CHAPTER 44
Marcello
The cabin of the jet was quiet, filled only with the low, steady hum of the engines cutting through the night. It was the kind of silence that should have felt controlled, contained—but instead it pressed in, heavy with everything that sat between us.
Roxanne lay curled into herself on the bed across from me, her body finally giving in to exhaustion.
It wasn’t restful sleep. There was no peace in it.
Just stillness—the kind that came when the body shut down because it could no longer carry what the mind refused to release. She looked smaller like this.
I sat opposite her, a glass of whiskey loose in my hand, watching the slow rise and fall of her chest as though it were the only thing anchoring her to the present.
The leather beneath me creaked when I shifted, the sound oddly loud in the cabin.
The burn slid down my throat, sharp and deliberate, and I let it linger, welcomed it even.
Because it was clean. Predictable. Unlike everything else that transpired.
I had told her I would never hate her. And I wouldn’t.
That part had been easy. But the truth beneath it was not.
I was hurt. Not in a way that would fade or dull with time, but in a way that settled deeper, and stayed.
Worse, I still loved her. Completely. Deeply.
Infuriatingly madly. In a way that made walking away feel less like survival and more like a slow, deliberate death.
I used to think people exaggerated when they said things like: I don’t know how I lived without you.
I used to dismiss that kind of sentiment as weakness.
Until her. Until I realised that everything before Roxanne had just been endurance. Breathing between disasters. Not living.
She stirred in her sleep, her fingers curling into the sheets as though she were holding onto something even now.
Or maybe trying not to let go. My grip tightened around the glass, the cut of it biting faintly into my palm, and just like that, everything I had held back since the hospital began to surface.
After she left for Mumbai, I stopped pretending I didn’t already know. The way she had broken in that hospital hadn’t been confusion or shock. It was the aftermath of crossing a line that changed people.
I gave it time. Not for her—for myself. Because I needed to walk into what came next without hesitation, without doubt, without losing control.
It took nearly a week before I went to see Santino. Because I knew exactly what I would do if I saw him too soon. And I don’t strike when I’m uncertain.
By the time I reached the hospital, he had already discharged himself. Santino was never the kind of man to stay where he didn’t need to be. But I knew where he would go. There was only one place that made sense currently.
I found him in the cottage. In her room.
The space felt wrong without her, but her presence lingered everywhere. In the air, in the sheets, in the faint trace of her scent that hadn’t yet faded. A familiar ache settled low in my chest.
He sat on the edge of the bed, a t-shirt clenched loosely in his hand. Hers. He didn’t look up when I walked in.
“She’s gone,” he said, his voice rough, like it had been dragged through gravel.
I didn’t answer.
“She told me to leave,” he continued after a moment. “Said if I stayed, I’d lose her forever.” A hollow breath left him, closer to a laugh but without the humour. “I came back anyway.”
Whatever restraint remained disappeared.
I crossed the distance and hit him hard enough to send him off the bed.
He didn’t brace, didn’t fight it—just took the impact like he had expected it.
I dragged him up again and hit him a second time, harder.
This time I saw the blood bloom through his shirt where the wound had reopened, dark and spreading.
He glanced down briefly.
“Fuck,” he muttered under his breath.
I didn’t stop. My hand closed around his throat, tightening just enough to cut off his breath without dropping him, forcing his gaze to mine.
“How long had you been planning?” I asked, my voice clipped, controlled in a way that made it worse.
His brow furrowed.
“Planning what?” he spoke through ragged breaths.
“To touch her.” My grip tightened. “To fuck her.” Another step closer. “To decide she belonged to you.”
I backed him up to the wall and shoved him against it without loosening my grip on his neck. His head hit it with a dull thud.
He groaned on impact. “I didn’t plan it.”
A hollow laugh left me then, cold and sharp, devoid of anything resembling humour.
“You expect me to believe that?”
“Why do you think I left two years ago?” he shot back.
That landed harder than anything else. Because I already knew the answer.
