The telescope gleams in morning light like a beautiful trap. I want to smash it, to reject this kindness that will cost me everything. But my traitorous hands are already caressing the brass, my heart already calculating which stars I'll show him tonight. When did I become someone who trades her soul for brass and glass?
"Alessandro, this is…" Words fail me.
"I had it delivered last night while you slept. Took some doing. Vintage telescopes aren't easy to source on short notice." He adjusts the angle slightly, his movements surprisingly confident. "I also had them leave these."
He hands me a leather-bound journal, pages blank and waiting. Inside the cover, a note in his handwriting: 'For your observations - A.R.'
"You listened." The words come out wondering. "That night on the rooftop, you actually listened."
"I always listen, stellina." He steps behind me as I peer through the eyepiece, his warmth blocking the morning wind.His chest presses against my back, solid and warm. I feel his heartbeat through the thin shirt, steady where mine races like a trapped bird. "You'd be surprised what people reveal when they think no one's paying attention."
Through the lens, Venus burns bright in the morning sky, more beautiful than I've ever seen it. This gift, this thoughtful, perfect gift, cracks something inside me. All my walls, all my careful distance, crumble in the face of this unexpected kindness.
"You remembered," I whisper, still looking through the telescope. "You remembered my dreams."
"This telescope," he murmurs against my ear, "has a motion sensor and a camera. So I'll always know when you come up here to escape me. Every time you seek the stars, I'll know. I'll watch you watching them."
The violation of it repulses and excites me. Heat pools between my thighs at the thought of him monitoring even my solitude.
"Look," I say, adjusting the telescope toward the eastern horizon, trying to regain some control. "That's Venus, the morning star. And there," I shift the angle slightly, "that's Jupiter. You can actually see four of its moons with this telescope."
"Tell me more." His voice is soft behind me, genuine interest replacing his usual calculating tone.
"In a few hours, they'll disappear into the daylight, but right now they're perfect." I straighten, turning to face him. "The ancient Greeks thought the planets were gods wandering among the stars. Venus was Aphrodite, Jupiter was Zeus."
"And what did Emma think?" He uses my real name gently, like he's savoring it, seeing how it fits between us now that we both acknowledge it.
"Emma thought they were escape routes." The honesty surprises me. "Every time things got bad, when my mother died, when Tommy got arrested, I'd find somewhere high and dark and map out constellations. Like maybe if I studied them hard enough, I could follow them somewhere else."
"And now?"
"Now I don't know what to think." I look down at my hands gripping the telescope. "You broke a man's fingers for touching me. You kept my secret when you could have destroyed me. And now this," I gesture at the gift that must have cost thousands. "I'm not terrified of you anymore."
"But?"
"That's what scares me." The admission feels dangerous. "Not being afraid of you."
His hand comes up to cup my face, thumb brushing across my cheekbone with devastating gentleness. The jasmine from the garden mingles with his cologne until I can't separate beauty from danger. "You want to know what scares me, Emma?"
My real name in his mouth makes my breath catch. "What?"
"How much I want to keep you safe. How the thought of you with some lover named Tommy made me want to scoop out his eyeballs and eat them with strawberries." His thumb traces lower, across my jaw. "I'm not a good man. I've done things that would make you run screaming. But with you…"
"With me what?"
"With you, you make me want to be better. Not good, I'm too far gone for that. But better." He leans closer, his forehead almost touching mine. "Do you know the story of Perseus and Andromeda?"
"Of course. Perseus saved Andromeda from the sea monster."
"Wrong." His smile is soft, dangerous. "Perseus claimed Andromeda. Killed anyone who tried to take her. That's the real story: not rescue, but possession."
I step back slightly, recognizing the warning in his words. Instead, I find myself reaching for his hand again, our fingers intertwining like they belong that way.
"I'm not Andromeda," I whisper.
"No," he agrees. "You're far more dangerous. You're the woman who makes me want to give you everything, even my carefully guarded control. Every star you name, every constellation you trace, they all become mine by extension. Because you're mine, Emma. Your dreams, your fears, your brother's safety: all mine to protect or destroy."
The gratitude and terror war inside me. This man, this dangerous, violent man, has given me the first gift that was truly mine. Not Frances's, not something to maintain a cover, but something for Emma. For the girl who loved stars.
