"Alejandro didn't know any of this until three years ago as I already said." I continue. "His mother was dying. Cancer. She told him the truth about his father. About Giuseppe. About what she'd been paid to forget."
I look at Alejandro. His jaw is tight now. The grin is gone.
"She told him to find a doctor. A man Giuseppe had paid to keep quiet for decades. The doctor was still alive. He had records."
I pause. Let the implication sink in.
"Records of every woman Giuseppe raped. Two kids that resulted from it. Every payoff. Every silence bought with money and threats." My voice hardens. "The doctor's clients were rich men like Giuseppe. Powerful men. Men who paid fortunes to make their crimes disappear."
Aria is shaking now. Her whole body trembling. Vittoria moves to her mother's side, puts an arm around her shoulders.
"Alejandro found the records. Found a folder with a name he recognized." I meet Alejandro's eyes. "My mother's name."
Alejandro's expression doesn't change. But something flickers in his gaze. Something that might be pain. Or satisfaction. Or both.
"That's how he found me. That's how he connected the dots. The boy who survived the hit he was sent to complete. The boy who somehow ended up serving the very family that destroyed his own." I turn back to the room.
Bruno is staring at me like he's never seen me before. Like I'm a stranger wearing a familiar face.
Bruno's face is unreadable. His hands have stopped shaking. That's worse, somehow. The stillness before violence.
"You should have told us." His voice is quiet. Dangerous. "You should have fucking told us."
"If I had told you, you would have acted. Alejandro would have known. And everyone he was watching would be dead." I don't look away.
"So you made the choice for us." Bruno's jaw tightens. "You decided we couldn't handle the truth."
"I decided I would rather have you hate me than bury you."
The words hang in the air between us. Twenty years of loyalty. Twenty years of brotherhood. All of it balanced on a knife's edge.
Bruno stares at me for a long moment.
"Giuseppe used both of us," Alejandro says. "He raped our mothers. He ordered our families killed. He turned us into tools for his empire."
He laughs.
The sound is hollow.
"The only difference between us is which side of the gun we ended up on."
I let his words hang in the air.
Let everyone absorb them.
Then I shake my head.
"No," I say. "The difference between us is much simpler than that."
Alejandro's eyebrows rise. "Is it?"
"You killed children." My voice is steady. Cold. "You killed my seven-year-old brother. You would have killed me if that gun hadn't jammed. And you've spent the last three years planning to kill more innocent people. People who had nothing to do with what Giuseppe did."
Alejandro shrugs. The movement is casual. Dismissive.
"Every man in this basement would have done the same thing," he says. "Given the right circumstances. The right motivation. The right order from above." His eyes sweep the room. "Don't pretend you're any different. Don't pretend any of you are better than me."
I don't laugh.
