Chapter 14 Alessandro
ALESSANDRO
“HOW MUCH DO YOU KNOW?”
Bianca stands across from me, her lips still swollen from our kiss, her eyes bright.
But underneath the heat, I can see the yearning for the truth.
I could deflect.
Could give her partial truths, carefully edited versions of events that protect both her and me from the full weight of what really happened.
But after watching her nearly die tonight because of inexperience, after feeling the terror of almost losing her to her own recklessness, I realize that more lies will only make everything worse.
She deserves the truth. All of it.
“I know a lot,” I say simply. “About Giuseppe and Sophia and how Matteo was involved.”
Her breath catches, but she doesn’t look away. “Tell me.”
I move to the window, needing distance from her intensity while I figure out how to explain twenty years of family secrets.
The city spreads out below us, lights twinkling like stars, completely unaware of the violence that shapes the shadows between buildings.
“I’m not sure how Sophia and Giuseppe’s paths first crossed,” I begin carefully. “Matteo has never gone into those details. But I remember when she arrived—sixteen years old, scared, pregnant, and completely traumatized.”
The memory surfaces with painful clarity.
Sophia as she was then—not the calculating manipulator she became, but a terrified girl who flinched every time Giuseppe entered a room.
Her voice had been soft, broken, like someone who’d learned that speaking too loudly brought unwanted attention.
“She was so young,” I continue, watching Bianca’s face carefully. “Innocent in ways that made it obvious what Giuseppe had done to her. She was terrified of him. You could see it in the way she positioned herself to always have an exit route, the way she’d go completely silent when he was around.”
Bianca bites her lip, and I can see her processing this image of her mother as a victim rather than a villain.
“Why did Matteo marry her?”
The question I’ve been dreading. Mostly because I’ve never understood it. “I don’t know. Matteo never disclosed his reasons or explained what drove that decision. All I knew was that one day Sophia and Matteo were married, and you came along soon after with Matteo claiming you as his own.”
“Did he protect her?” Bianca demands, gripping the chair tightly. “Did Giuseppe hurt Sop–my mother after she and Matteo were married?”
I don’t miss the way she almost called Sophia by her first name. “To the best of his abilities. But Giuseppe was a mean old bastard who saw Sophia as his property, regardless of her marriage to his son. The situation was…” I pause, searching for words. “Fucked up doesn’t begin to cover it.”
Bianca looks away.
By the way she’s narrowing her eyes, she’s connecting pieces of her childhood that probably never made sense before.
“Matteo tried to shield her, but living in that house, under Giuseppe’s roof, with constant reminders of what he’d done to her…it changed Sophia. She became hardened, calculating, manipulative. The sweet, terrified girl disappeared, replaced by someone who could manipulate the fuck out of anyone.”
“That’s why she was never a mother to me,” Bianca whispers, her voice barely audible. “Why she was always at parties, always somewhere else. She couldn’t stand being around Giuseppe’s child, especially since I look like him.”
The pain in her voice cuts through me.
I have my own opinions about how Sophia treated Bianca—opinions I keep to myself because they won’t help anything now.
A child shouldn’t have to pay for the circumstances of their conception, but Sophia was too broken to separate the innocent daughter from the monster who created her.
“You and Matteo look alike,” I say instead. “The DeLuca features are strong in both of you. You have his eyes, his bone structure. Anyone looking at you would see the family resemblance.”
“But not to Sophia.”
Outside of the eye shape and maybe some minor features, no. Bianca is a true DeLuca. “No, I admit. “Not to Sophia.”
Bianca is quiet for a long moment, staring out the window, her gaze faraway.
When she speaks again, her voice is harder. “What happened near the end? Something happened between Matteo and Sophia that ended in her death. What was that? The video was never clear.”
I close my eyes, cursing at the Calabreses for releasing that video that nearly damned Matteo.
“There were whispers that she was meeting with enemies, sharing information, undermining family operations.” I turn back to face her. “Matteo spent a long time getting proof. He wanted to understand the scope of the betrayal before deciding how to respond.”
“And when he got that proof?” Her voice is barely above a whisper.
I hesitate, unsure how much of this story belongs to me to tell.
But the desperation in her eyes, the need to understand what happened to her mother, breaks down my resistance.
“When Sophia’s alliance with Johnny Calabrese became undeniable, Matteo confronted her. At the lake house.”
