A Scandal in the Headlines(39)

Such vanity.

She only realized she’d said it out loud when Alessandro said something else in his brash Sicilian, so little of which she understood even after her time there. He shifted in his seat, making it swing with him as he did.

“I told you before,” he said. “It was a con.”

“I believed him,” Elena said simply, shame and regret in her voice, moving in her veins like sludge. She felt it all over her face, and had to stop looking at him before she saw it on his, too. “I believed every single thing he told me. All of his big dreams. All of his plans. That he and I were a team.” Her voice cracked, but she kept going. “That he loved me. I believed every word.”

“Elena,” he said in a voice she’d never heard him use before. She had to close her eyes briefly against it. As if her name was an endearment she couldn’t believe a man so hard even knew. “You were supposed to believe him. He set you up.”

She didn’t know why she wanted to weep then, again.

“I knew you were lying to me in Rome,” she said fiercely, hugging her knees tight, keeping her eyes trained on the sea, determined to hold the tears back. “About everything. You had to be lying, because Niccolo couldn’t possibly be the man you described, and because, of course, you were a Corretti.”

“Of course.” His tone made her wince. She didn’t dare look at his expression.

“I went looking for things to prove you were a liar. One night while Niccolo slept, I got up and decided to search the laptop he took everywhere with him.”

She heard Alessandro’s release of breath, short and sharp, but she still couldn’t look at him. Especially not now.

“He caught me, of course, but not until after I read far too many emails that explained in detail his plans for my family’s land.” She frowned, as horrified now as she had been then. “He wanted to build a luxury hotel, which would transform my forgotten village into a major tourist destination. We’re fishermen, first and foremost. We don’t even have a decent beach. We like to visit Amalfi, but we don’t want to compete with it.”

She shook her head, remembering that night in such stark detail. She’d only thrown on a shirt of Niccolo’s and a pair of socks, and had snuck down to the kitchen to snoop on his computer while he snored. It had been cold in his villa, and she remembered shivering as she sat on one of the stools, her legs growing chillier the longer she sat there.

And she remembered the way her stomach had lurched when she’d looked up to see him in the doorway.

He hadn’t asked her what she was doing. He’d only stared at her, his black eyes flat and mean, and for a terrifying moment Elena hadn’t recognized him.

She’d told herself she was only being fanciful. It had been well after midnight and she hadn’t heard him approach. But he was still her Niccolo, she’d assured herself. He was in love with her, he was going to marry her, and while they were probably going to fight about his privacy and all these emails she couldn’t understand, it would all be fine.

She’d been so sure.

“I asked him what it meant, because I was certain there had to be a reasonable explanation.” She let out a hollow laugh. “He knew we wanted to conserve the land, protect the village. He’d spent hours talking to my father about it. He’d promised.”

“I imagine he did not have a satisfying explanation,” Alessandro said darkly.

“He slapped me.” Such a funny, improbable word to describe it. The shock of the impact first, then the burst of pain. Then she’d hit the cold stone floor, and that had hurt even more.

Alessandro went frighteningly still.

Elena’s heart raced, and she felt sick. Her knuckles were white where she gripped her own legs, and she still wanted to curl up further, disappear. But it didn’t matter if he believed her, she told herself staunchly. Her own parents hadn’t believed her. It only mattered that she told this truth, no matter what he thought of it.

“He slapped me so hard he knocked me down. Off my stool. To the floor.” She made herself look at Alessandro then, burning there in his quiet fury, his dark green eyes brilliant with rage.

Directed at Niccolo, she understood. Not at her. And maybe that was why she told him something she’d never told anyone else. Something she’d never said out loud before.

“He called me a whore,” she told him quietly. “Your whore, in fact.”

Alessandro swore, and his hand twitched along the back of the swing as if he wanted to reach through her memories, through her story, and respond to Niccolo in kind.

“When was this?” he asked, his voice hoarse.