Chapter 14 14

• The afternoon before the wedding, my family left the Mandarin Oriental and headed to the Alessandro mansion in the Hamptons. The house loomed like a castle, its Italian palazzo-style grandeur swallowing up everything around it. The long, winding driveway stretched past garages, guesthouses, and acres of manicured grounds, finally stopping at the white mansion with its red roof and marble statues. It was a place that felt like it could bury you if you weren’t careful. A place that swallowed you whole.
• Inside, the marble floors and coffered ceilings felt like they were pressing down on me. I could barely breathe, but I was too scared to say anything. Through the panoramic windows, I saw the ocean a restless, violent thing, mirroring what I felt inside. Tomorrow, I would marry Lorrenzo. I could already feel the weight of the chains, even though he wasn’t here yet.
• Alessia and I insisted on sharing a room, and for the first time in a long while, I felt like I wasn’t alone. We’d spent the night in silence, staring out the window, watching workers set up the pavilion for tomorrow’s ceremony. Lorrenzo wouldn’t be here until the morning. We couldn’t cross paths before the wedding superstition, my father called it. But I didn’t believe in luck. And this this was as bad as anything could get.