The underboss’s surrogate

Chapter Three

Aria’s POV

I do not remember falling asleep.

One moment I am sitting on the edge of my bed, still in my uniform, the card burning a hole in my pocket. The next, sunlight is cutting through the shutters and my alarm is screaming at me from the nightstand.

Everything will sort itself out.

That is what I told myself before I closed my eyes. It is what I tell myself every night. Sometimes I almost believe it.

I sit up. My back aches. My hands ache. I look at the card, and I turn it face down.

Not yet.

"Matteo." I knock on his door with the flat of my hand. "Matteo. You will be late."

A groan. Sheets shifting.

"I am up."

"You are not up."

"I am spiritually up."

I almost smile. Almost.

We move through the morning like we always do. He takes the bathroom first because he takes longer. I make coffee with the last of the grounds. He eats bread standing at the counter with his schoolbag already on his shoulder.

"You did not eat dinner," I say.

"I ate."

"Matteo."

"I ate at nine." He kisses my cheek before I can argue. "See you tonight."

"Be careful."

"I am always careful."

He is not. But I let him go.

The villa is quiet when I arrive.

I am early. I always am. I greet the other maids in the kitchen, hang my jacket on the hook by the door, and start on the lower hallway before anyone asks me to.

Scrub. Wring. Press. Repeat.

Signora Ricci finds me within the hour.

"You are early," she says. It is not a compliment.

"I like to start before the house wakes up."

"Good." She folds her arms. "Because today you will need the time."

I keep scrubbing. "Why?"

"The Signora's nephew is coming. With a friend." She says friend the way other people say something unpleasant stuck to my shoe. "They are staying for lunch. Everything must be perfect. The good glasses. The silver. The table on the terrace. Do you understand?"

"Yes, Signora."

"Then move."

She walks away.

I do everything she asks. I polish the glasses until they shine. I set the silver in the correct order, the way my mother taught me from a magazine she kept for years because she thought one day we might need it. I wipe the terrace table twice. I arrange the flowers.

I am good at this. That is the worst part. I am very, very good at this.

They arrive at noon.

The nephew is young. Twenty-two, maybe. Expensive shirt. Expensive watch. The kind of face that has never been told no. His friend is louder, broader, and laughs at everything the nephew says before he finishes saying it.

I bring the tray out.

"Drinks," I say quietly, and set them down.

I am turning to leave when a hand closes over my bottom.

Squeezes.

"Nice," the friend says, to no one in particular.

I jerk forward. My hip hits the table. A glass rocks and I catch it, and my face is burning, burning, and I cannot look at either of them.

"Excuse me," I say. My voice comes out thin.

I walk back inside. My legs are shaking.

Signora Ricci is in the kitchen.

"Signora." I keep my voice low. "One of them touched me. On the" I cannot say it. "That is not right. That is not part of my job."

She looks at me the way you look at a stain on a countertop.

"Set the table," she says, and walks past me.

"Signora"

"Set. The. Table."

I stand there.

"No," I say.

She stops. Turns.

"What did you say?"

"I said no." My heart is hitting my ribs. "I will serve. I will clean. I will not be touched. I am not doing it."

Signora Ricci steps close. Close enough that I can smell her perfume.

"Then you will not work here," she says. "That is the choice. Go and set the table, or go and collect your things."

My mother's face. The seven million. Matteo's schoolbag on his shoulder.

I go and set the table.

They watch me the whole time.

I keep my eyes on the plates. On the silver. On the flowers. I place each fork like it matters, because if I think about anything else I will fall apart right here on the terrace.

A hand slides across my hip.

I flinch so hard I knock a napkin to the floor.

The friend laughs. "She is jumpy."

"She is shy," Signora Ricci says from the doorway. And then I hear it, and my whole body goes cold "If you want, I can take her to a room. She is only a maid. No one would know."

I turn around.

The nephew looks at me. Slow. Up and down.

"Bring her," he says.

"No." The word comes out before I can stop it. "I will not. I am here to work. This is wrong. This is"

"Who cares, baby." The friend leans back in his chair. "We will pay you. Highly."

"I said no."

Something changes in Signora Ricci's face. Not anger. Something worse. Something calm.

She leans down and whispers into the nephew's ear.

He nods. Takes out his phone. Dials.

It rings twice.

"Aunt. Yes. I am enjoying it." A pause. He smiles at me while he speaks. "But there is a maid here. She is being disrespectful. She will not obey me."

Another pause.

"Yes. That one."

He holds the phone out toward me, but not close enough for me to speak.

I hear the voice through the speaker anyway. A woman's voice. Sharp. Cold. Cutting through the terrace like a blade.

"Fire her."

The call ends.

Signora Ricci does not even look at me.

"You are fired."

My ears fill with water.

"Sir" I turn to the nephew, to the friend, to anyone. "I did not do anything. I need this job. I need it, please, I"

"Okay," the nephew says.

He sets his glass down.

"Then strip."

I stop.

The terrace is very quiet. The sea is somewhere below, and the gulls are somewhere above, and everything between them has gone completely still.

My fingers find the hem of my shirt.