Having spent almost half a year living in deliberate celibacy, Dante had finally decided to loosen the tight grip he had on himself. It hadn’t been easy. The discipline had already become a part of him. But somewhere along the line, that discipline began to feel less like strength and more like isolation, so he had chosen to associate with the opposite gender again. Dante had made a decision. Not necessarily to fall in love but to at least allow himself to feel something again. He had decided to feel affection, companionship even if it was fleeting. He wasn't that naive to fall in love again.Three days ago, he met a woman on a dating site. It wasn’t something he would normally do, but curiosity got the better of him. Their conversation had been surprisingly smooth. No awkward pauses, no forced responses. Just easy. By the end of that first exchange, they had agreed to meet, and today was the day. Everything had been planned down to the smallest detail, from the time to the venue,

Dante couldn't help but chuckle at the question."Really?" he blurted out, staring directly at Giulia. "Did you just ask me who she is?"Another laugh slipped from him, low and almost disbelieving, like her question alone amused him more than it should have.Giulia felt her fingers curl slightly at her sides.She knows Dante so well that she knows when his laugh is genuine and when it is not.This particular one is the laugh Dante uses whenever he wants to provoke someone intentionally."Well," he exhaled softly before continuing, his eyes never leaving hers. "She's the person I came for, and you know exactly what that means."A slow, mischievous smile appeared on his lips afterward.Before Giulia could respond, Dante stretched out his hand toward the lady standing beside him.The woman looked slightly surprised for a second before gracefully placing her hand in his.The instant their palms met, Dante locked their fingers together naturally, almost intimately, like it was something th

Giulia drove away from the restaurant without even looking back at the building fading behind her.Her fingers tightened around the steering wheel as the encounter with Dante replayed in her mind like a cursed film she couldn't stop watching.His coldness and indifferent treatment gnawed at her pride more than she cared to admit.The road ahead stretched endlessly under the dim evening sky, but Giulia barely noticed it. Her thoughts were far too loud.She had made up her mind to return home, not to her personal residence but to the Santoro estate, her family house.The decision alone irritated her because deep down, she knew exactly why she was going there.It was definitely not because she had suddenly realized how horribly she had treated her grandfather by disrespecting his idea not to divorce Dante.What prompted Giulia to make this visit was the encounter she had with Dante.For the first time in a long while, she felt powerless.The man she once discarded without a second though

Dante didn’t reply immediately.The silence that followed stretched uncomfortably between them, thick and suffocating, making Giulia’s grip on the phone tighten.She glanced at the screen to make sure the call hadn’t disconnected, but it hadn’t. Dante was still on the line.Her heartbeat grew uneven. She hated the silence. It unsettled her.Afraid he might end the call without answering, Giulia cleared her throat and repeated herself.“Which do you prefer?”Another pause.Then finally, Dante sighed quietly into the phone.“Well…” he exhaled slowly. “I actually heard what you asked. But I was just curious what prompted this sudden pursuit of reconciliation."The question caught Giulia off guard.For a brief moment, her mind went blank. She hadn’t expected him to ask that directly. Her lips parted, but no words came out immediately.She searched for something convincing, something that wouldn’t expose the desperation creeping beneath her calm tone.“Are you enjoying the space between us

Dorothy stared at her daughter as though she had suddenly begun speaking a language she could not understand.“What did you say happened?” she asked slowly, her voice trembling with disbelief.Giulia lowered her eyes. The words had already left her mouth once, yet repeating them felt even harder now. Her throat tightened painfully before she finally forced herself to speak again.“I said I’m pregnant, Mom.”Her tone was dry and heavy, stripped of emotion, almost as though she had repeated the sentence too many times in her own head and had become numb to it.For a moment, Dorothy said nothing. The air in the room turned suffocating.Her throat went dry instantly, and she blinked several times as though trying to wake herself from a nightmare.“You’re preg… what?” she stammered, her forehead creasing deeply.Her eyes searched Giulia’s face desperately, praying to find some trace of mischief, some hidden smile that would reveal this was all a cruel joke.“Don’t tell me this is not some