12. Nova
— ? —
Nova
The Wedding Day
The red dress weighs nothing.
That’s the strange thing - silk this expensive, cut this precisely, should feel like armor. Should feel like the weight of what I’m about to do. Instead it whispers against my skin like a secret, like a promise, like the first breath after drowning.
I stand in front of the mirror in our bedroom and I don’t recognize the woman looking back at me.
She’s not the ghost who stumbled out of an alley eight weeks ago.
Not the shell who flinched at shadows, who apologized for existing, who believed she deserved every bruise Vivienne left on her skin.
That woman would never wear a dress this red.
That woman would never walk into a cathedral full of enemies with her head held high.
That woman is dead.
I killed her. Luca helped me bury her.
And in her place stands someone else entirely.
The silk clings to curves I’d forgotten I had - curves that weeks of real food and real sleep and real touch have coaxed back into existence.
The color is obscene against my skin, not the soft blush of apology but the deep arterial crimson of a wound that refuses to close.
Of a heart that refuses to stop beating.
The neckline dips low enough to show the mark Luca left below my collarbone. I trace it with my fingertip - the bruise has faded to purple and gold now, a galaxy mapped onto my skin. I could have covered it. The dressmaker offered, delicately, to adjust the neckline.
I told her to lower it another inch.
Let them see. Let them all see.
“You look like you’re about to burn something down.”
I turn. Luca is standing in the doorway, and the sight of him steals the breath from my lungs.
Black suit, tailored so precisely it looks painted on. White shirt unbuttoned at the throat, no tie. His dark hair is swept back from his face, and his eyes - those dark, dangerous eyes - are fixed on me like I’m the only thing in the world worth seeing.
“That’s the plan,” I say. “Isn’t it?”
He crosses the room slowly, deliberately, each step eating up the distance between us. When he reaches me, he doesn’t touch - just stands there, close enough that I can feel the heat radiating off him, close enough that his breath stirs my hair.
“Turn around.”
I turn.
In the mirror, I watch him step closer. Watch his hands come up to rest on my shoulders - light, barely there, his thumbs tracing the ridge of my spine.
“The last time I saw you in that cathedral,” he says quietly, “you were wearing white. Walking toward my brother. And I stood in the back row and thought-” He stops. Swallows. “I thought I was going to have to watch you disappear into that family forever.”
“I almost did.”
“I know.” His hands slide down my arms, raising goosebumps in their wake. “But not today. Today you walk back in there on my arm. Today you show every single person who smiled at Vivienne across a dinner table exactly what she did to you.”
“And what she couldn’t do.”
“And what she couldn’t do.” He meets my eyes in the mirror. “She couldn’t break you, Nova. She tried, and she failed, and today everyone is going to see the proof.”
He leans down. Presses his lips to the mark on my collarbone - gentle, reverent, a benediction.
“Ready to ruin a wedding?”
I smile at our reflection. At this woman in red silk, standing in the arms of the man who put her back together.
“I’ve never been more ready for anything in my life.”
***
Luca
The drive to the cathedral takes forty-five minutes.
Forty-five minutes of Milan scrolling past the windows of the Rolls-Royce. Forty-five minutes of Nova’s hand in mine, her pulse thrumming against my palm like a second heartbeat. Forty-five minutes of watching her face as she prepares herself for what’s coming.
She’s nervous. I can tell by the way she’s breathing - too controlled, too deliberate, the way someone breathes when they’re trying not to hyperventilate. But she’s not backing down. Not asking me to turn the car around.
That’s my girl.
The cathedral appears on the horizon like a monument to old sins, its spires clawing at the gray Milan sky.
Cars line the street - Mercedes, Bentleys, a Rolls-Royce or two that aren’t mine.
The social event of the season. Everyone who’s anyone is inside, watching my brother marry Nova’s sister, celebrating Vivienne’s triumph.
They don’t know what’s coming.
“The ceremony started twenty minutes ago,” Marco’s voice crackles through my earpiece. “They’re at the vows now. The priest just asked if anyone objects.”
“And my mother’s men?”
“Handled. Two of them, waiting by the sacristy door, exactly where Marta said they’d be. We took them quietly ten minutes ago. No noise, no witnesses. They never saw us coming.”
My mother set a trap. And Marta - dear, loyal Marta, the woman my mother trusted to be her eyes - handed me the blueprint.
“Perfect timing.”
I catch Nova’s eye. She laughs. Actually laughs, bright and sharp and slightly unhinged.
