All Chapters of My Ex Called Me a Stand-In So I Married the Don: Chapter 11 - Chapter 20

A thousand miles north, a private jet touched down at Teterboro just after nine.Elena came down the stairs with the shoebox in her arms.There was a man waiting at the bottom.She had never seen him in person, but she knew who he was before he said a word. He was tall, a few inches over six feet, in a black overcoat over a dark suit with no tie. Black hair, cut short. A thin white scar through his left eyebrow. A face that didn't give anything away.Six men stood spread out behind him across the tarmac, and every one of them was watching the edges of the airfield instead of her.The ground crew had stopped talking. A man in an orange vest had frozen halfway to the jet with a fuel hose in his hands, until his supervisor took him by the shoulder and turned him around.Nobody on that airfield looked straight at Dante Valenti. Elena understood why."Elena," he said.It was the voice from the phone."Mr. Valenti.""Dante."She wasn't ready to say it back.The wind off the runway was colder

Julian had it figured out by the time he finished his drink.Elena was angry. She'd packed her things to scare him, and she was using the word breakup to get his attention. It was a tactic. She wanted him to come running.He wasn't going to.Five days, he thought. Give it five days, and she'd be back at the front door with her suitcase and that quiet look on her face, waiting for him to say it was okay.And in the meantime, he'd show her he was doing just fine.Bianca came into the kitchen with her phone in her good hand."Julian. I was thinking." She sat on the stool next to him. "After everything this week, I could really use a few days away. We both could. What if we took a trip?""Where?""There's a cruise out of PortMiami. Five nights, Nassau, a private island, all of it. I found a suite." She turned the phone toward him. White ship, blue water, people in robes on a balcony. "Wouldn't that be perfect?"Julian looked at the screen.A cruise.Elena had asked him for exactly this las

When Elena came downstairs the next morning, it was almost 11. She'd slept straight through the alarm. Dante was already at the table.He had coffee in front of him and a newspaper folded beside his plate. He looked up when she came in, and he didn't look back down.The table was full. Fresh berries. Soft scrambled eggs. Smoked salmon. A plate of warm toast, and beside it, in a little glass dish, lemon curd.Every single thing on that table was something she loved.She sat down and picked up a piece of toast. It had already been spread with lemon curd, right to the edges, the way she'd always made it for herself.Nobody had ever done that for her. Not since she was a kid."You like lemon curd too?" she asked."Coincidence," Dante said. "We have similar taste."She looked at him over the toast. He went back to his coffee.Sal came in halfway through breakfast and set a new phone next to her plate."New York number, Ms. Rossi. Your contacts are already on it. The ones you'd want, anyway.

Back at Sands Point, Dante's men carried in the bags and boxes, set them down in her room, and left without a word.Elena was exhausted. Seven fittings and half of Madison Avenue had worn her out more than a 30-hour shift.She took a long shower and came out in a white silk robe, towel-drying her hair. The robe had been hanging in the closet with everything else. It fit her too.There was a knock. Dante stood in the doorway with a tray. Cut fruit, crackers, a small bowl of almonds, a glass of milk.He'd taken off his jacket and tie. His sleeves were rolled to the elbow, and the watch she'd given him was on his wrist."You hardly touched dinner," he said."I wasn't hungry.""You're hungry now." He set the tray on the dresser. Then his eyes went to the towel in her hands, and to the drop of water running down her neck into the collar of the robe. They stayed there a second too long. "Sit down.""What?"He took the hair dryer from the bathroom counter and plugged it in by the vanity. "Sit

Elena's eyes filled.She didn't try to stop it. She stood in the hallway and cried, and he didn't move to touch her. He just stayed there with his hand on the wall and let her."I looked for you," she said. "After. I asked the nurses, I asked my father, I asked everyone. Nobody would tell me anything. I didn't even know your name." She wiped her face with the heel of her hand. "How have you been? All this time. Have you been all right?""I've been fine," Dante said."Don't." She shook her head. "Don't do that. You told me the truth on that bench every single day. Tell me now."He was quiet for a long moment."My father cheated on my mother," he said. "For years. Everybody in the family knew. She put up with it until she couldn't. She died the winter I turned 13."Elena put her hand over her mouth."After the funeral, I stopped talking. To my father. To the doctors. To anyone. Eight months, I didn't say one word. My grandfather didn't know what to do with me, so he put me in St. Clare's