Chapter 33 Eleanor
Eleanor
I’m out of bed before the sun, leaving my tangled sheets and Leo’s steady breathing behind.
His touch lingers on my skin, even now. I tighten my robe, step out onto the terrace, and feel the cold sting of morning air, sweet and sharp as lemonade.
I drink it in, breath after breath. Manhattan wakes in the distance, but here, it’s silent, the world pared down to whispers. Pale light pools around me.
I stand and watch the sky bleed pink and gold and tell myself, It’s mine.
All of it. Even the parts I thought I didn’t want.
When Leo joins me outside, he’s shirtless, the bruises from last week’s fight at the Albanian warehouse blooming like dark flowers, and overlaid with more recent ones from the fighting ring.
His hair is wild, catching the dawn’s light like fire.
I take him in, every line of him. The tight muscles in his shoulders and the tattoos curling up his arms. The breath on my lips turns shaky, warm against the cool morning.
I love him, I think, and the thought lands with more force than I expect.
The sky opens, gold spilling across the gray, and I open too, heart pounding.
Leo sees me and smiles, that unfiltered grin. “You’re up early,” he says, accusing and teasing at the same time. I take a step toward him, my eyes on the bruise shadowing his ribs. I can still hear Domenico’s words from the fighting ring: Let him fight, Eleanor. It’s in his blood.
I hated it then, the way his family spoke about him like he was some animal, born for violence and nothing more. Now I see the way Leo stands there, bruised and alive, and I know they were right in a way. He will do anything to protect me, and to protect Juliet. Now I love him for it.
“You can’t sleep either?” he says.
“Too much on my mind,” I tell him.
He gives me a look like he’s about to ask what, but then I don’t give him the chance.
“I love you,” I say. His smile vanishes, but it’s not shock that moves across his face, not like I expect.
It’s satisfaction. Like he’s been waiting to hear it all along.
He doesn’t speak. He moves toward me, quick, one hand closing around my waist and pulling me against him.
The kiss is warm, tastes like his skin, his sweat, and the coffee he’s already had.
I don’t resist it. I don’t resist any of it. His hands slip up my arms, pushing the robe away from my shoulders, and then he’s pulling back, looking at me, pressing something into my palm. A ring, I realize, silver and gleaming. The Rosetti crest is etched into the face.
“You’re serious,” I say.
He shrugs, careless. “Try it on.”
I do, but it’s too loose for my finger. “I’ll have to resize it.”
“It’s not a collar,” he tells me. “It’s just what I’ve been trying to say all along. You’re mine, and I’m yours.”
I turn my hand over, inspecting the ring from all angles. “We’re already married,” I say.
“But now you’re a proper Rosetti. Not just by marriage. By blood and soul.”
When he kisses me again, it’s softer than before, like he’s giving me the chance to pull away. But I don’t. I let him taste me, the ring warm in my hand, and when I look up again, the sun’s washed over everything, painting the terrace gold.
“Not running this time?” he teases.
“I’m not going anywhere,” I tell him.
Leo holds me for another moment. “There’s a pot of coffee in the kitchen,” he mumbles into my hair.
“Ah. Well in that case, I’m going.”
He laughs as I slip back inside, leaving him alone with the sunrise.
She’s sitting on the kitchen counter, phone in one hand and a mug of coffee in the other. Her blond hair spills over her shoulders, still mussed from sleep, and I’m surprised to see her awake this early. She doesn’t notice me right away, so I take a second to watch her. My sister. My baby sister.
She looks up, meets my eyes, and gives me a half-smile. “Hey,” she says, setting her phone aside. “You’re up.”
“Old habits die hard.” I take the mug from her hands, bring it to my lips. Too much sugar. “I’m surprised you’re not sleeping till noon now that you have the chance.”
She shrugs, noncommittal, but there’s a warmth to her that wasn’t there a week ago. She’s not free yet, not really, but she’s getting there.
We sit together, side by side on the counter, not saying much. I look at my sister, see the future in her face, and I can’t help it. I ask.
“So, what’s the plan? You going to stay here with me?”
She gives me a quick glance, too quick, like I’m putting her on the spot. “I don’t know,” she says, brushing hair back from her eyes. “Haven’t thought about it yet.”
“You haven’t thought about it, or you haven’t decided?” I’m teasing her, but there’s an edge to my voice I can’t quite erase.
She hears it. She always does. “Why?” she asks, and her voice is quiet. “You don’t want me around?”
“That’s not it,” I say, too fast, my words piling up on each other. “I just want to know what’s going on in that head of yours.”
She pauses, and I can see her considering. I can see her picking each word like she’s plucking a stone from a river, checking it over to see if it’s right. It makes me want to smile, because this is what it’s like to know someone.
“I think I want to travel,” she says. “I think I want to go everywhere I’ve never been, just to see what it’s like.” She hesitates, and I can see a flicker of worry pass across her face. “Would you be mad?”
Mad. No, that’s not it. I’d be disappointed.
I’d be heartbroken. I’d be the only thing I know how to be, and that’s alone.
Then I remember my husband, my sister-in-law, Dom, the twins, Rafe, and all those other Rosettis, and I know I'll never really be alone again.
“Whatever you need to do, Jules,” I tell her.
"I'll be right here waiting for you when you get back. "
Her face breaks open into a smile. She takes the mug back from me, leans her head against my shoulder, and we sit like that for a minute.
“I don’t know if I’m going to leave yet,” she says.
“I just want to feel free, for once. I've spent so much time planning everything. How to survive father. How to sneak into college. How to get to you. I don’t want to have a plan anymore, Eleanor. I don’t want a schedule or a map or—”
“A cage,” I finish for her.
She’s quiet.
Then, “Yeah,” she says, softly. “Yeah, that.”
I look down at my hands, see the glint of the Rosetti ring Leo gave me, and I know she deserves to find her own brand of happiness.
We sit for another minute, another lifetime, and I can feel her thoughts buzzing in the space between us.
She hasn’t decided yet, and I know what that means.
It means she could stay, or she could go, or she could do anything she wanted.
I let her lean against me, I let her take her time, I let her feel what it’s like to have the chance to decide.
She looks up at me, her green eyes clear, and it’s like I’m seeing her for the first time, seeing her the way she really is. Not the scared little sister. Not the child with too much fear and not enough hope.
“I love you, Eleanor,” she says, and the words spill out, raw and unfiltered. “You know that, right?”
My throat tightens. “I love you, too."
Her hand slips into mine, our fingers tangling together, and we sit like that as the sun climbs higher. I think about Leo, standing on the terrace, the ring in his hand, his words: You’re mine, and I’m yours. I think about my sister, her plan to have no plan, and my heart melts.
We’re free.
The Rosetti mansion rises around us, cold and bright, and I don’t feel like a prisoner anymore.
I’m finally home.