Chapter 7 #2
I watch Lucrezia's face change as the number sinks in.
Her shoulders drop slightly, the weight of responsibility settling on them.
She knows as well as I do that most of those employees come from struggling families, people who couldn't find work elsewhere, people the Ferettis have protected for generations.
"So you're using them to manipulate me," she says, but her voice has lost some of its edge. "Making me the villain if I refuse."
"I'm stating facts," Damiano counters. "I'm telling you what we're facing."
"There has to be another way," Enzo interjects, looking between his siblings.
Damiano turns to him. "You think I haven't looked for one? You think I want to put our sister in this position after everything she's been through?"
The room falls silent. I shift my weight, keeping my breathing steady despite the urge to intervene. Not my place. Not my family.
"I must be a fucking monster in your eyes," Damiano says, turning back to Lucrezia.
His voice cracks slightly. "But I love you more than myself.
I'm just telling you the situation because I don't know what else to do to prevent it.
And I hate that I don't know what to fucking do when everything and everyone depend on us Lu. "
Lucrezia stares at him, tears welling in her eyes. "You promised me," she whispers. "After what happened, you promised I'd never be powerless again."
"I know." Damiano's face crumples for a moment before he regains control. "And I'm still looking for solutions. We have a week."
Lucrezia shakes her head, pushing her chair back. "I can't do this right now."
She turns and walks out, her steps quick but controlled. Every muscle in my body tenses with the instinct to follow her, to make sure she's okay, to stand between her and whatever pain is coming.
But I can't. That's not my role.
I glance at Damiano, who gives me a slight nod. Permission to follow, but at a distance. To protect, not comfort.
I move toward the door, maintaining professional distance even as something in my chest aches to close the gap between us.
Behind me, I hear Enzo's voice rise in argument with Damiano. Zoe tries to mediate. The family fracturing under impossible choices.
I step into the hallway, catching sight of Lucrezia disappearing around the corner. I follow at a respectful distance.
This is the hardest part of my job. Watching her hurt and knowing my only purpose is to keep her physically safe, not emotionally whole.
I slam my studio door behind me, the sound echoing through the empty space. My chest heaves with each ragged breath as I pace across the hardwood floor, my heels clicking an angry rhythm.
This room used to be my sanctuary. Now it feels like another prison.
Four hundred employees. Four hundred families. Thousands of people depending on our casino staying open. On me.
"Fuck!" I grab the nearest object, a ceramic mug, and hurl it against the wall. It shatters, leaving a constellation of broken pieces on the floor. The violence of it feels good. Not enough, but something.
My eyes land on the blank canvas I set up days ago, back when I thought I might try painting again. Back when I foolishly believed I was healing.
Without thinking, I grab a tube of crimson paint and squeeze it directly onto the pristine white surface. The red bleeds outward like a wound. I snatch a palette knife from my supplies and drag it across the canvas, creating a violent slash of color.
Four hundred families.
Four hundred fucking families.
The knife scrapes across the canvas, leaving jagged trails of red. I add more paint, black now, smearing it with my bare hands, feeling it coat my skin like blood.
My brothers think they're protecting me. They've been suffocating me with their protection since that day.
Watching me.
Guarding me.
Making decisions about my life while pretending to give me choices.
And now this.
Another slash of red. Another smear of black.
My hand trembles as I reach for more paint. Blue this time, dark and cold. I spread it with my palms, feeling the wet slide between my fingers.
I slash more paint across the canvas, my movements frantic and uncontrolled. The colors blend into a chaotic storm. Red like blood, black like darkness, blue like the bruises they left on my skin.
Their hands.
The memory flashes unbidden, and I freeze, paintbrush suspended in mid-air. Their hands holding me down. Rough. One had a tattoo on his wrist. The other wore a gold ring that caught the light as he?—
I gasp, dropping the brush. It clatters to the floor, splattering red across my bare feet.
I haven't let myself remember these details in months.
My therapist, when I had one, said it's normal for memories to return in fragments, but I've been pushing them away, locking them in a box labeled "before. "
Before I became this hollow version of myself. Before my brothers started looking at me like I might shatter. Before I stopped painting.
I pick up another brush and dip it in white paint, dragging it through the chaos on the canvas. It creates a path, like I'm trying to find my way through the darkness.
"What choice do I have?" I whisper to the empty studio.
If I say no to Bruno, hundreds lose their jobs. If I say yes...
I add more white to the canvas, creating a shape that looks almost like a cage. That's what marriage to him would be. A gilded cage where I'd be expected to play the perfect mafia wife.
I'd never have love. Never have a choice. Never have the chance to feel a gentle touch that doesn't make my skin crawl with memories.
I step back from the canvas, my hands covered in paint like blood. The image stares back at me—a storm of violence and fear with a tiny flame of hope in the corner, about to be extinguished.
Is this what healing looks like?
Trading one trauma for another?