Total pages in book: 123
Estimated words: 118245 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 591(@200wpm)___ 473(@250wpm)___ 394(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 118245 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 591(@200wpm)___ 473(@250wpm)___ 394(@300wpm)
Again, super smart.
I gasped. “How insulting!”
She rushed over and grabbed my shoulders. “I need you to take the test for me.”
I twisted my shoulders to break her grasp and backed up, placing a chair between us. “Me? Why?”
She paced away and turned back to me again, throwing her arms up in the air. “Don’t be such a stupid prude, Ella.”
My gaze narrowed. “Toni, why do you need me to take the test?”
While I often wished her actions would have consequences, I never wanted any serious harm to come to my sister. Oh, God! What if she was sick?
She crossed her arms again. “It’s not that!”
“I didn’t say anything.”
She smirked. “But you were thinking it.”
Fair enough.
“So if it’s not that, then what is it?”
She huffed and turned to play with the spine of a book on a nearby shelf.
I tapped my foot. “I will not help you if you don’t tell me.”
“Fine!” She murmured the next below her breath so I couldn’t hear her. “I'm pregnant.”
I tilted my head so my ear was facing her, certain I hadn’t heard her correctly. “You’re what?”
She tossed her arms up in the air again and shouted. “Pregnant! Okay, is your stick up the ass nerdy little soul happy now? I’m pregnant.”
I ran over to her and covered her mouth with my palm. “Not so loud! They’ll hear.”
It was pointless to ask her who was the baby’s father. She refused to tell me the name of her boyfriend and there was a decent chance it wasn’t even his.
Focu ‘ranni. What a freaking mess.
Her eyes widened as she mumbled something unintelligible against my hand.
I pulled my hand away.
“Does that mean you’re going to help me?”
Fuck no.
“Yes.”
What choice did I have? She was still my sister. Our father could literally murder her if he found out she disgraced the family by getting pregnant out of wedlock. Not to mention the embarrassment he would suffer after having to call off his daughter’s wedding to the powerful Cavalieri family. There would be gossip as to why.
Plus, that asshole Fino implied he wouldn’t continue to pursue my mother’s murder if the wedding was called off.
Antonia hugged me. “You’re my favorite sister! You are the best! I love you to death for this. I’ll totally owe you one!”
“I’m your only sister,” I grumbled as she dragged me out of the library and upstairs to her bedroom.
She turned her back on me and gestured over her shoulder. “Hurry up. We have to switch clothes. They’re waiting.”
I lowered the zipper to her dress. “Do you always have to wear such tight, short dresses?”
As she shimmied out of her dress and left me to get out of my own, she fired back. “God, you’re such a fucking prude, Ella. Hurry up so I can put some makeup on you and tease your hair. They’ll never believe you are me if you walk in looking like a pale nun.”
So much for her showing me love and gratitude.
CHAPTER 17
ELLA
With a clenched fist between my thighs, I wrenched down on the hem of Antonia’s precious Prada dress. It was a waste of time. No matter how hard I pulled on the fabric, I would never get it below mid-thigh. At least I could raise the zipper over my breasts, so they weren’t spilling out.
A small win.
As I stood just outside his closed office door, my father bellowed, “Antonia! Get your ass back here!”
I closed my eyes and took a deep breath before pushing the door open. “I’m here, Father.”
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Matteo standing near the bookshelves which lined the far wall but refused to make eye contact.
That didn’t stop the heat of a humiliating blush from rising up my neck and over my cheeks.
There was also a travel-weary looking man in a slightly wrinkled linen blazer who was fussing with cleaning his glasses with an equally wrinkled handkerchief, and a very stylish, beautiful, older woman.
In her early forties, she was dressed to perfection in couture fashion. Everything about her was fabulously bold. From the large gold bangles that stretched up her forearm to the matching large gold hoop earrings to her glossy black hair with a single stylish streak of gray that was arranged in voluminous waves which seemed to defy gravity and the slightly drizzling weather.
Her style reflected precisely what I wished I could pull off, if I weren’t so shy and hated attention. It was like she was the embodiment of my inner heroine. The confident queen all those memes and girl boss quotes on Instagram said was within us all, just waiting to break free.
If only. Perhaps one day.
When I finally broke free of my oppressive father, my selfish, demanding sister, and this horribly demoralizing household with all its memories of my ill-fated mother.
My father stormed toward me and grabbed my upper arm to haul me deeper into the room. “What the fuck took you so long to piss? Did you fall in, you good-for-nothing—”