Her.
It had always been her.
“Ti fidava,” I said, the words rough. “Eri la famigghia… e mi tradisti.”
(I trusted you. You were family… and you betrayed me.)
He didn’t deny it. Didn’t look away.
“You forgot the code we live by,” I continued, my voice dropping further. “Loyalty. Devotion.”
“I didn’t forget,” he said.
I hit him again. The words came sharper this time.
“And yet you touched her. I should kill you for that.”
A pause stretched between us, heavy and unrelenting.
“I should have killed you the moment you came back.”
Blood coated his lip now, but he didn’t wipe it. Didn’t defend himself.
“Do it. I accept my fate,” he said finally, steady despite everything.
And then, almost like a final strike—
“If I had to do it again, I would.”
Silence followed. Because he meant it.
My hand went to my gun. I pulled it out and pressed it against his forehead, right between his eyes. The weight of it sat easily in my grip, familiar, final.
“La lealtà nun s’avissi a tradiri,” I said through clenched teeth.(Loyalty shouldn’t be betrayed)
His eyes closed, not in fear but almost in relief. Like a man who had already made peace with whatever came next.
“Tell her—” he started.
I cocked the gun. “Don’t.”
His eyes opened again, steady despite the blood, despite everything.
“…I love her.”
My finger pressed on the trigger. The shot rang through the room. I turned and walked out without looking back even as I heard him hit the floor with a heavy thud.
For a second, another version of him flashed through my mind. Younger. Grinning through split knuckles and bloodied teeth after a fight neither of us should have survived. Standing at my side like he always would. Family.
I kept walking.
I didn’t stop until I reached the driveway, the cold air hitting my lungs harder than it should have. It didn’t help. Nothing did. The anger didn’t dissipate. It didn’t cool. It stayed—low, constant, burning through everything it touched.
I paused in front of his bike and kicked it hard enough to send it crashing onto the ground. The sound of metal against concrete split through the silence, violent and sharp, but it didn’t touch what sat inside me. It didn’t fix anything. Nothing would.
The drive from the cottage to the airport passed without memory. I didn’t think. Didn’t process. Didn’t allow anything to settle.
By the time I reached Palma, the night had quieted into a deceptive calm. The Leopardi estate lit in warm pools of light that had no business existing after what I had just done. Kyra was the first to see me.
She ran toward me before I had even stepped fully out of the car, Romano stumbling behind her with determined, uneven steps. I bent automatically, lifting him into my arms, his small body warm and solid against my chest.
“Where’s mamma?” Kyra asked.
The question landed clean. I crouched slightly, pulling her closer, my hand settling at the back of her head.
“She’ll be home soon.”
Not a lie but not entirely the truth either. Something in between. She accepted it the way children do—without suspicion, without doubt. Then she smiled, tugging Romano’s hand from my shirt.
“Nonna is waiting for you in the study.”
I found her exactly where I expected. Seated with a calm composure in the study. Waiting.
I didn’t speak when I entered. Just crossed the room and sank into the chair opposite her, dragging a hand over my face before leaning back, closing my eyes for a brief second.
“Così grave?” she asked.
(That bad?)
I didn’t answer. She didn’t repeat the question. Instead, she studied me. Properly.
“You haven’t slept,” she said after a moment. “And you haven’t shaved. When was the last time you ate something that wasn’t poured into a glass?”
I let out a tired breath, edged with equal parts irritation and exhaustion.
“I didn’t come here to be examined.”
“No,” she said calmly. “You came here because you’re already past that.”
Yet, she reached for the decanter, poured, and handed me a glass. I took it and finished it in one swallow. The burn didn’t touch what sat underneath.
“What happened?” she asked.
This time, I answered. Not everything. But enough.Enough for her to understand. Enough for me to hear it out loud.When I finished, the silence didn’t rush in to fill the space. It settled slowly, like it had been waiting.
“I should have killed him the day he came back,” I said finally, pushing to my feet. Movement felt necessary.
