

I laugh into his shirt, a wet, hiccupping sound, and I sob harder, and he rocks me very slightly from side to side like I'm one of his little nieces.

“What the hell is this?” Dante snaps.

I jerk out of Matteo's arms so fast I nearly knock over the crate. Dante is standing just inside the swinging doors with a manila envelope in his hand, dressed in the same wrinkled shirt he had on last night. He's clearly had even less sleep than I did. His eyes are bloodshot, his jaw is dark with stubble, and he's staring at Matteo like he's about to walk straight across the kitchen and put him through the wall.

“Dante,” I say. “What are you doing here?”

“I told you that I’ll go and see Conti.” He raises it without taking his eyes off Matteo. “It's a signed statement. I waive any claim to this restaurant, now and forever. He had it drawn up by eight. I came straight here to give it to you.” His voice goes low and dangerous. “And I walk in and find you wrapped around some other guy.”

“He's not a guy. He's my head chef.”

“Do you hug all your staff like that?”

“Hey.” Matteo steps forward, not aggressively, but not backing off either. He's got a good four inches on Dante, and he plants himself between us with his arms loose at his sides. “Easy, my friend. She was upset. I was comforting her.”

“Why? What happened?” Dante's eyes finally swing to me, and I watch the anger in them flicker when he sees my face, the swollen eyes, the bruise, the tear tracks. “Gia. Was it last night? Did I do this?”

“That's none of your business.”

“The hell it isn't.” He takes a step forward, his knuckles white around the envelope. “You're still my wife.”

“Don't you dare.” The words come out of me like a whip, and all three of us go still. “Not in my kitchen. You can't do that, Dante. You don't just barge in here acting jealous and territorial, like you've got some kind of claim on me, like I'm your property. You threw that away the day you went to Mia's bed.”