Chapter 27 - Emma
The suitcase sits open on silk sheets like a wound, half-filled with the few things that were ever truly mine.
My grandmother’s astronomy book, worn soft from years of handling, sits next to the cheap watch I wore as a servant, its face cracked from when I dropped it scrubbing floors.
Everything else in this room belongs to someone who doesn’t exist anymore.
The sheets still smell like this morning: sex and his musky floral cologne that makes my traitorous pussy clench even now.
I hate my body for its betrayal, for the wetness gathering between my thighs just from his ghost lingering in the fabric.
My nipples harden under the silk nightgown as I pull another dress from the closet, the emerald one he fucked me in after the charity gala.
The fabric whispers against my fingers like a memory, and I can still feel his hands on the zipper, hear his voice rough with need: "Perfect, stellina. My perfect girl."
These clothes he chose for me, each piece selected with those careful hands that know exactly how to transform me.
I fold it carefully before setting it aside. It was never mine to take, even though my body remembers every time he peeled it off me.
The marriage certificate lies on the nightstand where I found it in his desk drawer, the paper heavy with lies.
Frances Hewson married Alessandro Rosetti.
Not me. Never me. The girl who loved stars and scraped together pennies to buy Tommy commissary money vanished the moment I signed that name in the chapel, witnessed by Chicago's most dangerous families, sealed with a kiss.
My hands freeze on the leather folder tucked behind his watches.
Seventeen of them, I've counted, each a trophy from someone who crossed him.
Inside, I find photographs. Dozens more than what the blackmailer sent days ago, all of me.
Me sleeping in his stolen shirt, hair spread across the pillow, one breast exposed where the fabric shifted.
Me at the telescope, lost in mapping constellations, unaware of his camera capturing the way moonlight painted my skin.
Me in the kitchen that morning I burned bacon, laughing at something he said, my mouth open in genuine joy.
His handwriting changes through the dates.
Controlled at first, then increasingly desperate, like he was trying to capture something he couldn't quite hold.
The notes make my chest tight: "She hums off-key when happy, sounds like heaven" and "Left side of neck most sensitive, makes her arms erupt in goosebumps when kissed there" and "Prefers sleeping closest to window, reaches for me in her sleep. "
He's been studying me like I'm one of his acquisitions, documenting my transformation from servant to wife with the same precision he uses for violence.
But there's something else in these photos.
A tenderness in how he's captured my unguarded moments, an obsession that goes deeper than possession.
These are intimate, private, taken with care.
I try the bedroom door, but not because it's locked.
I know it isn't. The electronic panel would light green for me, Alessandro made sure of that weeks ago.
But my hand freezes on the handle because I know what happens if I leave.
The guards will alert him immediately. Every camera in this compound will track my movement.
The gate won't open without his authorization.
And outside these walls? The Hewsons who still want to control me.
The Russians who've been circling. The other families who would love to use Alessandro Rosetti's wife against them.
I'm trapped not by locks but by the reality that I know too much to ever be truly free.
Even if I could leave this room, where would I go? My bank accounts are all in Frances Rosetti's name. My identification is a beautiful lie. The servant girl is dead. I can't even remember how she walked with her head down, how she made herself invisible.
The first dress tears easier than I expect, silk ripping under my hands with a sound like screaming.
The white gown from our anniversary dinner, the one he made me come in three times before we even made it to the restaurant.
Then another, the cream Chanel skirt suit I wore when he first called me stellina, when he ate my pussy in that bathroom and made me forget my own name.
Each piece holds a memory that cuts deeper than the last, each destruction making my body throb with phantom touches.
The torn silk catches the light like fallen stars, beautiful even in destruction. That's what he's done to me. Made beauty in my breaking.
I catch my reflection in the floor-length mirror. Hair wild, cheeks streaked with tears and mascara, wearing a designer gown because I arrived with no clothes of my own.
"Who are you?" I whisper to the stranger staring back.
Not the servant girl who knew her place, kept her head down, survived on invisibility.
Not the mafia wife draped in diamonds, learning to command rooms with borrowed authority.
