“I know what you meant,” I said, frustrated. “Nothing happened. Dante gave me the cold shoulder.”
“He didn’t try to sleep with you? What about last night?” I wished Bibiana didn’t sound so stunned; it made me feel even worse. As if somehow it was my fault that I hadn’t managed to make Dante want me. I knew she didn’t mean it that way.
“He didn’t even kiss me. He just lay down beside me and said he had an early day, and then he turned off the light and fell asleep. What kind of wedding night is that?” I leaned my head against the backrest. “I don’t get it.”
“Maybe he really was tired,” Bibiana said tentatively.
I gave her a look. “Do you truly believe that? He looked fit enough to me. And what about yesterday? Was he tired then too?” I bit my lip. “Do you think it’s still because of his wife?”
Bibiana twisted a strand of her brown hair around her finger nervously. “Maybe. I hear he adored her. They were the dream couple in Chicago.”
I’d never paid much attention to Dante and his wife in the past, but I remembered seeing them together at social gatherings. I remembered thinking they looked like they belonged together. There were few couples in our world who appeared to love each other. Most of us married for convenience, but with Dante and Carla you had seen that they were meant to be together. Fate was cruel for ripping them apart, and even crueler for throwing me into the arms of a man who’d already found the love of his life once. “Maybe he hasn’t been with a woman since his wife died. That could be the reason why he didn’t try to consummate our marriage.”
Bibiana avoided my gaze and reached for a macaron on the silver étagère on the table in front of us. She shoved it into her mouth and chewed as if it afforded all of her concentration. Dread filled my stomach. “Bibi?”
Her eyes darted to me, then they were gone again. She swallowed and reached for another sweet, but I grabbed her wrist, stopping her. “You know something. Did Dante have a lover since his wife’s death?”
Bibiana sighed. “I didn’t want to tell you.”
The words hollowed me out. “Didn’t want to tell me what?”
What if Dante had a steady lover? Someone he couldn’t marry for social and political reasons. Maybe that’s why he chose me, a widow, because he didn’t want to screw over a poor innocent girl like that. My head started spinning.
Bibiana gripped my hand tightly. “Hey, it’s not that bad. Calm down. You look like you’re going to pass out any moment.”
I reached for a green macaron and stuffed it into my mouth. The sweet taste of pistachio spread on my tongue and I relaxed slightly. “So spill before I come up with more horrible scenarios.” I could tell Bibiana wanted to ask what kind of scenarios had popped into my mind, but thankfully she didn’t. Bibiana knew me well enough to guess anyway. We’d been friends since we could both walk. She was the cousin closest in age to me and we’d always spent every free minute together. Even in school we’d been inseparable, except for the classes that we didn’t share because I was a year ahead. But it was difficult to make friends among normal kids, so we’d stuck together. That hadn’t changed after we’d married. If possible we’d gotten even closer, because we both could share our marriage troubles with each other without having to worry that anything would get out.
“My husband told me Dante frequented Club Palermo for a while.”
I froze. Club Palermo was a mob-owned nightclub with pole dancing, striptease and prostitution. Bibiana’s husband was the manager of the club. “What do you mean?”
Bibiana’s cheeks turned red. She looked like she regretted ever having brought it up. “He used prostitutes for sex.”
I pressed my lips together, trying to figure out why this hurt so much. Only last night we’d talked about prostitution; why hadn’t he mentioned something? I could almost see how that conversation would have gone. “Not anymore, right?”
“Oh no, it happened a while ago. About a year after his wife’s death, he had a rough stretch and came into the Club a couple of times per week to ‘let off some steam,’ as Tommaso put it.”
It had been way before our marriage, and yet the knowledge that Dante had slept with prostitutes, but hadn’t even tried to kiss me, hurt a lot. “So he has no problem sleeping with other women, he just doesn’t want to sleep with me.”
“No, that’s not true. And like I said, he hasn’t visited Club Palermo in a long time.”
“Okay, but that doesn’t change the fact that he didn’t want to sleep with me. With Antonio, I could deal with it. I knew it was nothing personal. He wasn’t into me because he wasn’t into women, but what’s the reason for Dante’s disinterest? Maybe he doesn’t find me attractive.”
“Don’t be ridiculous, Val. You’re gorgeous. He’d have to be blind not to be into you. Maybe he didn’t want to push you? You lost your husband less than a year ago, and Dante doesn’t know that you and Antonio were never a real couple.”
“It’s not like I don’t miss Antonio,” I said defensively. “I miss our conversations, and that he confided in me.”
“I know you do, but you don’t miss him physically. Maybe Dante thinks you’re not ready to be intimate with another man.”
I pondered that. It seemed like a logical explanation, and Dante was nothing if not a logical man. On the other hand, Dante was also a Made Man, and they usually didn’t suffer from excessive sensitivity. “How many men do you know who would care about that?”
Bibiana grimaced. “Tommaso definitely wouldn’t.”
“See,” I said, feeling even more miserable. “It’s unlikely that Dante’s conscience is keeping him from sleeping with me. He’s a killer, and a skilled one at that. He’s the Boss for a reason.”
“That doesn’t mean that he doesn’t have some scruples. I know that he strongly disapproves of rape.”
I snorted. “He disapproves?”
Bibiana gave me a stern look. “I’m serious. Dante told his men that he’d castrate anyone who would use rape as a form of torture, punishment or entertainment. Tommaso hates it because he thinks he should be allowed to do whatever he wants with the women in Club Palermo.”
I didn’t doubt that for one second. I’d lost count of the times he’d raped Bibiana. Of course, nobody called it rape in our world because she was his wife and her body belonged to him. Thinking about it made me sick. “Okay, so he has qualms about a couple of things.” It made sense after what he’d said about Gaby yesterday. Maybe he really didn’t want to initiate anything with me because he thought I was still mourning Antonio.
“Maybe you should make the first move?” Bibiana said.
“I pranced around him half-naked yesterday; what else can I do?”
“You could kiss him. Touch him.”
I knew how to kiss. Antonio had kissed me a few times. It had been nice, for me at least, so kissing Dante was definitely something I could do. “Touch him? Do you mean his you-know-what?”
Bibiana flushed. “I guess so? I never initiated anything with Tommaso, but he always wants me to touch him there and blow him.” Bibiana took another macaron. I knew she hated talking about sex with Tommaso. Who wouldn’t?