Chapter2

I woke to sharp, piercing pain.

The agony felt like red-hot iron spikes drilling into my bones from my shoulders and arms simultaneously.

I gasped, my throat making a hoarse, ragged sound, then opened my eyes.

Darkness. The smell of damp stone rushed into my nostrils, mixed with mildew and a faint trace of blood—my own blood.

I lay on a hard plank with only a pitiful layer of straw beneath me. My left shoulder and arm had been roughly bandaged, the bindings pulled tight, barely stemming the bleeding, but the friction of cloth against wounds sent waves of stinging pain.

I moved my fingers. Excruciating pain shot through me.

No broken bones, but the flesh was definitely torn open.

I recognized this place. The Rossi family dungeon, deep underground, never seeing daylight year-round.

I'd only passed by the entrance before, never imagining I'd one day lie here.

Memories crashed back like a tide.

The rack. The steel nails. The cold faces of the crowd.

And Franco... Franco gripping the hammer, one strike, then another.

My heart clenched sharply. My tears had long dried, and now my eyes felt dry and gritty.

They'd treated my wounds—probably didn't want me dying too easily.

Death was too cheap. Living in agony was the real punishment.

Just then, a violent throb of pain seized my left shoulder wound. I couldn't suppress a muffled groan, my vision going black.

In the dizziness brought by pain, images flashed unbidden.

Pain, too. Seven years ago. High fever, burning so hot my bones felt like they were falling apart.

My brother had just died. I'd moved into the Rossi family mansion, like a ghost living under someone else's roof.

That night I was delirious with fever, feeling only cold, shivering cold.

Then a pair of steady hands tucked the blanket around me, and a cool towel was placed on my forehead.

I struggled to open my eyes and saw Franco sitting in the chair by my bed, reading documents under the dim lamp.

"Sleep," he said without looking at me, his voice low. "I'm here."

Just those three words. And he really did sit there all night.

I drifted in and out of sleep. Each time I hazily opened my eyes, I could see him sitting in that same position in the circle of light, like a silent guardian deity.

In that moment, the enormous void left by my brother's death seemed to be gently filled, just a corner of it.

He was twenty-five then, already the family's feared young godfather.

But at my sickbed, he was just a silent man keeping vigil.

The dungeon's chill dragged me back to reality. I shivered, and the wound throbbed again.

Now I was in pain too, but he would never sit by my side again.

I couldn't sleep because of nightmares, so I crept downstairs barefoot and found he wasn't sleeping either.

He asked if I was afraid. I nodded. He said nothing, just handed me a glass of warm milk, then let me stay on the couch.

I fell asleep in that comforting quiet. When I woke, his suit jacket covered me, smelling of cigars and leather.

In the garden, I nearly stumbled backward when a garden snake suddenly darted out, and I bumped into him.

His hand steadied my arm, releasing quickly, but that instant of warmth and strength made my ears burn for days.

And countless other details.

He remembered I didn't eat parsley.

On my birthday, he'd have the kitchen make a small cake, though he never said "happy birthday."

When I injured my wrist from recoil learning to shoot, he tossed me a tube of ointment without a word, but the next day he gave me a lighter ladies' pistol.

These scattered, warm moments accumulated over seven years, like an undercurrent, silently changing something.

I knew I shouldn't, but I couldn't control it.

When he frowned I worried. When he coughed I wanted to offer water. His rare, faint smiles could make me happy for an entire day.

Likewise, I could sense the change in how he looked at me.

From initial pure guardianship duty to gradually something else—

Deeper attention. Longer gazes. His eyes lingering on me when I turned away.

But neither of us pierced through it. We couldn't.

I was his dead brother's sister.

In the Rossi family, even in all of Sicily's traditions, for feelings to develop between guardian and ward was scandal, betrayal, profound disrespect to the dead.

From the moment this emotion sprouted, it wore heavy shackles.

We silently maintained our unspoken understanding, carefully guarding that invisible line, thinking as long as we didn't speak it, it didn't exist.

How foolish.

The clearer the memories, the more sharply reality pierced through that numb place in my chest.

All those things I thought were "special understanding"—what were they now?

A momentary whim? An emotional game for a bored godfather?

His cold eyes on the rack, his unhesitating hand with the hammer—colder and harder than the dungeon's stone walls.

I turned my face to the rough wall, pressing my forehead against the cold stone, trying to let the chill suppress the churning agony in my heart.

Did I hate him? Of course I did.

But beneath the hatred lay something else, something that made me despise myself—a lingering thread: Why? Why could he be so decisive? Seven years—even if you raised a dog, you'd hesitate before killing it with your own hands, wouldn't you?

Just then, from the end of the dungeon corridor came the heavy sound of an iron door opening, and the crisp click of high heels on stone, approaching steadily.

Those footsteps were leisurely, almost cheerful, jarringly out of place in this deathly quiet dungeon.

My body froze, my blood seemingly turning to ice in an instant. I knew who it was.

Nicole.

What was she doing here?