My arms tighten around her involuntarily. The thought of young Emma, just a child herself, watching her mother waste away while trying to protect her brother—it makes something violent rise in my chest. If I could reach back through time, I'd destroy everyone who failed to help them. I'd paint Chicago red with their blood.
"The debt collectors started calling before she even died," she continues, her voice barely above a whisper. "Like vultures circling. When she finally passed, we had nothing. Less than nothing. We had debt that would take three lifetimes to pay."
"That's how you became…" I trail off, not wanting to say 'servants' like it's shameful when I'm already planning how to retroactively destroy every debt collector who harassed a grieving child.
"That's how we became trapped," she says gently. "The Hewsons bought our debt in exchange for our service. Modern day indentured servitude dressed up as employment. My brother and I, we belonged to them from that moment."
She pulls back to look at me, tears streaming down her face. "I was so powerless, Alex. Watching her fade away, knowing I couldn't save her, couldn't even make her comfortable. It's the worst feeling in the world, being that helpless."
I wipe her tears with my thumbs, my own throat tight with rage for everyone who failed her. "You were a child. It wasn't your job to save her."
"But it became my job to save my brother," she says. "And look where that led us."
"It led you to me," I growl, the possessive darkness creeping into my voice. "And now you'll never be powerless again. Anyone who tries to hurt you, to make you feel helpless—I'll feed them their own organs while they watch."
She shivers at the promise in my voice, but doesn't pull away. She's learning to love my violence when it's wielded for her protection.
"Do you regret it?" I ask, the question that's been burning since she revealed the truth weeks ago. "The path that brought you here?"
She considers for a long moment, her fingers tracing patterns on my chest through my shirt, occasionally catching on the chain that holds my St.Christopher medal—protection I never believed in until I had her to protect.
"I regret my mother's suffering. I regret that my brother's in prison. I regret that I had to lie to you at first."
"But?" I prompt when she pauses.
"But I can't regret the path that brought me to you." The words come out sure, decisive. "Even with everything—the fear, the deception, the danger—I'd do it again if it meant ending up here, in this kitchen, stealing bacon from your plate while you plan seventeen ways to keep me safe."
Something cracks in my chest, the last wall I've been maintaining even after everything we've shared. She's here for me. Not the Rosetti name or the money or the protection, but me, Alessandro, the man who wakes early to make backup bacon because he knows she'll burn hers.
"I love you," she says suddenly, the words natural as breathing, not a dramatic declaration but simple truth stated while she sits on my lap in our sunlit kitchen. "I probably have since that night you gave me the telescope, when you actually listened to me ramble about stars."
The words make me want to lock every door and never let her leave this room where she's safe and mine and loves me despite the blood I'll never wash clean. Women have said they loved me before—usually while eyeing my watch or my car or my family name. But Emma says it like it's just fact, like loving me is as natural as burning breakfast.
"Emma," I start, but she presses her fingers to my lips.
"You don't have to say it back. I just needed you to know."
My last defense crumbles entirely. This woman who started as a servant, who was forced to pretend to be someone else, who I thought I was corrupting—she's the one who's destroyed and rebuilt me.
I pull her closer, breathing in her scent mixed with my cologne from my shirt. "You bring light into my life. Make me believe there's something more to all this violence and family and bullshit. You make me feel real."
She smiles, that genuine smile that appears when she forgets to be afraid. "We're making each other real."
The morning sun climbs higher, painting her skin gold, and I know with absolute certainty that I would burn the entire world to keep this moment, this woman, this unexpected love that's demolished everything I thought I knew about myself.
My phone buzzes again—Marco, insistent. Something about the Irish getting bold near the docks. Let them. I'll deal with it later, after I've reminded my wife exactly who she belongs to.
I stand abruptly, keeping her in my arms. "Come with me."
"Where?" she asks, but she's already wrapping her legs around my waist, trusting me completely even though she knows my hands have blood on them that won't wash off.
"Our rooftop," I say, carrying her through the mansion's quiet halls, noting the guards' positions, the new camera I had installed yesterday. "I need you under the sky where you taught me to see stars, where you showed me who you really are."
The morning air on the rooftop is already warm as I carry her to the spot where we've spent so many nights mapping constellations together. The telescope stands sentinel, but I lay her down on the blanket we keep up here. I automatically scan the perimeter—no movement, no threats visible, but that silver sedan is parked just down the street. Later. I'll deal with it later.
"Alex," she breathes as I cover her body with mine, but there's no urgency this time, no desperate hunger. This is something else—tender and sacred in a way that makes my hands shake even though they've been steady while taking lives.
I undress her slowly, revealing skin I've memorized but still need to worship. My shirt falls away from her body, and she's bare beneath me, gorgeous in the strengthening light. I kiss every bruise I left on her hips, every mark that proves she's mine, but gently now, reverently, even as the possessive monster in me wants to add more.
