19. Pietro
Pietro
The palazzo is still standing.
The guests have gone. The champagne is flat. The music’s long stopped.
But I’m still here.
Waiting.
I sit on the stone steps—inhaling the night air—glad to be breathing. My body aches. My knuckles are split. My ribs cracked.
But none of it hurts like this.
Like not knowing if she’ll come.
And then?—
I hear footsteps.
Measured. Reluctant. Hopeful.
Valaria.
She steps out into the moonlight, arms crossed over her silk wrap, eyes wary.
“I’m not here for a scene,” she says.
“I’m not here to give you one.”
She nods once. Then sits beside me. Not touching. Not speaking.
The rhythmic plink-plink of water droplets sprinkling from the fountain is loud enough to fill the silence between us. The silence stretches.
But it’s not angry anymore.
Just… heavy.
And real.
“I read the directive,” she says finally. “The one that said I was leverage.”
“I know.”
“And I believed it.”
“I don’t blame you.”
Another beat.
“Is it true?” she asks. “I’m your mark to handle?”
I don’t flinch.
“Yes,” I say.
She inhales sharply.
“But only for the first five minutes.”
She looks at me then. Really looks.
I hold her gaze.
“They handed me a file with your name and picture, and I thought, oh brother, not the maid of honor. Said I was to evaluate your potential to compromise the mission. Said you’d flinch. That your emotions made you dangerous. That you were volatile.”
“I don’t flinch. They’re right about the rest,” she says, voice bitter. Before I can stop her, she sprints down the hallway—vanishes into the shadows.
Twenty minutes later, I find her.
She’s not crying in a corner.
She’s standing on the rooftop terrace of the eastern tower. Alone. Wind in her hair. Gown rippling like a brilliant blue flag of defiance.
Looking every inch a queen sheathed in moonlight.
And every bit like a woman who’s about to walk away.
“I’m not here to explain,” I say as I approach her.
She doesn’t turn. “Good. I wouldn’t believe you anyway.”
“Valaria,” I whisper. “They were wrong.”
She says nothing.
So, I go on.
“They thought your passion made you a liability. They didn’t see that it made you unstoppable. They didn’t see how you command a room without raising your voice. How you save lives without ever drawing a gun. How you make people believe in something—even when it’s broken.”
She swallows hard.
“You used me.”
“Not ever. I didn’t know what they’d assigned me to do until after I said yes. By that time, I was already gone.”
“Gone?”
“In you,” I say. “In love.”
She spins, eyes blazing. “You don’t get to say that now.”
“I mean it.”
“I don’t care if you mean it. You should’ve told me the truth. I gave you everything.”
“I was trying to protect you.”
“You were protecting yourself.”
Silence.
Then she steps closer.
And for a second, I think she’s going to hit me.
Instead, she leans in.
“I’m going to finish this mission. Smile for the cameras. Do my job,” she whispers. “But when this is over?”
I brace.
“I’m gone.”
She walks past me. I watch her descend the stairs, slip into the backseat of the Rolls next to Emma.
And I let her go.
Because I know she’s right.
Because I know the only way to get her back—is to earn it.