Chapter 10: Let's play pretend

Bianca

The resort was supposed to be a cage, but I was quickly learning that the wider social circle of the DeSantis and their associates was something far more dangerous—a viper's nest where I was cast as the unwanted intruder.

It started at a poolside cocktail party, one of those casually luxurious affairs that screamed of generational wealth and unshakeable power. I stood beside Alessandro, my hand resting on his arm like a dead weight, my face carefully arranged into what I hoped passed for contentment. We were performing our roles—the picture-perfect couple whose merger would save empires.

That's when she made her entrance. Jennifer swept through the crowd with the kind of confidence that comes from never hearing the word "no," her designer swimsuit cover-up floating around her like gossamer. Her gaze locked onto Alessandro with unmistakable possession before sliding to me with an assessment so swift and dismissive it felt like a slap.

"Alessandro, darling," she purred, moving in to air-kiss both his cheeks, lingering just a fraction too long, her fingers trailing down his arm. "It's been far too long. We've all been missing you terribly."

"Jennifer," Alessandro said, his voice carefully neutral, almost cold. He shifted slightly, his shoulder pressing into mine in a gesture that felt simultaneously protective and distancing—like he was trying to shield me while maintaining the wall between us.

"This must be the famous Bianca," Jennifer said, turning those champagne-colored eyes on me. They performed a ruthless inventory—from my simple silk dress to the family heirloom diamond glittering on my finger, each detail catalogued and judged. I saw the verdict in the microscopic curl of her perfectly lined lips. Gold-digger. Outsider. Temporary inconvenience. If only she knew that I owned the City she thinks she rules.

"A pleasure," I said, my voice emerging as flat as the ocean was deep.

"Oh, the pleasure is entirely ours," she countered, her tone dripping with false warmth that somehow implied the exact opposite.

"We were all so surprised by Alessandro's sudden engagement. It's really not like him to be so... impulsive. I'm absolutely sure you'll fit right in with us."

The insult was woven so delicately into the fabric of polite conversation it was nearly invisible to anyone not looking for it. Impulsive. You're a rash mistake. You don't belong here, and we all know it.

The rest of the afternoon became a masterclass in subtle social exclusion. Jennifer held court like a queen among her subjects, spinning stories that reached back decades, referencing people and places and private jokes I had no context for. She pulled Alessandro's sister Olivia into her orbit effortlessly, she refused to acknowledge me as her brother's finance,the two of them were laughing over shared memories while I stood there like furniture.

Whenever I tried to contribute to the conversation, Jennifer would ask the group another question before I could finish speaking, or she'd already turned away to laugh with someone else. I was a ghost at my own engagement celebration, a specter in a life that wasn't mine. Olivia and I were friends she didn't recognize Alessandro because he looked different.

The final, most deliberate cut came three days later. We were having lunch at one of the resort's restaurants when Olivia mentioned a gallery opening—apparently one of Cape Town's most exclusive social events of the season.

"Oh, you absolutely must come, Liv!" Jennifer exclaimed, immediately linking her arm through Olivia's like they were schoolgirls. She looked directly past me, as if I were constructed of glass and air. "It'll be just like old times. I'll have my assistant send you the details right away."

The message landed with crystalline clarity. I was not invited. I was not part of "old times," and I certainly wasn't being welcomed into new ones.

Alessandro, who had maintained an uncomfortable silence through most of Jennifer's performance, tensed visibly beside me. "Jennifer," he began, a warning threading through his voice.

But I placed my hand on his arm, stilling him before he could finish. I would not beg for an invitation from this woman. I would not give her the satisfaction of seeing me wounded.

"It's perfectly fine," I said, my voice miraculously steady despite the humiliation burning through my chest. "I have prior commitments that evening anyway."

Jennifer's smile sharpened into something that resembled a razor blade.

"I'm sure you do. It's so important to stay busy, isn't it?"

Later, in the suffocating silence of our suite, Alessandro attempted to address what had happened.

"About Jennifer... she can be..."

"Don't," I interrupted, keeping my gaze fixed on the endless, indifferent ocean beyond our windows. "Just don't. I don't need your analysis of your ex-girlfriend's behavior. I don't need your pity or your explanations."

"What do you need, Bianca?" he asked, and his voice was raw with a frustration I knew was directed at the situation, at Jennifer, at my impenetrable walls, maybe at all of it simultaneously.

I turned to look at him then, letting him see the cold, unyielding resolve in my eyes. "I need to not be here."

And I knew exactly where I could go. The one place in this entire city that had always felt like mine, even from thousands of miles away. The one place their money and influence and social hierarchies couldn't touch.

The Mitchell's Plain Community Football Center.

The next morning, I dressed in comfortable jeans and a soft sweater—nothing like the designer clothes Alessandro's mother had been sending over. As I headed for the door, Alessandro looked up from his tablet, his expression carefully unreadable.

"Do you have plans today?" he asked, and there was something tentative in his voice, almost hopeful.

I paused with my hand on the door handle. "Yes," I said, not looking back at him. "A lunch meeting."

It wasn't technically a complete lie. I just wasn't specifying the details of who or what or where.

"With whom?" he pressed, and I could hear the tension creeping back into his voice, tightening it.

I finally glanced over my shoulder, meeting his guarded gaze with my own challenge. "With Olivia I need to salvage whatever friendship we have."

The surprise that flashed across his face was brief but unmistakable, followed quickly by something that looked disturbingly like hurt. He'd witnessed Jennifer's systematic exclusion tactics firsthand; he must have thought I was trying to forge an alliance, to find my place within the viper's nest itself, with his own sister as my entry point.

He simply nodded, a tight, jerky movement, and looked back down at his tablet. The silence that expanded between us filled the entire room, thick and suffocating.

I didn't correct his assumption. Let him think whatever he wanted. My solace wasn't going to be found in their world of gallery openings and poolside politics. It was waiting for me on a dusty pitch, with the sound of children's laughter and the solid, honest thud of a football connecting with turf. It was the one place I could go where I wasn't Bianca Romano, the pawn in a corporate merger. I was just Bianca, Max Blackwell's friend and the center's biggest supporter...for a few precious hours, that would be enough to remember who I really was.