3. Luca
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Luca
I haven’t set foot in this restaurant in five years.
Five years since Victor told me to leave and never come back.
Five years since my own brother looked me in the eye and lied - told the family board I’d fabricated evidence, that I was unstable, that I couldn’t be trusted.
Five years of building a life outside the Moretti name, pretending I didn’t care that they erased me.
Erasing me was always the easy part. I was the first son - Victor’s boy with his first wife, Sophia, who died when I was seven.
He married Rosa before the headstone had finished settling, and she gave him Tommy a year later: a son with no dead woman attached to him, no inconvenient grief.
After that I was just the kid who looked too much like someone they were all trying to forget.
Tommy got the name, the heir’s chair, the soft mother who’s still alive to dab her eyes at parties.
I got my mother’s piano and a one-way ticket out.
But Nonna called.
“It’s my eightieth birthday, Luca. Maybe my last. I want all my grandsons there. Even the one they don’t talk about.”
So here I am. Lurking near the exit like a ghost at my own family’s feast. Watching my brother parade his mistress - his wife’s sister - in front of the whole room like he’s won some kind of prize.
Same old Tommy. Always taking what isn’t his. Always getting away with it.
My hand tightens around my glass of whiskey. The urge to walk over there and put my fist through his face is almost overwhelming.
But that’s not why I’m here.
I’m here because I’ve been waiting. Five years of waiting. And tonight, I finally see something worth waiting for.
Her.
Maria.
I notice her the moment she walks in. Hard not to - she’s beautiful, but that’s not what catches my attention. Lots of women are beautiful. Maria is something else.
She’s wearing red. Not black, like someone in mourning. Not something demure and apologetic, like a woman who’s been beaten. Red. Like a fucking battle flag.
And the way she’s holding herself - spine straight, chin up, eyes scanning the room like she’s cataloging exits and enemies. That’s not a woman who’s given up. That’s a woman who’s planning something.
I watch her sit in the back. Watch her order sparkling water instead of wine - interesting, that. Watch her pretend to pick at her food while her eyes track every movement Tommy and Giuliana make.
And then Nonna opens her mouth.
“What did you do to drive him to this?”
I see Maria flinch. See the color drain from her face. See her hands shake as she grips the tablecloth.
But she doesn’t cry.
She doesn’t scream.
She doesn’t give them a single fucking thing.
She just stands up, walks out, and leaves every Moretti in the room staring at her back.
That’s steel. That’s something most people don’t have.
I follow her before I can stop myself.
***
She’s in the hallway when I find her. One tear sliding down her cheek, just one, and she wipes it away before it can fall.
Don’t let them see you break.
I know that feeling. I’ve lived that feeling.
“I can help you destroy him.”
She turns. Looks at me. And for a moment, I forget what I was going to say.
Because up close, she’s even more striking than I realized. Dark hair tumbling around her shoulders. Soft eyes that have clearly been crying, but are dry now, fierce, determined. A face that’s too expressive to hide what she’s feeling, but she’s trying anyway.
And her body-
Stop it. She’s Tommy’s wife. She’s vulnerable. She’s not for you.
But the thought’s already there, sliding into my brain like poison.
The curve of her hips in that red dress.
The swell of her breasts. The way the fabric clings to her waist, and the urge to put my hands there, to pull her against me, to show her what it feels like to be wanted by someone who actually sees her-
Jesus Christ, Luca. Get a grip.
“Who are you?” she asks.
I tell her. Watch her face change when she realizes who I am - Tommy’s brother, the exile, the one they don’t talk about.
I expect disgust. Suspicion. Maybe fear.
Instead, she studies me. Those dark eyes cataloging every detail. Not backing down. Not looking away.
She’s not afraid of me.
The realization hits harder than it should.
“Why would you help me?” she asks.
I give her the short version. Victor’s crimes. Tommy’s betrayal. Five years of exile.
What I don’t tell her is that this isn’t just about revenge anymore.
What I don’t tell her is that from the moment she walks into that party in her red dress, refusing to break, I feel something shift in my chest.
What I don’t tell her is that I’m standing here in this hallway, looking at my brother’s wife, and all I can think about is what it would feel like to taste her.
She’s off-limits. She’s broken. She’s everything you can’t have.
But God help me, I want her anyway.
“Tomorrow,” she says. “10 a.m. Give me the address.”
I give her the information. Tell her not to tell anyone. Try to be professional about it.
But as I walk away, I can feel her eyes on my back. And I wonder if she’s thinking the same thing I am.
This is a terrible idea.
And we’re both going to do it anyway.