Page 98 of Valentino

“Please.” I roll my eyes.

“Look, I get it.” She laughs. “You don’t have to convince me, he’s most definitely a hot jerk.”

“If you’re into that sort of thing.” I widen my eyes into my coffee cup. “Change the subject please.”

“Tell me.” Francesca leans closer. “What’s going on with you two?”

“There’s nothing to tell.” I shrug. “He’s still grieving Giovanna and let’s not forget that he’s seeing someone else…we had a huge fight this morning actually.”

“Over what?”

“I don’t even know, one minute we were talking and the next minute we were screaming. I guess…” I shrug, confused myself, “…we both have a lot of baggage.”

“He’s not seeing someone else?” she scoffs. “Who told you that?”

“He did, but then he denied it this morning so who knows what the truth is.”

“Oh.” She sips her coffee. “I haven’t heard anything about this.”

I wish I hadn’t.

“Well, besides that point. I know for a fact that he’s definitely not brokenhearted over Giovanna.” She sips her coffee. “I mean, there is no doubt he would be suffering guilt over her death, and the trauma of all that. But apparently before she died he and she were having huge problems.”

“What kind of problems?” I frown.

“You can’t tell anyone that I told you this.”

“Of course.”

“Well.” She leans in closer. “Promise me.”

“Yes.”

“When we got home from the office I made a comment that you and Valentino had settled in to be very cozy staying together and Giuliano told me that…” She cuts herself off and looks around.

“Francesca,” I whisper impatiently. “Will you just spit it out.”

“I don’t know if I should say anything.”

“Oh my fucking God, it’s too late now, will you just tell me.”

“We went to dinner last night and Giuliano had a few glasses of wine on an empty stomach, he was tipsy, so I think he told me more than he meant to.”

“Go on.”

“When we got home, we were getting undressed in the bathroom, and I said to him that Valentino and Anna seemed very cozy.”

I listen intently.

“He said that he wasn’t surprised.”

“I asked why not?”

“He said before everything went down, that Val and Giovanna had been fighting because she found out that he had always had a thing for you.”

My eyes widen. “What do you mean?”

She leans in closer and whispers, “Apparently a few weeks before it all went down, she heard him and Carlo having a huge fight one night.”