Chapter 2

Bianca smiled, smug all through her expression.

"A little car like this is more than enough for me!"

She turned toward me.

"Ava, I'll bet you've got a whole garage of cars to rotate through, don't you?"

I answered mildly:

"Not right now. But I will."

Luca's brow snapped into a frown.

"When did I agree to buy you a car?"

"You don't need a car. Just keep the house in order."

I let out a soft, scornful laugh.

In his eyes, if I said I wanted a car, it could only mean I was waiting for him to buy it.

But what I meant was—I'd buy it myself, from now on.

"Ava doesn't work, so honestly, she has no real need for a car. Cooking a little, cleaning a little at home—must be so easy."

Bianca chimed in at just the right moment. Luca glanced at me.

Two words:

"True."

Suddenly the whole thing struck me as absurd.

His stomach was bad. He couldn't eat takeout. Every day I invented new ways to simmer him chicken broth, to make low-oil, low-salt home cooking. A single stew meant three hours standing over the stove.

The three-story townhouse—he refused to hire a housekeeper. "I can't sleep easy on things strangers have touched," he'd say.

Just cleaning it took an entire afternoon.

All he ever did was come home to a steaming dinner and a spotless house.

He'd simply never seen the rest.

My throat went tight.

"Luca, anyone in the world can call me idle. Anyone but you."

He caught the emotion I couldn't quite hold down in my eyes, and something like guilt flickered in his.

He opened his mouth to say something, but Bianca cut him off.

"Ava, you have no idea how hard Don works every day. I'm the only one who sees it—out at dawn, home at midnight, and how many things he has to handle. You really should be more understanding. Even I feel sorry for him, and I'm just his assistant."

Luca looked down at her and smiled.

"You little thing, so you actually know how to feel sorry for me?"

"Didn't spoil you for nothing."

Bianca lifted her chin. "Too bad your fiancée doesn't know how to look after you. Guess I'll just have to be even better to you from now on!"

Luca laughed and tapped her lightly on the head.

When he turned back to me, all the warmth was gone from his eyes.

"Ava, do you see?"

"Bianca runs herself ragged for me every day, all the little errands that never end—has she once complained she's tired?"

I lowered my head. I didn't want to say anything more.

"Right. I'm the most idle person in the world." I turned and went into the bedroom.

The door hadn't even shut.

Bianca followed me right in.

She made herself at home, opening the closet, pulling out several of Luca's custom suits.

She came by every week to take his clothes to the dry cleaner.

But this time, her eyes settled on the corner of the closet.

Where, folded and stacked, from the years before he made it—

were the cheap couples' hoodies Luca and I had picked out together at a Brooklyn thrift shop.

Neither of us had had the heart to throw them out.

Bianca gave them a glance, then called loudly toward the door:

"Don, there's some old junk in here. Mind if I toss it?"

I opened my mouth to speak.

From outside came Luca's careless voice:

"Do what you want with it."

The sound died in my throat.

I looked at those childish, almost ridiculous matching hoodies in her hand.

Maybe back then had been the happiest we'd ever been.

I didn't stop her.

Fine. Throw them out.

Bianca gathered the clothes up, then her gaze slid back to me.

"Ava, what are you keeping all this junk for, anyway?"

"Luca stopped loving you a long time ago. You haven't noticed?"

Her smile was open, brazen.

Nothing at all like the face she wore in front of Luca.

"I know. You really wanted that Spark, didn't you? But he just refused to buy it for you. I only mentioned it once, and he got it for me right away."

"Are you mad?"

I looked at her, and suddenly I laughed.

She got a little flustered, staring at me, baffled.

"What are you laughing at?"

"Bianca, sometimes I honestly find you quite entertaining."

"All your little schemes are so obvious, and so clumsy. Don't you think?"