“I can’t stop looking for the threat,” I admit, the words jagged in my throat. “Eleven years, Matteo. Eleven years of waiting for the floor to give way. Eleven years of wondering if today was the day Turi’s secret would finish what the Bellantis started.”
Matteo winces at the name, but he doesn’t look away. He steps forward, clapping a hand on my shoulder. His grip is steady. “Turi is gone. Vane is gone. The war is over. Today isn’t about the dead, Alessio. It’s about her.”
Amara.
The thought of her name is a physical pull in my chest, a hook buried deep behind my ribs that drags me toward her every second we’re apart. My woman. The only person in this world who looked into the dark of my history and didn’t flinch. She saw the scarred hands, the cold calculations, the feral need to keep the world at bay, and she stayed.
“Go inside,” Matteo says, giving my shoulder a final squeeze. “The priest is ready. The family is waiting. Don’t make her come out here and drag you to the altar. She’s small, but we both know she’d do it.”
I huff a laugh, a rare, genuine sound. “She’d do more than drag me. She’d probably put me in a headlock.”
I leave the porch and step into the chapel. It’s a small space built from local timber and fieldstone. The scent of cedar andold beeswax fills my lungs, grounding me. Light cuts through the high, narrow windows, highlighting the grain of the wood.
Dominic is already there, standing near the front. He looks like a man trying to believe the kingdom is finally safe enough to rebuild. Beside him, Santi and Fabio are whispering, their faces bright. The women fill the pews in a blur of silk. They are the steel spine of this family, the part I should have trusted sooner.
I take my place at the altar. My heart is a frantic, thudding thing, a caged animal throwing itself against my ribs. I’ve faced down hitmen, held a man’s life in my hands while the world burned, but this is different. This is the weight of being known.
Father Antonio stands before me, his eyes sharp and wise. He buried some of our dead. He buried Turi. Today, his hands are empty of earth. He nods at me, a silent acknowledgement of the road it took to get here.
I look at the front row. A single chair sits empty between Dominic and the wall. On it rests a white rose and a small, framed photo. It’s not of our parents. It’s a photo of a young man with a bright, easy smile and eyes that look exactly like Amara’s.
Curtis Osei.
The man whose death became the price of a secret he never should have touched. The man whose memory brought her to my door. Seeing him there, in the place of honor, makes my throat tighten. His name stands with ours today. Not erased. Not swallowed. Honored. We are weaving his name into the fabric of our future, ensuring that his murder wasn’t reduced to a footnote in a war he never asked for.
The room goes silent. The heavy wooden doors at the back of the chapel groan as they swing open.
I stop breathing.
The entire family stands as one. It’s not just a gesture of respect; it’s a wall. Every Costa man moves to the aisle. Theydon’t sit. They stand in a line, forming a corridor of muscle and history.
And then she appears.
Amara isn’t wearing a mountain of lace or a dress that looks like a cage. She’s in ivory silk, simple and fluid, clinging to her curves and flowing behind her like a quiet promise. Her dark skin glows against the fabric, her hair pulled back in a soft style that shows off the sharp line of her jaw. She looks like she’s coming home from a long, weary journey.
She doesn’t have a father to walk her down the aisle. She doesn’t have a brother left to give her away.
But she isn’t alone.
As she reaches the first pair of brothers—Enzo and Nico—they step in behind her. Then Dante and Vincenzo. Then Fabio and Santi. By the time she reaches the middle of the chapel, the Costa men are a phalanx around her, a living shield that says this one is ours. They are claiming her. Not as a replacement for the brother she lost, but as the family she never thought she’d have.
Dominic is the last one. He meets her at the end of the aisle, his face solemn and fierce. He takes her hand, leaning down to whisper something in her ear that makes her smile—a quick, sharp flash of the woman I found in the dark of a clinic. Then, he places her hand in mine.
His gaze meets mine over her head. Protect her, his eyes say. I will burn the world if you don’t, mine reply.
Then he steps back, and it’s just us.
Amara’s hand is warm in mine. Her fingers are steady, but her pulse thrums against my palm, a frantic, rhythmic tremor. I want to pull her against me. I want to tuck her under my chin and never let her go.
“You stayed,” I whisper, the words for her alone.
“I’m here, Alessio,” she whispers back, her eyes bright. “I found the only thing worth staying for.”
Father Antonio begins the service, but the words are just a backdrop to the electricity humming between us. I can feel the weight of her wedding band in my pocket—a slim platinum circle forged to sit flush against the amber stone she has worn since the terrace, the stone that matches the candle she lit for her brother, grief turned into something she can carry without bleeding.
When it comes time for the vows, we don’t use the ones written in the books.
I take her other hand, turning her to face me fully. I don’t look at the family. I don’t look at the priest. I look at her, and the truth is simpler than the lies I told myself. She isn’t just a woman I claimed; she’s the only one who can carry the weight of this family’s future with me.
