"Thank you," I say, and mean it despite the conflict tearing me apart. "For the telescope. For keeping my secret. For…"
"For not being the monster you expected?"
"For being exactly the monster I expected," I correct. "Just… a thoughtful one."
He pulls me closer, his free hand settling on my waist. His hand slides up my thigh, stopping just before indecency. "Show me how grateful you are, stellina. One day, you'll let me taste that gratitude on your lips, your throat, wherever I choose to claim it."
My pussy clenches with need I hate myself for feeling. "Alessandro…"
"Unless you'd prefer to thank me now?" His thumb strokes higher, and I have to grip the telescope to stay standing.
"I want to give you the universe, Emma. Every star, every planet, every constellation you've ever dreamed of seeing. You just have to let me."
The dark promise underlying his words makes me shiver.
12 - Emma
The telescope he gave me catches the late afternoon sun behind me, beautiful and suffocating all at once. Everything in this rooftop observatory reminds me of his thoughtfulness, his control, how he pays attention to what I love and uses it to bind me tighter.
Some things even marriage to the mafia can't erase. Sarah, my best friend from childhood, the only person who knew Emma before she became nobody, then somebody else entirely.
The door to the rooftop opens with that particular silence that means Alessandro. My whole body goes rigid, caught in the act of reaching for my past.
"You look lost, stellina." His voice carries across the garden, soft but inescapable.
I don't move. Don't turn around. Looking at him makes thinking harder, makes me forget why I need to remember who Emma was.
"Just thinking," I say to the city laid at my feet, to the roses, to anything but him.
"About?"
"About who I used to be." The honesty surprises us both.
His footsteps approach, expensive Italian leather barely whispering against stone. "And who was that?"
"Someone who had a friend named Sarah. Someone who knew her own phone number, her own address, her own last name without having to think about which one I'm supposed to use."
He stops beside me, not touching but close enough that I feel his warmth. His eyes drop to the phone in my hand. "Sarah? You want to call her."
Not a question. He always knows what I want before I ask, maybe before I know myself.
"Yes."
"Then call her." He reaches into his pocket and hands me his cell phone. "I'll be listening, but you can call."
His casual violation of my privacy makes heat pool in my belly at his complete control, my body already trained to his ownership. Of course he'll monitor the call. Nothing in this house happens without Alessandro's knowledge.
I dial anyway, desperate for a voice that knew me before I became his.
Sarah answers on the third ring. "Hello?"
"Sarah, it's me. It's Emma."
Silence stretches across the line, then: "Emma? Oh my God, Emma! Where have you been? You just disappeared from the Hewson house, no explanation, nothing! Penny told me you just vanished one night."
Sarah, being friends with another Hewson maid, would have heard about my sudden departure through the servant network. I glance at Alessandro, who leans against the doorframe. His eyes never leave my face, reading every micro-expression like a map to my soul.
"I got married," I say, the words tasting strange. "It was sudden."
