Chapter 4 - The Secret Della Never Told Him
Luca stayed away for four days.
Della noticed.
She told herself she was relieved.
There were no black SUVs outside.
No security men pretending not to watch her building.
No expensive groceries appearing at her door.
No billionaire arguing that mustard did not constitute dinner.
Her life became quiet again.
Almost.
The press moved on to another scandal.
Vance Development announced a restructuring plan.
Cordelia checked herself into a private counseling program and disappeared from public view.
Della returned to the Ashworth after her doctor approved light duty.
The broken mirror had been replaced.
She hated that.
Somehow she had expected the cracks to remain.
Instead, the lobby looked perfect again.
Hotels were good at erasing evidence that anything ugly had ever happened.
Her manager rushed over when she arrived.
“Della.”
“Am I fired?”
“What? No.”
“Demoted?”
“No.”
“Then why do you look terrified?”
“Mr. Moretti changed your assignment.”
Her stomach tightened.
“To what?”
“Guest relations.”
She stared.
“I carry plates.”
“Not anymore.”
Della closed her eyes.
“Of course.”
Her manager lowered his voice.
“It comes with better hours.”
“Of course.”
“And health insurance.”
Della opened one eye.
“What?”
“Full coverage. All employees working thirty hours now qualify.”
“All employees?”
“Yes.”
Della slowly smiled.
He hadn't changed the policy only for her.
Luca had expanded benefits across hundreds of workers.
Clever.
Infuriating.
But clever.
She took the job.
---
Two weeks passed.
Then three.
Her pregnancy progressed normally.
The baby's kicks grew stronger.
Della discovered she was having a girl.
She bought a pair of tiny yellow socks.
And every time she looked at them, she thought about the father.
Nathan Cole.
A name Luca had never heard.
Nathan had not abandoned Della.
That would have been easier.
He had died.
Six months before the night at the Ashworth.
A highway collision.
Drunk driver.
Nathan had been returning from an overnight electrical job when another vehicle crossed the median.
He died before paramedics arrived.
Della discovered she was pregnant eleven days after his funeral.
That was why she worked so much.
Nathan had left no large savings.
No life insurance beyond enough to cover burial expenses and several months of rent.
Their wedding had been scheduled for spring.
Instead, Della had buried him in winter.
She kept his photograph inside the top drawer beside her bed.
And she had never told Luca.
Not because she wanted to hide Nathan.
Because Luca's growing presence frightened her.
She liked him.
More than she wanted to.
And liking someone felt like betrayal.
---
Luca appeared at the Ashworth on a Thursday afternoon.
Della was behind the concierge desk explaining restaurant reservations to an elderly couple when she saw him.
Their eyes met.
He stopped.
Della's heart did something deeply inconvenient.
She finished helping the couple.
Then Luca approached.
“Ms. Marsh.”
“Mr. Moretti.”
“You're angry about guest relations.”
“Who said I was angry?”
“Your face.”
“My face is pleasant.”
“Your face wants to throw something at me.”
“Only something light.”
He smiled.
She hated that she had missed it.
“Walk with me?”
“I am working.”
“I own—”
“Don't finish that sentence.”
He nodded.
“After your shift.”
Della hesitated.
“Fine.”
At five-thirty, they walked through a small garden behind the hotel.
Autumn had turned the leaves bronze.
Luca kept his hands inside his coat pockets.
“How are you?”
“Fine.”
“The baby?”
“Also fine.”
“Good.”
They walked farther.
Finally Della stopped.
“You disappeared.”
“You told me you didn't want your life rearranged.”
“I didn't say disappear.”
“You said you didn't want trouble.”
“Are you trouble?”
“Yes.”
She laughed unexpectedly.
“At least you're self-aware.”
Luca's expression grew serious.
“My brother told me something.”
“Should I be worried?”
“He said saving my life didn't give me permission to control yours.”
“I like your brother.”
“You haven't met him.”
“I already like him.”
Luca nodded reluctantly.
“He'd enjoy hearing that.”
Della looked down.
“You weren't controlling me.”
“I changed your job.”
“You changed insurance for everyone.”
“I assumed you'd reject anything done only for you.”
“You assumed correctly.”
Silence settled.
Then Luca noticed tears gathering in her eyes.
“Della?”
She looked away.
“There's something I should tell you.”
He waited.
“The baby's father didn't leave me.”
Luca said nothing.
“He died.”
Something inside Luca sank.