“I had every reason to. Every right.”
She didn’t interrupt.
“I trusted him,” I continued, pacing once across the room, my hand dragging through my hair. “He knew exactly what he was doing.”
She said nothing, refusing to either agree or deny it. Her silence irritated me more than any answer could have. I hurled the empty glass towards the fireplace. Shattering it with a deafening sound sharp, violent—gone as quickly as it came.
“I should have ended it,” I said in a rough voice. “All of it.”
A beat passed.
“Then why didn’t you?”
She asked calmly in a way that only a mother would. The question cut right through me, stripped of any warmth or comfort. I stilled. Because I’d known the answer the moment I stepped back.
“I wouldn’t survive it,” I said, with a low breath.
The truth sat undeniably heavy between us. She watched me for a long moment. Then, quietly—
“So it isn’t about him.”
My head snapped toward her.
“Don’t reduce this.”
“I’m not,” she said evenly. “I’m removing what doesn’t matter.”
My jaw tightened. “She betrayed me.”
“Yes.”
No hesitation. No cushioning.
“And you’re… what?” I let out a breath, sharper now. “Going to tell me to understand it? Accept it?”
Her gaze didn’t waver.
“I’m going to tell you that you don’t get to pretend this is simple.”
That was what triggered it.
“Are you justifying her?” I asked, the edge slipping through now. “Is that what this is?”
“No,” she said calmly. “I’m telling you a truth you don’t want.”
Silence stretched.
“She made a choice. Crossed a line,” I snapped.
“Yes.”
“She’s mine.”
The words slipped out before I could catch them. Across from me, her expression didn’t even flicker.
“Yes,” she said. “But she is still her own.”
Something in me resisted that instantly.
“What are you implying?” I asked.
She held my gaze.
“I’m saying that what you feel for her is not something you can measure against what she’s done and expect it to balance.”
I let out a quiet scoff.
“If you force her to choose,” she continued, “you will get your answer.”
My gaze sharpened.
“But she won’t be the same woman when she gives herself to you.”
That landed deeper than anything else. Because I knew she was right.
Logic told me to walk away, cut the loss and restore control.
Any man in my position would have done exactly that.But Roxanne wasn’t something I could remove.
She had threaded herself through my life too completely. Without her, everything collapsed.
“She could destroy me,” I said.
“And you would let her,” my mother replied.
I didn’t argue. Because I knew. If she asked me for anything—
Anything—I would give it to her. Even if it meant carving a vital piece out of myself I could never replace.
I stepped outside before I said anything else. The night air hit cooler. Kyra’s laughter carried faintly from the garden. Romano’s voice followed. And then—Roxanne.
Her face in the hospital. The way she had looked at me. Like she was already bracing for me to walk away. And maybe part of her believed she deserved it.
I exhaled slowly. If I walked away now—I would survive. But I would not live. This was harder than any decision I’d ever made.
“I’m bringing her back,” I said.
The decision settled the moment the words left me. Final.My mother didn’t react immediately.
“Then don’t mistake this for winning,” she said.
My gaze shifted back to hers.
“Because if you try to take,” she added quietly, “you will lose her.”
I didn’t respond. Because I understood.
Back in the jet, I looked at Roxanne again.Still curled into herself. Still carrying everything alone. She hadn’t asked about Santino. Not once. Not because she didn’t care. Because she cared too much. A truth she wasn’t ready to face.
And somewhere beneath all the hurt, I understood something I had been resisting since the hospital. What existed between them had not replaced me.
That was the part that made this unbearable. And somehow… survivable.
My chest tightened with recognition. She had always been like that. Giving. Enduring. Breaking where no one could see. Not anymore.
My hand came to her forehead, brushing a strand of hair away, and I pressed a soft kiss there. She stirred faintly but didn’t wake. I lingered for a second longer than necessary before pulling back.
And in that quiet, with nothing left to hide behind—I cemented the decision I made.