Chapter 21
Luca stared at his phone in disbelief, his fingers gripping it tightly as yet another call went unanswered. His frustration flared like a matchstick, and before he could stop himself, he threw the phone onto the table. It clattered against the wood, spinning dangerously close to the edge before he snatched it back up, his pulse quickening. The panic was setting in. He couldn’t just sit here, waiting for her to call back.
“Damn it!” he cursed under his breath, his thoughts a whirlwind of guilt and fear. He tried calling her again, but the voicemail picked up almost immediately. His heart pounded in his chest. Amber wasn’t at any of the major hotels—St. Regis, Fendi, Waldorf. Each front desk gave him the same empty response: *No Signorina West is staying here*. Where could she have gone?
A knock on the study door interrupted his frantic thoughts.
“Hi, can I come in?” Carlotta peeked her head inside, her expression pinched with discomfort. “I’m really sorry for what happened.” Her lips thinned into a strained smile. “Mom and Dad have left.”
Luca exhaled, rubbing a hand over his face. The thought of facing his family right now was unbearable.
“Guilia is very upset though,” Carlotta added, meaning his mother was still lingering, stewing in her anger. Luca felt his frustration flare even more.
“I’ll talk to her,” he muttered. He didn’t have the energy for his mother’s theatrics tonight. He kissed Carlotta, but the gesture felt hollow. “Goodnight, Lottie.”
She hesitated for a moment, sensing his tension, but she gave him a tight smile before leaving. As soon as she was gone, Luca grabbed his car keys. Sitting here, waiting, wasn’t an option anymore. His guilt over kicking Amber out gnawed at him like a living thing, and his mind raced with fear for her safety. She wasn’t from here. She didn’t know the city well enough to navigate it alone at night.
He drove aimlessly at first, circling the neighborhood, hoping to spot her on the quiet streets. Every minute that passed without finding her only tightened the knot in his chest. He stopped at two smaller hotels, asking if a certain redhead had checked in. The answer was the same: *No.*
With each rejection, Luca’s fear deepened. He gripped the steering wheel until his knuckles turned white, his mind spinning. Rome wasn’t safe for a woman on her own at this hour. Anything could happen. And Amber... she had been through enough already.
As he drove through the city, a memory flashed in his mind—a beachwear commercial billboard catching his eye. He remembered something Amber had once told him in passing, how she loved the beach. She had confided that as a child, she’d only gone to the beach a couple of times. Her mother had been too busy, and her stepfather... well, their relationship hadn’t been good. The beach had been her refuge, her place of escape.
*Santa Severa.*
Luca slammed his foot down on the gas, the memory of finding her at that little café on Santa Severa beach after their arguments flooding back. Every time they fought, especially when his mother had been particularly harsh, Amber would disappear. Luca had dragged her home more times than he could count, their fights inevitably leading to apologies and desperate, make-up sex. He hadn’t been to that place in three years, hadn’t set foot on that beach since she left.
Now, his heart raced as he drove toward the coastline, fear and hope mingling in his chest.
Fifteen minutes later, Luca’s car pulled up to the familiar stretch of sand. The beach was dark, the sky above glittering with stars. He kicked off his shoes, the cool sand squishing beneath his toes as he walked, the memories of their past hitting him hard. This place was a graveyard of moments from another life—moments both beautiful and painful, moments that felt as though they belonged to someone else now.
And then he saw her.
A small silhouette, hunched over, sitting alone by the shoreline. Amber looked tiny, her arms wrapped around her knees, her body curled in on itself like she was trying to make herself disappear. She was staring at the sky, unmoving, and the sight of her like that—so still, so silent—made Luca’s stomach twist.
“Dio mio,” he muttered under his breath, anger and relief crashing through him in equal measure. “You can’t be this stupid! No one can be this damned stupid!” He shouted into the wind, startling her. Amber’s head jerked toward him, but she didn’t move. She just stared at him, her face blank, like she didn’t quite understand what was happening.
“I can’t believe that at one in the morning, you’re sitting out here alone!” Luca’s voice cracked with anger, the frustration boiling over. “What? Were you waiting for something to happen to you?” His heart was pounding, not just from fear for her, but from the sheer insanity of it all. She could’ve been hurt, attacked, or worse, and he was furious with her for putting herself in danger. But Amber said nothing. She just stared at him with an empty expression, as if his words barely registered.
“Come on, let’s go home,” Luca said, softer now. His anger had fizzled into something else—something more like fear. Fear for what she had become. She didn’t argue, didn’t protest, didn’t even ask how he knew to find her here. She simply rose to her feet, holding her sandals in one hand, and began walking beside him without a word. Her silence unnerved him more than anything else.
As they walked back to the car, Luca stole glances at her, trying to decipher the strange expression on her face. There was something broken in the way she moved, something defeated. And that terrified him. This wasn’t the fiery, sharp-tongued Amber he had known. This was a ghost, a shadow of the woman she used to be.
They drove in silence. Amber’s face was turned toward the window, the dim streetlights casting flickering shadows across her pale skin. Luca clenched his teeth, his frustration growing with each passing moment.
“What’s wrong with you?” he finally snapped, unable to hold back any longer. “Are you trying to get yourself killed or something?” He was hoping to provoke her, to get some kind of reaction—anything that would shatter the eerie silence. But Amber didn’t rise to the bait. She remained silent, her eyes fixed on the city lights passing by outside.
“How was the dinner?” she asked suddenly, her voice flat, emotionless.
Luca gritted his teeth. “Fine.” He didn’t want to talk about dinner. He didn’t want to think about the chaos of the evening, the judgmental looks from his family, the tension between them all. He especially didn’t want to think about Nico’s heart-wrenching breakdown.
“And Nico? Did he go to sleep?” she asked quietly.
“Yes,” Luca said, his voice clipped. He didn’t want to get into that right now either. They needed to talk about Nico and his fears, but it was a conversation better left for the morning. He felt too tired, too frayed at the edges to deal with it now.
The rest of the drive passed in silence, the tension between them thick enough to choke on. Amber’s face remained turned away from him, her eyes dull, her spirit seemingly crushed. Luca’s frustration mounted with every second. This wasn’t right. She wasn’t right.
When they finally arrived back at the casa, Luca was relieved to see that his mother’s car was gone. As Amber climbed out of the car, Luca stopped her. “Amber…” His voice softened, guilt creeping into his words. “I’m really sorry for what happened this evening. You were a guest in my home. I invited you, and it was disgraceful—”
“Let it go, Luca,” she interrupted, her voice tired, defeated. “I’m fine. Everything is fine. It doesn’t matter.”
*Fine?* Luca stared at her, stunned by the emptiness in her voice. Nothing about this was fine. The haunted look in her eyes, the defeated set of her shoulders—it screamed that nothing was fine. But she turned away from him, heading toward the door without another word.
Luca stood there for a long moment, watching her walk away, his chest tight with the realization that something was deeply wrong. Amber was slipping away, and he had no idea how to stop it.
Tomorrow, he told himself. Tomorrow, he would talk to her and Nico. Tomorrow, he would face the problems he had been avoiding for far too long.
But tonight, they were both too tired, too broken, to do anything more.
He watched her disappear inside, the weight of all their unresolved issues pressing down on him like a lead blanket. Tomorrow, he promised himself.