“When?”
“Six months ago.”
“I'm sorry.”
“His name was Nathan.”
Della's voice trembled.
“We were together for four years.”
She sat on a stone bench.
Luca sat beside her but kept distance between them.
“He was an electrician. Terrible cook. Sang country songs off-key. He wanted three kids.”
She laughed through tears.
“I wanted two.”
Luca listened.
“Then a drunk driver crossed the median.”
Her hands folded over her belly.
“I found out about her eleven days after his funeral.”
Luca looked at her stomach.
“A girl?”
Della nodded.
“Nathan wanted a daughter.”
Tears slid down her face.
Luca didn't reach for her.
Not yet.
“I still love him.”
“You should.”
She looked at him, surprised.
“You don't have to erase someone because they're gone.”
The tears came harder.
“I feel guilty.”
“For what?”
Della's eyes met his.
“For liking you.”
Luca went completely still.
She closed her eyes.
“I shouldn't have said that.”
“Probably not.”
“Forget it.”
“Impossible.”
Della stood.
Luca gently touched her wrist.
She stopped.
“You don't owe me anything,” he said.
“I know.”
“And I'm not asking you to replace Nathan.”
Her eyes filled again.
“I don't know what I'm ready for.”
“Then we don't decide today.”
“You make everything sound easy.”
“It isn't.”
He stood.
“We go slowly.”
“Is that something Luca Moretti knows how to do?”
“No.”
She smiled.
“I suspected.”
He extended his hand.
Not taking hers.
Offering.
Della looked down.
Then placed her hand in his.
---
Their relationship grew in inches.
Coffee.
Lunch.
Walks.
Luca assembled the crib after Della refused to let him buy a new one.
He spent three hours swearing at instructions.
Della sat on the sofa laughing.
“You run an international company.”
“This is more complicated.”
“It's six pieces.”
“There are fourteen screws.”
“Six pieces.”
“Stop criticizing.”
When the crib finally stood upright, slightly uneven, Luca looked absurdly proud.
Della took a photograph.
“If you ever show Matteo—”
“I absolutely will.”
“You wouldn't.”
“I haven't met him and I'm already planning it.”
Luca pointed at her.
“You're dangerous.”
She smiled.
For a few months, life softened.
Then the past returned.
Not Della's.
Luca's.
A federal investigation reopened into one of Moretti Holdings' shipping subsidiaries.
Reporters swarmed the hotel.
Old photographs surfaced.
Men associated with Luca's father.
Rumors.
Violence.
Deals nobody discussed.
Della saw headlines.
MORETTI EMPIRE UNDER SCRUTINY
FEDERAL GRAND JURY REVIEWS PORT CONTRACTS
She waited until Luca came over that evening.
“Tell me the truth.”
He knew immediately.
“About what?”
“All of it.”
Luca sat.
“There are parts of my family's business I spent years removing.”
“That isn't the same as saying they never existed.”
“No.”
“Did you hurt people?”
His silence lasted too long.
Della's stomach tightened.
“Luca.”
“I've done things I'm not proud of.”
“Did you kill anyone?”
His eyes held hers.
“I have been responsible for violence.”
Della stood.
He didn't stop her.
Her daughter kicked beneath her ribs.
“I can't raise her around that.”
“I know.”
“Do you?”
“Yes.”
“You told me your world wasn't simple.”
“I did.”
“But this isn't complicated. People get hurt or they don't.”
Luca looked down.
“For most of my life, I believed power was the only thing that prevented my family from being destroyed.”
“And now?”
“Now I'm trying to build something different.”
“Trying?”
“Yes.”
Della shook her head.
“I need more than trying.”
Luca's face tightened.
“What do you want?”
“A clean life.”
“That takes time.”
“My daughter doesn't have time to wait for you to decide what kind of man you want to be.”
The words struck him.
Della regretted them immediately.
But she didn't take them back.
Luca stood.
“I understand.”
He walked toward the door.
“Luca.”
He stopped.
She wanted to tell him not to leave.
Instead she said nothing.
He opened the door.
“I won't bring danger to you.”
Then he left.
Della sank onto the sofa.
Her hand rested on her daughter.
For the second time in less than a year, she watched a man she cared about disappear through a doorway.
The difference was that Nathan had never chosen to leave.
Luca had.
May you like
And somewhere deep inside herself, Della knew the reason hurt so badly because she had finally started imagining him staying.
---