The woman in the mirror exists somewhere between, fractured and lost, created entirely by Alessandro's hands, marked inside and out by his possession.
My body shakes like I'm going through withdrawal. And maybe I am. The absence of his touch feels like missing a vital organ. My hands won't stop trembling. Even my breath comes wrong without his presence filling the room.
Grabbing my battered suitcase, I stumble out and along the service corridor, up the stairs, where I can finally breathe.
The rooftop observatory feels smaller tonight, the stars blurred through tears I can't stop.
The night air cuts through the Stella McCartney dress.
The telescope stands between me and the city lights, this perfect gift that represents everything beautiful and terrible about us.
He gave me the stars but made sure I could only see them from his roof, through his gift, under his protection.
I run my fingers along the brass, remembering how he learned Perseus's story, how his hands covered mine as we traced Cassiopeia, how he made me come against this very telescope while the stars watched.
"I'm addicted to my own cage," I whisper to the stars, the truth burning worse than the lies ever did.
My pussy throbs with emptiness, my body recognizing what my mind fights. That I'm biologically addicted to him now, that every cell has been rewritten to crave his touch. The thought makes me wet with shame and need in equal measure.
I pack the telescope carefully, leaving the bulky stand behind. Whatever I become next, I'll keep this piece of us.
Sofia's voice cuts through the darkness like a blade, her silhouette appearing in the rooftop doorway. She looks different. Harder, colder, the sweetness she wears like armor completely absent. Tonight her hair is scraped back into a severe knot, her eyes rimmed in kohl and glittering with intent. She looks like she’s been poured into her black dress and then left to chill in the freezer, every curve honed to a lethal edge.
"You've picked the perfect night to run," she says, voice flat.
She steps forward, stilettos punctuating each syllable with a click that echoes off the glass and stone. Her perfume precedes her—a sharp, resinous thing with no hint of sweetness. She doesn't stop until she's close enough to see that my hands are shaking.
For one hot, idiotic second I think maybe she’s here to help me, or at least warn me, or tell me it's not as hopeless as it seems. Maybe she’s going to tuck me in her car and drive me out of the city.
But Sofia's smile is cold as January. “Shall I carry your suitcase for you, cara?” She glances at the battered roller bag at my feet, the one that’s never belonged in a place like this. “Or shall we just throw it off the roof?”
I want to say something clever, something that will put her back in her place, but all I can think of is how her mascara has never once smudged and how mine is probably leaking down my cheeks like tar.
"How did you know I was—"
She cuts me off with a flick of her finger.
“Frances Hewson is joining us for dinner.” She says it like she’s announcing the arrival of a shipment of caviar, or a new piece of art for the foyer.
“Alessandro will be otherwise occupied. You’re free to go.
” Her eyes rake over me with clinical disdain.
“Unless you’d prefer to stay and watch him trade one wife for another? ”
A sound bubbles up from my throat, but it isn’t a word. I try again:
“You’re lying.”
It comes out uncertain, a child’s protest.
Sofia leans in, her breath hot and vodka-laced against my ear.
“Darling, do you think you’re the first woman to fall for him?
He’s had a thousand wives. You’re just the one who thought the paperwork mattered.
” She straightens, brushing invisible dust from her sleeve.
“She landed at JFK an hour ago. There’s already a place setting for her at the table. You should have packed lighter.”
The world tilts. I grip the telescope stand to stay upright, the brass hot against my palms.
Alessandro married me thinking I was Frances Hewson. When he discovered the truth, when the lie burned off in the heat of his obsession, he didn’t rage or abandon me. He just stared down the ugly thing I am and said, “I love you anyway.”
Those words should have healed me. They didn’t.
They were a knife, carving away the last soft flesh, leaving only scar and bone where a girl used to be.
I told myself it didn’t matter that I was a fraud, that the body he worshipped and the mind he tried to break belonged to a girl who never existed.
I let myself believe it was enough to be loved by a man like him, to be necessary even if I was never real.
But now, the real Frances Hewson is here.
The true heiress, the lost girl who was always supposed to be his.
Tonight, she’ll be in the dining room, her back straight, her hair neat, every part of her designed to be devoured and paraded in front of the world.
