The reception, although I had no hand in planning it—and I suspect, neither did Angelo—is beautiful. It’s held back at the mansion in the grand ballroom that was reserved for my father’s biggest parties and events—rarely held after my mother’s death—the room choked with flowers and satin-draped tables, finished off with a string quartet serenading the guests from the other side of the wooden dance floor. I don’t recognize very many of the people who come to give their well-wishes, but I recognize the names—many of them the parents of the young men who were originally paraded in front of me to marry. If any of them are resentful that Angelo ended up claiming the right to marry me after all, none of them show it—probably all assuming that it’s more prudent not to.
The Romano family, pointed
