"What if it doesn't get better?" I asked quietly. "What if I'm just... like this now? Constantly scared?"
"Then we deal with it. Together. But Stefan—it will get better. I promise."
I wanted to believe him.
***
My phone rang that afternoon while I was working on the quarterly financial reports.
Unknown number. I almost didn't answer. But something made me pick up.
"Hello?"
"Stefan." The voice made my chest tighten. "It's your mother."
"Mom." The word felt strange in my mouth.
"Don't hang up. Please." Her voice was shaking. "I need to talk to you."
I should hang up. Should block this number like I'd blocked Antonio's. Should maintain the boundaries I'd set.
But I couldn't make myself do it.
"I'm listening," I said.
"I heard about the threats. About what's been happening." She took a breath. "Stefan, you need to come home. It's not safe where you are."
"It's not safe anywhere right now."
"It's safer here. With your family. Where we can protect you."
The irony was almost funny. "Giuseppe sent me on a mission expecting me to fail. Possibly expecting me to die. That's not protection, Mom. That's elimination."
"He didn't—Stefan, your father made a mistake. But he's still your father. He still cares about you."
"Does he? Because I've spent twenty-three years waiting for evidence of that and I'm still looking."
She was quiet for a moment. "I know he's been hard on you. I know he hasn't valued you the way he should. But Stefan—he's your father. You can't just walk away from family."
"Why not? He walked away from me first. Sent me into enemy territory wearing a wire and expecting me to fail. Used me as a pawn in whatever game he's playing with the FBI." My hand tightened on the phone. "I don't owe him anything, Mom. Not loyalty. Not obedience. Nothing."
"You owe him respect—"
"I owe him nothing." My voice was firm. "And honestly? I don't owe you anything either. You stood by for twenty-three years and watched him treat me like decoration. Watched him diminish me. Watched him sell me at auctions. You never once stood up for me. Never once told him to treat me better. So no, Mom. I don't owe you or him or anyone in that family a damn thing."
I heard her crying softly. The sound made guilt twist in my chest.
"I couldn't stand up to him," she said quietly. "You don't know what he's like. What he'd do if I defied him."
"I know exactly what he's like. I lived with him for twenty-three years."
"Then come home. Please. I can't—" Her voice broke. "I can't lose you, Stefan. You're my son. My baby. And I've already lost so much."
The grief in her voice destroyed me.
Because some part of me—the part that was still that child desperate for his mother's love—wanted to give in. Wanted to say yes. Wanted to go home and fix this and make her stop crying.
But I couldn't. Not without destroying myself in the process.
