The words hit me hard. "You told them?"
"I had to." His tone sharpens. "You're not just some secret I can tuck into a dark corner, Aoife." The sound of my name in his voice makes my stomach twist.
"And your father?" I ask quietly.
His jaw tightens, muscle ticking. "He looked at me like I spat on our blood." He flicks the cigarette, watching the ember die. "Like I betrayed everything we are."
There’s nothing I can say to that. His pain sits heavy between us. So, I turn toward him, finding his eyes.
"You didn’t betray them," I say. "You chose yourself."
He doesn’t look at me right away. When he does, the mask slips.
This isn’t the ruthless Matteo everyone fears, it’s the boy underneath, raw and stripped bare.
"And you?" he asks, voice low. "How was your weekend, little lamb?"
He’s deflecting, trying to pull me from what’s tearing him apart. It’s what he does when he loses weight and gets too heavy.
"They talked about honeymoons like they were discussing the weather," I say. "As if choosing the right island could make me forget I’m being sold."
My fingers twist the loose thread on my jeans until it bites into my skin. "My uncle told me not to fuck it up. My father just watched, like I’m already dead."
Matteo’s throat works. The sound he makes isn’t a word.
It’s a growl, low, dangerous, animal.
The storm above us stills, the lighthouse casting its slow pulse across the water like a heartbeat against the dark.
Without thinking, I reach for him. My fingers trace the split skin across his knuckles. He doesn’t flinch. Doesn’t even breathe.
"You’re bleeding," I whisper.
His voice drops low, rough as gravel. "So are you. Just not where anyone can see." The words tilt the world beneath me.
Everything slows, the sea, the wind, even my pulse.
Two broken things, balanced on the edge of a cliff, pretending they aren’t already falling.
My hand slips into his. He squeezes once—tight, sure, alive.
Neither of us speaks again.
The waves pound below, the storm rolling somewhere beyond the horizon.
Up here, in the broken dark, we build something small and dangerous something no one can touch. If they try, I’ll burn for it.
Matteo’s thumb moves over the back of my hand, slow, distracted. The touch doesn’t comfort me.
For a long while we sit like that, breathing the salt and storm into our lungs. Then he shifts, folds me closer; his voice drops so low only the night and I can catch it.
“Next weekend,” he says. “We need a way for you to come home with me.”
I freeze.
Everything in me scrambles for the exits.
No, my family would kill me in a heartbeat.
