She is my everything. The axis of the world I built. The calm. The chaos. The fire that remade me into something more than my father’s shadow.
If she leaves me, the world will burn and choke on my fury.
I lean in, resting my forehead against her temple. My voice cracks on the plea. “Come back to me. Please, Beatrice.”
I don’t know how long I stay like that—seconds, minutes, a lifetime—before the door creaks open behind me. I don’t lift my head.
“Boss?” Valerio’s voice threads quietly into the room. “Daniele is here. He’s speaking with one of the nurses about your wife’s care.”
I nod, eyes fixed on Beatrice’s unmoving form. “Give me a minute. I… I just need a second.”
I’m not ready to put on the mantle yet—not the king, not the unshakeable father. Daniele will tell me it’s okay to grieve, that I don’t need to be strong for him. But the syndicate rests on myshoulders. I am a king, and if my head lowers, the crown will slip.
“Okay,” Valerio murmurs softly. “I’ll tell him he can come in five.”
I have no idea what time it is. The windows are sealed behind blackout curtains. I could have been sitting here minutes or hours.
Time doesn’t move in rooms like this. It dissolves.
When I finally force myself to stand, I lean down and kiss the back of her hand. I breathe her in, what’s left of her scent. It’s faint, diluted by antiseptic and steel, and the familiar lavender that always clung to her skin is gone.
Something inside me shatters, but I rub the grief from my eyes, straighten my spine, and flip the switch I’ve relied on my entire life. The man who feels can break. The man who leads cannot.
Exactly five minutes later, the door opens.
My son walks in.
He’s already seen her, but the subtle widening of his eyes tells me that no second viewing makes this easier. It’s a sight neither of us should ever grow used to—or ever could.
“Papa.” He steps inside, gaze flicking from me to her, then anchoring back on me. “Any change?”
I shake my head, still holding her hand like a lifeline. “Not yet. Valerio is finding more specialists. We’ll get her the help she needs.”
He nods, jaw tightening, and walks to her bedside. When he takes her hand, something in him fractures. He rubs her knuckles with a gentleness that would break her if she were awake—because she would never believe this grown man was the same boy who used to race through hallways without fear.
“She looks like her,” he murmurs, voice distant, “but also not like herself, at the same time. The last time I saw her, she triedto make me stop worrying. I could tell she didn’t look good. I should have?—”
“No.” My voice comes out sharp. “Don’t do that to yourself, my boy. This is not your fault. You did not kill your mother. You couldn’t have known she was suffering.”
I exhale roughly.
“I hatethat she kept it from me, but your mother has always been the suffer-in-silence type. Even if she had a spear through her chest, she’d wave it off.”
He nods because he knows this is the truth.
“But I should have forced her,” he says quietly.
“We both know,” I reply, hollow laughter slipping out, “that we can’t force this woman to do a single thing she doesn’t want to.”
My wife is stubborn in all the ways that made me fall in love with her. Now I need that same stubbornness to keep her alive.
Silence stretches—heavy, suffocating.
Then my son speaks again, voice low, steady, and far too old for his age.
“What will we do? We’ve been going in circles, Papa. I know you’re a man of honor, but I think… the code needs to be set aside here.”
I look at him. Truly look. And I see myself. My heir. A man forged far earlier than he should be.
