The Arrangement

Chapter Three

  The sun was shining bright, surprisingly there were no clouds and it was a nice small breezy kind of day. The weather was perfect. My mood though, wasn't.

Today was the day my mother was forcing me to meet with my 'fiance'.She keeps trying to talk to me about him, but every time she brings him up I change the subject or shoot it down very bluntly.

I don't even want to know his name, what he does, how he looks, nothing. I'm not interested at all in being eighteen and engaged. How did I get roped into meeting with him then? My mother guilt-ed me into it. She told me it was one of my father's last dying wishes.

Two years ago my father died from heart failure. His heart was weak, and it was fast and shocking. One day he was alive and fine, then the next he was gone. We only had a certain amount of time in the hospital after his first heart attack to talk to him, then he died in the middle of the night.

I miss him and think of him all the time. My mother was heart broken, she was deeply in love with my father, and she told me she never ever thought of the possibility of losing him, she wasn't ready to lose him. None of us were ready to lose him. He was young, only forty three. I don't think you're ever ready to lose anybody.

Some times I still hear her cry at night. It's devastating and I hate seeing her in so much pain, but all I could do is hold her and tell her how much I love her.

My mother and I walked in to the restaurant, Caro's was the name of it. I've never eaten here, but I've heard the food is delicious, but it's a high class five star restaurant, so it's expensive. I closed the glass door behind us and we both stepped towards the hostess, who smiled brightly towards my mom and I.

The restaurant was two stories, and there were double doors for outside dining around the first floor. The walls were dark and the lights were dimmed but bright enough to see clearly. There was a bar to my right, and this place was packed with people all around. There was a piano and soft classical music being played int the background, it was soothing and hardly noticeable unless you were real quiet.There was chatter amongst us and my mom nudged her elbow to my arm and nod in appreciation to the place around us, but I couldn't help but be confused as to why my 'fiancee'would want to meet at such an expensive and fancy place.

Did he have money? I hope he wasn't those arrogant annoying business men who think they have all the money in the world and want to gloat about it.

I haven't talked to Giuliana or Michael sense my birthday. I felt hurt that they didn't tell me anything and I felt lied to. My mom told me that her and my dad made the both of them promise not to tell me or Catie and Carlo. Yet, I still couldn't help but feel a little betrayed by every one.

My mom was the first to speak, "Hi, I'm Serafina and this is my daughter; Rosabella. We are here to meet with-" my mother was interrupted by the hostess and her bright fake plaster smile.

"Of course. He's been expecting you." she grabbed two menus from the podium she stood behind of, "Right this way" we followed her towards the back of the restaurant.

My stomach was turning and the curiosity was killing me. I felt my hands start to cramp and I pushed my arms to my sides. My nerves were getting to the best of me and I almost tripped over these horrible extremely high heels my mother made me wear. My dress was purple and black -mother picked this out as well- it was tight fitting and showed my curves. My long brown hair was in lose curls and I wore the appropriate amount of makeup.

Walking towards the dark corner of the resturaunt, there was a rather large booth, it was dark gray and there were three heads sticking out that I can see from where I was. The hostess was heading towards that direction. Oh no, this is it!