Page 501 of Reign

“Those aren’t from me.”

I glance back at him.

“They’re from your brothers.”

“My brothers bought me dresses?”

“Not exactly.”

Something in his voice makes me slow down. I turn back to the rack and move the first hanger aside.

Then the second.

The dresses are beautiful, but they aren’t new. The fabrics belong to another time. Soft florals. Structured waists. Delicate buttons. Full skirts and hand-finished hems.

My fingers still against a pale-blue sleeve.

Wait.

My heart drops. I know these dresses.

Maybe I don’t remember each one, but I know the shape of them. The softness. The kind of woman who would have chosen them.

“Mamma?”

The word barely leaves me.

Luciano comes closer.

I grip the hanger more tightly. “My brothers had these?”

“Your father kept most of her belongings in storage at Angelo’s estate. Angelo found the dresses there. A few boxes had been moved to Santo’s months ago.”

“All this time?”

“Yes.”

I push through the rack faster now.

There are so many.

Thirty dresses, maybe more. Some elegant enough for dinners and parties. Others light and simple, made for warm afternoons. A black dress with pearl buttons. A deep-red one with a fitted waist. A pale-yellow dress covered in tiny white daisies.

My hands stop.

I ease the daisy dress from its hanger and press the fabric against my chest.

It feels impossibly soft. I lift it to my face and breathe in.

For one second, I expect her perfume.

It isn’t there.

The dress smells like cardboard, old fabric, and years spent folded away from the light. Any trace of Mamma disappeared long ago.

I press my face into it anyway.

They’re hers.