Part 3I Took the Fall, He Took Her Side

By the next day, Luca had already forgotten his words to me last night. He put on a black shirt and reverted to the usual imperious attitude befitting a Don.

He said, "Rosa, there's some place I want to take you to today."

I picked up my briefcase and turned him down promptly, "I'm not going. I have work to handle."

He said in a rare soothing tone, "It was my bad for missing our appointment yesterday. I'll add my signature to the agreement later.

"I remember that you used to love gazing at rings in shop windows back in college. You would say that it didn't matter how simple or lavish a ring was, so long as you could have my family crest openly engraved on it. I've already placed an order for a custom one, so let's go try it on."

I'd certainly said such a thing back in college, but now, I no longer wanted it.

Still, I did want to see what kind of ring Luca would order. So after some thought, I decided to get into his car.

As I did so, I opened the door to the front passenger seat out of habit, but Luca abruptly reached out to stop me.

"Sit in the back," he said.

My hand froze in midair. In the end, I retracted my hand without asking any questions and silently opened the rear door.

Luca started the engine, then glanced through the rearview mirror at me and asked coolly, "Don't you have anything to ask me?"

In the past, I would've felt confused and angry, but now, I simply wanted to get some shut-eye.

Just then, his phone rang, and he put the call on speakerphone.

He said in a voice so soft he didn't sound like himself, "Yes, I'm almost there. I don't have anything in the front passenger seat today. It's very spacious, so you'll fit."

While he hung up, my heart plummeted like a rock.

It turned out that the seat had been reserved for Margherita today.

At the next intersection, Margherita got into the front passenger seat with a coat in her arms.

She said cheerfully, "Don Alfonso, thank you for lending me your coat, or I would've frozen to death yesterday. Are we still conducting driving practice today?"

Luca smoothly helped Margherita adjust the tightness of her seatbelt, then replied, "I already promised Rosa today that I'm going to take her to see her ring first."

Margherita finally noticed me in the back seat and panicked. "Mi dispiace! How could I let the future Donna sit in the back seat? I'll switch with you right away."

Luca stopped her and said casually, "Just relax and sit down. The front passenger seat has been adjusted to your height, so there's no need to go to the extra trouble."

Margherita looked apologetically at me before turning away to chat with Luca. They chatted with great familiarity, as if they were good friends who'd known each other for years.

I leaned back against the cold seat like a mere spectator.

It turned out that the reason Luca hadn't shown up at all yesterday was because he was helping Margherita with her driving practice.

Luca, the Don Alfonso who hated stupidity and valued rules more than life, was actually answering every one of Margherita's trivial questions with unending patience. His tone was highly indulgent.

Not once in the past seven years had I seen such a soft side of Luca.

Upon arriving at the high-end jewelry workshop directly operated by the family, a staff member welcomed us respectfully.

"Don Alfonso, the custom signet ring you ordered is one step away from completion. Would your Donna perhaps like to try it on first?"

The staff member looked at Margherita, who smiled shyly.

She tugged on my arm and said, "She's actually our future Donna."

The staff member was quite surprised, but he quickly apologized to me.

A jeweler brought the ring to us. It was crafted primarily from gold with an extremely rare and flashy emerald inlaid in the center of it. The oval ring face bore the Alfonso family's crest. Overall, the ring seemed to carry a cold, suffocating power.

The jeweler placed a silk handkerchief over my hand, but the ring was only made to fit the slender finger of an upper-class woman.

Having spent years wielding a gun, my knuckles were on the larger end. The ring wouldn't fit on my finger at all. It was stuck at my middle joint and couldn't slide on any further.

The jeweler was sweating with anxiety. "That's not possible. I crafted the ring according to the given specifications, so how could it not fit?"

He suddenly caught sight of Margherita and exclaimed, "That lady's finger looks more slender, so it might fit better…"

The staff member gave him a shove from behind, looking incredibly awkward.

I lowered my head, looking down at my heavily scarred and calloused hands. Then, I looked directly at Luca and took off the ring.

"The ring's not my size, so I'm not wearing it."

Luca looked rather impatient. "What difference does it make? We can just take down new measurements. Rita can have this ring instead."

I sneered.

When Margherita made a mistake, I took the fall for her.

She was also allowed to ride shotgun in my place.

Even now, despite the fact that I was clearly Luca's future Donna, he had the ring crafted according to Margherita's measurements. He knew what the ring represented, but he still went ahead with it anyway.

I nodded and replied, "Bene. She can have it, and the title of Donna as well."

Margherita looked aggrievedly at Luca. "Has Rosa misunderstood our relationship? I can explain things to her."

Luca reassured her gently, "Ignore her. She only misunderstood because she's too stupid. You're not to blame."

I simply picked up my pace, all too eager to leave.