I imagine Alessandro folding a linen napkin for her, pouring wine with those steady hands that always smell like gun oil and expensive soap.
I imagine her voice, crisp and bright, bouncing off the marble and glass.
What happens to me now? What purpose is there for a counterfeit when the original is back in circulation?
The thought should make me want to vomit, but all it does is hollow me out further.
I want to hate Frances, but I can’t. She was stolen, just like me, just like Tommy.
She never asked for this life, and she’s probably more lost than I am.
I could run. The thought comes so easily, so naturally, it feels like muscle memory. I could take the telescope, the suitcase, and disappear before sunrise. There are always cities where a girl like me can start over, where no one cares who you used to be.
But I know I won’t. The urge to flee is old, but it’s not as strong as the new urge: to stay, to see this through, to face the consequences like a woman instead of a scared little nothing. I owe it to Alessandro, even if he’s about to choose someone better. I owe it to the family.
Mostly, I owe it to Alex. I owe him a reckoning, however ugly and pointless.
I can’t run from this. Can’t run from my own lies, can’t leave without looking Marco, Valentina, Dante, Ana, Nico in the face and telling them I’m sorry.
Even Luca and Faith. I can see their faces now, each one a different flavor of disappointment: Marco’s stoic judgment, Valentina’s quiet dismissal, Dante’s open confusion, Ana’s brittle disgust, Nico’s silent, wounded stare.
Faith, at least, would look at me with pity, but Luca would stop her from showing it.
I want to tell them I did it for Tommy, for myself, for survival, but none of those reasons would matter. It wouldn’t matter that I loved them, that I loved him, that I tried so hard to deserve any of this.
I want to scream, or break something, or throw myself off the roof and see if I bounce.
But instead I just stand here, breathing in the humid air, feeling my body break into smaller and smaller pieces until I’m nothing but twitch and ache.
I don’t think there’s enough left of me for anyone to love, even a man like Alessandro.
I tell myself I’ll go back inside, face the dinner, let him dump me with dignity. I’ll hold my head up, even if it feels like it’s balanced on a needle. I’ll do it for the girl I used to be, and for Tommy, and for the man who loved me when I was nothing but a lie.
"By tomorrow," Sofia continues, stepping closer. "The real Frances Hewson will finally be part of our family. And Alessandro?" She laughs, the sound like breaking glass. "He'll do what Rosetti men always do. He'll keep what's useful and destroy what's not."
I sway on the spot, clinging to the brass telescope stand like a lifeline, imagining Alex’s hands on Frances’ hips.
"Run or stay," Sofia says, turning to leave. "Either way, by tomorrow night, the servant will be dead. The only question is whether Alessandro pulls the trigger himself."
Something flashes in Sofia's eyes, a hungry gleam I've never seen before. She's enjoying this. She's been waiting for this.
"You never fooled me, you know," she adds, lingering at the doorway. "I knew you were nothing but garbage Alessandro picked up. I just let him play with you because…" She waves her hand dismissively. "Well, men have their toys."
The words slice deeper than they should. I've heard worse from Alessandro himself, in moments when his anger broke through his control. But Sofia's casual cruelty feels different. Final.
"Did he know?" I whisper, the question burning my throat. "Did he know she was coming back?"
Sofia's smile widens. "What do you think?"
“I didn’t.”
Sofia’s eyes soften, just a little, and I glimpse a soft heart beneath her stylish exterior, the little sister who only ever wanted to protect her big brother. “If you ever truly loved him, you’ll let him go now. Walk out before you see what happens when he’s given no choice.”
She leaves me there, the door clicking shut behind her. The night air grows cooler around me, stars blurring as fresh tears fill my eyes.
I sink to my knees, the suitcase toppling beside me.
I should leave. But my body refuses to move.
Because the truth is, I don't want to survive without him.
I gather my suitcase and the telescope, leaving the stand behind. My decision forms with each step down the stairs, hardening like steel in my veins. I won't run. I won't hide. I'll face them all—Alessandro, the real Frances Hewson, the entire Rosetti family.
If I'm going to die, I'll die looking them in the eyes.