“But why?” Bianca demands. “Why did she do it? Why betray the family?”
I shrug. “She was going to go public with Giuseppe’s transgressions against her. Expose everything he’d done, destroy the family’s reputation and power.”
I can still remember Matteo’s fury when he told me. “She wanted the DeLuca family destroyed, and she didn’t care that you would be collateral damage.”
Bianca flinches like I’ve physically struck her. “She was willing to destroy me too?”
God, this fucking sucks telling her this.
“You were a DeLuca daughter in her mind, not hers. Part of the legacy she wanted to erase.” The words are brutal but necessary.
“Matteo couldn’t let that happen. He tried to reason with her, tried to find another way.
But Sophia was too far gone in her anger and manipulations. ”
“So he killed her.” Her voice is flat, emotionless.
“There was a gunfight. Sophia drew first.” I watch Bianca’s face carefully, seeing her struggle with this final piece of the puzzle. “Matteo was the one who executed her, but it was self-defense as much as family protection.”
The silence that follows is deafening.
Bianca stares at me with those steel-blue eyes that suddenly look far too old for nineteen, processing the complete destruction of whatever illusions she might have had about her mother’s love or her family’s protection.
Before she can respond, we’re interrupted by a sharp knock on the penthouse door.
My hand immediately moves to my weapon.
Nobody should have access to this floor.
“Expecting someone?” I ask quietly.
Bianca shakes her head, but she’s already moving toward the door.
When she checks the peephole, her entire body goes tense.
“It’s Matteo,” she says in surprise.
She opens the door, and Matteo DeLuca stands in the hallway.
He looks immaculate, but there’s a tightness in his eyes when he sees Bianca.
“How did you find me here?” Bianca’s voice is ice-cold.
“I’m still your father,” Matteo says quietly, stepping into the penthouse.
His eyes sweep the room before lingering on her.
There’s pain in his expression, but also resolve. “And you’re still my daughter, whether you want to acknowledge that or not.”
“Half-sister,” she corrects, tossing her head.
“Daughter,” he counters, but his voice cracks slightly on the word. “You are my daughter. I love you more than my own life.”
The raw emotion in his admission makes even me uncomfortable, but Bianca’s expression doesn’t soften.
“Stop calling me your daughter,” she fires back. “I don’t consider you a father anymore.”
Matteo closes his eyes and for a moment he looks weary.
When he opens them again, he says, “I made choices to protect you from truths that would have destroyed a child. And yes, maybe I kept protecting you longer than I should have. But every decision I made was because I couldn’t bear the thought of you being hurt by things beyond your control.”
His voice is quieter now, less commanding and more pleading. “I know you’re angry. I know you feel betrayed. But please don’t let that anger destroy everything we built together.”
Bianca scoffs and looks away from him, shaking her head. “What we built was based on lies.”
“What we built was based on love.” He takes a step closer, his hands slightly raised like he’s approaching a dangerous animal. “Complicated love, messy love, imperfect love—but real love, Bianca. That was never fake.”
I watch this exchange, seeing both sides of the man—the don who commands through authority and the father who’s terrified that he’s permanently lost his child.
The vulnerability in his voice is genuine, but so is the underlying steel that suggests he won’t be pushed indefinitely.
“I came to ask you both to dinner,” he continues, his tone becoming more controlled. “At the compound. Tonight. Seven o’clock.”
Bianca tilts her head to the side, considering the invitation, and I can see the wheels in her head turning.
“Fine,” she finally says. “We’ll come. But don’t expect me to pretend everything is normal.”
“I don’t expect anything,” Matteo replies, and there’s exhaustion in his voice. “I just hope we can find a way forward that doesn’t destroy our family.”
He moves toward the door then pauses, looking back at her with something that might be regret.
“Whatever you’re planning to prove tonight, whatever point you think you need to make—just remember that some bridges, once burned, can never be rebuilt.”
The warning is gentle but unmistakable. Then he’s gone, leaving us alone with the weight of what’s coming.
I’ve never been to a more uncomfortable dinner in my life.
We arrive at the compound with Bianca looking stunning in a black silk dress that emphasizes her elegance while somehow making her appear untouchable.
Her hair is pulled back in a sleek chignon, her makeup flawless, every detail made to project power and distance.
She looks like she’s attending a business meeting rather than a family dinner.