The stars don’t lie, at least. Unlike me, who can’t even remember which name to answer to anymore.
Instead of waiting anxiously in our rooms, I escape to the rooftop observatory while Alex deals with Sofia. My bare feet scrape against still-sun-warmed stone while my evening gown drags behind me like chains made of silk. The telescope Alessandro gave me stands waiting, but tonight I don't need it. I use my fingers to measure the distance between stars, the way my grandmother taught me before everything fell apart.
The stone scrapes my bare feet raw, a sharp contrast to the silk dress that weighs heavy on my shoulders. I find Polaris first, the one constant in a world where I can't navigate between who I was and who I'm supposed to be. My fingers span the distance to the Big Dipper's pointer stars, measuring celestial angles while my mind replays Sofia's cutting remarks about my table manners, my obvious discomfort with their world. "Two fists from the horizon," I whisper to myself, the familiar ritual grounding me. "That's how you find truth when everything else spins."
The city spreads below like scattered diamonds on black velvet, but up here with my stars, I can almost remember who Emma was before she disappeared into Mrs.Alessandro Rosetti. My fingers trace constellation patterns in the air, measuring distances between celestial bodies that never lie about what they are. Unlike me, who lies with every breath, every gesture, every moment I pretend to belong in this deadly, beautiful world.
Alessandro finds me like he always does, appearing from the stairwell with a bottle of wine and two glasses, his movements careful like he's approaching a spooked animal. The June humidity clings to my designer gown, but his body heat still draws me even from feet away. "Peace offering," he says, setting the wine on the ledge beside me, and there's something different in his voice. Not the usual possessive edge but genuine concern. "You okay?"
His hand twitches toward me, I recognize the gesture from a hundred possessive touches, but he forces it to still, letting me have this space even though it clearly costs him.
"Sofia's digging into my past," I say, not looking at him, keeping my eyes on the stars because they're safer than seeing whatever expression he's wearing. "I don't know if I'm supposed to be the servant who knows her place or the wife who commands respect," I tell him, the wine loosening my tongue. "Sofia sees right through me. They all do. I'm lost between Emma and Frances, and I don't know which version you want me to be."
He moves closer, his cologne mingling with the rooftop jasmine, creating something that makes my mouth water. His presence cuts through the humid night, but doesn't touch me yet.
"Tell me about the stars," he says instead of answering my identity crisis, starting to use his commanding tone before deliberately softening it. "Show me what you like about them."
The request is so unexpected, so genuine, that I finally turn to look at him, finding his green eyes focused entirely on me, waiting to learn something I can teach.
“I like that they make me feel small, just as small as every other human.” I chuckle. He wouldn’t understand that. He’s a Rosetti, for God’s sake. He’s never felt small in his life.
He opens his mouth. I expect a smooth deflection, one of his charming jokes, but something raw escapes instead.
"After our father died in that massacre, I was invisible," Alessandro says suddenly, his jaw clenching as he fights his instinct to deflect, his voice carrying a weight I've never heard before. His grip tightens on the wine glass until I worry it might shatter. "Fourteen years old, too young to help with revenge, too young to matter. Marco took over everything, Dante became his enforcer even without his voice, but me? I was decoration. Still am, according to most of the family. So I know a thing or two about feeling small."
His confession hangs between us like a new constellation I'm just learning to map.
I take his hand without thinking. The same one that broke Blair's fingers for touching me, now learning to map stars with unexpected gentleness. My chest presses against his back as I guide his hand to trace Orion, his breath hot against my neck, making me remember how that mouth felt between my thighs at the charity luncheon.
"Marco still sees me as the pretty brother who charms people," he continues while I position his hand to find Cassiopeia. "Useful for negotiations but not trusted with real power. Like I'm playing dress-up in a role I'll never truly fill."
"I know about feeling like a fraud," I whisper, his hand still in mine as we map the sky together. "These designer clothes feel like costumes. Every morning I put on Frances's life but underneath I'm still the girl who cleaned the marble floors." Our bodies have moved closer without either of us deciding, drawn together by shared wounds neither of us usually admits. He could destroy worlds with these hands, but right now they're learning to trace constellations.
He turns our joined hands so he's holding mine instead of me guiding his, and suddenly I'm not teaching anymore. We're justtwo people who understand being unseen by those who should see us most clearly.
"You're not decoration," I tell him, my voice shaking slightly with the weight of being seen. "You're the one who saw through my disguise, who protected me from your own sister, who bought me a telescope because you actually listened when I talked about stars."
The rooftop door creaks. A guard checking in, his hand on his weapon until he sees us. "All secure, Mr.Rosetti," he says, reminding us both that danger exists even here, before disappearing back inside. The interruption makes me hyperaware of our proximity, how vulnerable we are even in our sanctuary.
"Look," I say, pointing to Venus burning bright in the western sky. "That's Venus. Morning and evening star, the brightest planet we can see. It doesn't matter if you're a servant looking up from a fire escape or a queen from a palace balcony. The brightness is the same. The stars don't care about your costume, Alessandro. They just are what they are."
Something shifts in his expression as he processes my words, his hand coming up to cup my face with devastating gentleness. "But I care about what's underneath yours. Not the dress, Emma. What's under your skin, in your blood, the parts of you I haven't corrupted yet." His thumb traces my cheekbone. "You're the only real thing in my life. Everything else is performance, territory, family obligation. But you, teaching me constellations in your bare feet and designer gown? This is real."
"You make me feel like I could be real too," I whisper, and then his lips are on mine. The kiss starts gentle, mutual, both of us leaning in at the same moment like binary stars drawn by shared gravity, but then heat explodes between us. His tongue traces my lips and my pussy clenches, my body responding toemotional intimacy as powerfully as his physical dominance. When he groans against my mouth, I taste wine.
He pulls back before we lose control completely, both breathing hard, and rests his forehead against mine. "Teach me more," he says, voice rough with arousal and something deeper, and I know he means about stars but also about being seen, about being real, about finding truth in a world built on beautiful lies. So I do, our bodies intertwined as I show him Perseus saving Andromeda, the irony not lost on either of us.
We end up lying on our backs on the rooftop, watching the stars wheel overhead while our hands stay linked between us. The city sounds float up: sirens, distant music, the ever-present hum of danger. But up here we've created our own universe. Alessandro's thumb strokes mine, a simple touch that somehow feels more intimate than everything we've done before.
"Tomorrow we go back to being who they expect us to be," I say, already feeling the weight of Frances settling back onto my shoulders like expensive armor. "You'll be the charming negotiator, I'll be the perfect mafia wife, and we'll pretend this didn't happen."
"But up here, we're real," Alessandro says, squeezing my hand. The promise in his voice makes my chest ache with want. That this rooftop, these stars, this version of us can exist even in stolen moments.
His free hand slides up my thigh under the designer gown, fingertips tracing patterns that make my breath catch. The silk bunches around his wrist as he moves higher, finding the edge of my lace panties. "Before tomorrow comes," he murmurs against my throat, his mouth hot against my pulse point, "let me worship you under these stars you love. Let me corrupt you in the only place you feel free."
My back arches off the warm stone as his fingers slip beneath the lace, finding me already wet. "Alessandro…"
"I want to taste you while Perseus watches," he growls, shifting to kneel between my legs, pushing the expensive gown up to my waist. "Want to make you come under the same stars you used to wish on as a servant girl. Show you that some wishes do come true, even if they come wrapped in darkness."
