I anxiously waited for a text from him, even after I had arrived home, but there was no message, not even a dot. I became increasingly worried.
“Alicia, I’ll wait for Gio before eating, so we can have dinner together,” I informed her.
I lay down on the bed for a moment and scrolled through my social media accounts. I rarely used them because Gio didn’t use social media much. He had accounts, but he wasn’t active on them.
Most of the personal accounts of the Locatelli family were also private, only accessible to their close associates.
I noticed that Raffaele had a My Day post. I quickly checked it. At first, I was feeling okay, but my mood suddenly plummeted when I saw it.
The caption read: “How is Gio going to sign my vacation leave if this idiot is getting drunk?”
In the short video, they were in a VIP room at a bar. Gio was there, along with Taddeo, Valerio, and even Arcel, a cousin who was usually absent from such gatherings. There was a woman with them, whom I couldn’t quite recognize because she wasn’t in the camera’s focus.
Gio was just quietly drinking, looking rather upset because of his cousins. He wasn’t doing anything wrong, just drinking with his cousins, but I felt uneasy about it.
Various questions began to clutter my mind, such as why didn’t he say goodbye? I was here waiting for him, and he was out drinking with his cousins?
I turned off my phone and placed it on the bed. Why did it feel like something was wrong between us, even though I couldn’t quite pinpoint what it was? The weight of my thoughts grew heavier.
~***~
I waited for Gio to come home. I was still sitting on the bed when I heard the door open, so I prepared myself.
“Why are you still awake?” I closed my eyes as I heard his voice. I heard some noise, a sign that Gio was moving around the room. I looked at him. He went into the walk-in closet and then to the bathroom. I didn’t respond to his earlier question, and it seemed like he wasn’t waiting for an answer either.
I waited for him to come out of the bathroom, and there Gio was, looking fresh with damp hair and sweatpants. Maybe he noticed my stern expression because he glanced at me briefly before heading back into the walk-in closet.
“Where have you been?” I asked calmly.
When he emerged from the closet, he looked at me again. “At a bar,” was his brief response. He didn’t deny it, but he also didn’t admit to being there without informing me. I wasn’t about to stop him, was I?
I stood up and faced Gio. I didn’t want to get angry and start a fight. There might be a reason for what Gio did. Maybe it was spontaneous, and he didn’t have a chance to inform me.
I swallowed hard. But that’s not Gio. He always finds time to let me know. I can feel the bile rising in my throat.
Gio looked at me. His jaw tensed. It was clear from his eyes that he had been drinking. They weren’t bloodshot, but they weren’t clear either. But there was something about them that made his gaze unsettling.
“You know, my cousins invited me. I just went.”
“You’ve been gone for a while now, haven’t you? Where were you? I was looking for you at Dario’s place, but they said you had already left the site. Did you go back to your office without telling me?” I wanted to ask more, but I didn’t want to come off as petty or like the kind of wife who picks fights.
“I figured there was no reason to stick around there. I decided to head back to my office.” He looked at me, and there was a meaningful stare.
I didn’t like how he looked at me. There was something unsettling about it.
“Why didn’t you at least tell me that you were leaving earlier?” I finally mustered the courage to say that to him.
Gio paused in his actions and looked at me. The earring he was wearing glinted in the light.
“I was actually planning to do that, but it seemed like you were busy having coffee with your friend.”
My eyes widened as I heard it from him. What could be so important about having coffee – I remembered Rory and I were having a chat earlier, and he offered me a cup of coffee. Our conversation was enjoyable, but it didn’t mean I was so occupied that he couldn’t talk to me.
“I wish you had still told me,” I said with all my strength, even though it felt like my chest was being squeezed. I had a feeling that something was wrong, and Gio just didn’t want to tell me what it was.
Gio looked at me with a dark expression. He sighed before turning his gaze away from me. “You looked happy while talking to him. I didn’t want to interrupt your conversation.”
I quickly approached him and grabbed his arm. “Are you jealous?” He was usually open about feeling jealous, and sometimes I even teased him about it. So it was strange that he seemed to be hiding it now.
“I’m not jealous,” he said, and then he turned away. He picked something up and walked away from me, leaving me to watch his every move.
Gio sat on the bed, typing on his phone. I had no idea who he was texting.
“What’s wrong, Gio?” I asked. I rested one hand on the console table for support. I knew there was a problem, but Gio wouldn’t tell me, and that was puzzling.
“Nothing,” he replied curtly.
I bit my lip because I was losing patience. “You weren’t like this before, were you? You used to tell me when you had a problem or when you felt jealous. Why are you denying it now? How can we fix this if you don’t tell me?” I finally let my emotions flow. I had been holding back since I saw that video of Raffaele at the bar, and Gio’s behavior was making things worse. I couldn’t tell if it was because of his intoxication and the alcohol in his system.
Gio stopped what he was doing again. He slowly looked at me, as though I had said something wrong.