“Did you plan that? The ‘speak now or forever hold your peace’ moment?”
“I’m a dramatic person. Family trait.”
“Your mother’s son after all.”
“In some ways.” I bring her hand to my lips, press a kiss to her knuckles. “In the ways that matter, I’m nothing like her.”
The car pulls to a stop. Through the tinted windows, I can see the cathedral steps - empty now, everyone already inside. Paparazzi cluster at the barriers, cameras ready for the moment the happy couple emerges.
They’re going to get a different shot entirely.
“Last chance,” I say. “We can still turn around. Go back to the mansion, open a bottle of wine, forget about all of them.”
Nova’s jaw sets. “Open the door.”
I open the door.
***
Nova
The sunlight hits me like a physical force.
For a moment I just stand there, blinking in the sudden brightness, letting my eyes adjust. The paparazzi haven’t noticed us yet. They’re focused on the cathedral doors, waiting for the bride and groom.
Then one of them turns.
I watch it happen in slow motion: the camera swinging toward us, the photographer’s face shifting from boredom to confusion to shock. He says something to the photographer next to him. She turns. Her camera comes up.
And suddenly they’re all looking.
“Nova Castellani!” someone shouts. “Is that Nova Castellani?”
“Who’s that with her?”
“Is that, is that the brother?”
The flashbulbs start going off like fireworks. I feel Luca’s hand at the small of my back, steadying, guiding. His voice in my ear, low and amused:
“Wave, darling. You’re famous again.”
I don’t wave. I just walk.
Up the cathedral steps, toward the massive wooden doors, the red silk of my dress catching the light with every stride. Behind me, I can hear the photographers screaming questions - are you crashing the wedding? are you back together with Dante? who’s the man?-but I don’t turn around.
I don’t need to answer them.
They’ll find out soon enough.
We reach the doors. Luca’s hand finds the iron handle.
“Together?” he asks.
“Together.”
He pulls.
***
Luca
The doors swing open, and sunlight pours into the cathedral like holy water.
I planned this. Timed it to the minute, calculated the angle of the afternoon sun, positioned us so the light would stream in behind us like a divine announcement. A sea of heads turns toward the blinding brightness, hands coming up to shield eyes, murmurs of confusion rippling through the pews.
They can’t see us yet. They can only see the silhouette - two figures in the doorway, backlit by glory.
Let them wonder. Let them squint and whisper and try to make sense of what they’re seeing.
Let them wait.
The orchestra is the first to break. The first violin trails off mid-note, the player’s bow hovering frozen above the strings. Then the second violin stops. The viola. The cello. One by one, the music dies, each instrument falling silent like a body hitting the floor.
The silence that follows is absolute.
And then we step forward.
Out of the light. Into the cathedral. Into the view of all of Milan’s finest, who are about to have the social event of the season become something else entirely.
I hear the first gasp. A woman in the third row, her gloved hand flying to her mouth. Then another gasp, and another, spreading through the congregation like ripples in a pond.
“Is that-”
“It can’t be-”
“Nova?”
I feel her straighten beside me. Feel her chin lift, her shoulders square. She’s trembling - I can feel it through my hand on her back - but she doesn’t stop walking.
God, she’s magnificent.
We’re halfway down the aisle now. I can see the altar clearly: white flowers everywhere, candles flickering, the priest frozen mid-sentence with his Bible open. Beside him, Chloe in her princess gown, her face a mask of dawning horror.
And Dante.
My brother has gone gray. His mouth is hanging open, his eyes fixed on us with an expression I’ve never seen on his face before - fear, maybe. Or recognition. The understanding that everything he’s built is about to come crashing down.
He knew we were coming. I made sure of that, sent word through channels I knew he’d intercept. But knowing and seeing are different things.
Knowing we would be here, and watching us walk down the aisle of his wedding to another woman, are two very different things.
The front pews are full of Castellani allies. My mother’s friends, her co-conspirators, the women who’ve smiled at her across dinner tables for decades while knowing exactly what she is. They’re staring at us with expressions that range from shock to fury to something that looks almost like fear.
Good. They should be afraid.
And there, in the front pew, rising slowly to her feet-
My mother.
Vivienne Castellani is wearing champagne silk. Pearls at her throat, diamonds at her wrists, her silver hair swept up in an elegant chignon. She looks like what she’s always looked like: a queen. A society matron. A woman above reproach.
But her eyes.
Her eyes are the eyes of a predator who’s just realized she’s become the prey. She’s glancing toward the sacristy door - once, twice - looking for men who are never coming.