Page 9 of My Wedding Mafia Style

“Oh,” Lucy says. “Great. Wonderful. I was hoping to be processed as a group.”

My mouth curves before I can prevent it.

Bianca beams. “I like her.”

“You like everyone for the first twenty minutes,” I say.

“Not true. I disliked your last attorney immediately.”

“So did I.”

“Yes, but I was honest about it.”

Lucy looks between us, her brows drawn together. “Should I be concerned there are attorneys involved?”

“In this family?” Isabella asks, appearing on Lucy’s other side as if she teleported. “Always.”

Lucy’s eyes widen. I send Isabella a warning look. She ignores it with the ease of lifelong practice.

“I’m Isabella,” she says, leaning in. “Youngest sister, best personality, least trusted with secrets.”

“That is not something you should tell people,” Adriana says, joining us.

Isabella shrugs. “It saves time.”

Adriana stops in front of Lucy. She is elegant tonight in black, her dark hair pulled back, her expression polite but sharp enough to cut glass. Of all my sisters, she is the one most like me. Controlled. Careful. Far less amused by surprises. Her gaze moves to Lucy’s face.

“Adriana,” she says.

Lucy smiles, but I feel the tension return to her shoulders. “Lucy.”

“How do you know my brother?”

Adriana is direct and clean with no wasted questions. Lucy’s mouth parts. I consider stepping in. I do not. Part of me wants to see what she does under pressure. Another part, less strategic and more foolish, wants to hear how she will describe me.

Lucy lifts her chin.

“We met tonight.”

Silence. Then Isabella whispers, loudly, “Oh, she’s honest. That’s new.”

Bianca coughs into her hand. Adriana’s expression does not change, but her eyes sharpen.

My mother rises then, saving Lucy from the next question or perhaps walking her directly into a worse one. She crosses the small distance with the grace that made men twice my father’s size move out of her path for thirty years.

“Enough,” she says softly.

Everyone listens … mostly.

My mother turns to Lucy and takes both her hands. “I’m Sofia.”

Lucy’s face softens instantly. “It’s nice to meet you.”

“And you,” my mother says. “Ignore my daughters. They were raised better than this, but only in theory.”

“I heard that,” Isabella says.

“You were meant to.”