Page 43 of The Ruin I Chose

(That piece of shit.)

“I refused,” I said. “He didn’t take it well.”

My mother looked up, her eyes sharper now.

“You think he’ll come after her?”

“He cornered her in Florence,” I admitted.

The memory still burned.

“She was shaken and disgusted. I didn’t tell her much—I don’t want her caught in this mess.”

The words tasted bitter. Like failure. Like I’d already let her down.

There was a heavy silence. The kind that settles between people who know too much and say too little.

Then Alessia spoke, her voice softer than I expected.

“She’s strong. Stronger than she looks. I saw it in the way she handled Sophie. In the way she looked at you when Elaine came up.”

My mother nodded. “She’s not afraid of your silence. That’s rare. You deserve softness, someone who can hold your hurt without flinching.”

I looked towards the hallway, where Roxanne’s voice floated down in fragments—soft, animated, telling stories to children who hung on every word.

She didn’t belong in this world. But somehow, she fit right in.

And somehow, that scared me more than Lorenzo ever could.

Alessia stood, gathering the toys scattered across the floor. She kissed my cheek, then retreated upstairs to check on the kids.

My mother and Antonio exchanged a glance. Without a word, they moved towards the study—where the real conversations always happened.

I followed.

CHAPTER 18

MARCELLO

I told Antonio the day before that I’d be coming to Sicily.

Bringing Roxanne was an impulse. A reckless one. The kind of decision you make when you’re tired of pretending you don’t feel. And I was tired. And I don’t let impulses win. Not since Elaine. Yet all it took was Roxanne—one look, one breath beside me—and the rules I built around myself cracked. I barely recognised the man who let himself feel this.

My chest tightened, remembering the kids yelling—

Uncle Marcello has a girlfriend!

Is that what she was? What were we, really? Nothing. Not yet—but the echo of that word wouldn’t leave my chest. I still didn’t know what I felt for her. How could I, when wanting her already felt like a risk?

All I know was this pull—to keep her close, to keep her safe.

And the fact that it came so instinctively unsettled me more than it should have.

Antonio poured me another glass of whiskey. I took a large sip. Letting it burn the back of my throat.

“Slow down, big man,” he said.

Antonio Leopardi—my brother-in-law, my closest ally. He married my sister, Alessia, ten years ago. Their wedding was the only time I’d seen my mother cry from joy.