I was required to go in person to the sleepy federal outpost in the town where I'd been born, to collect the letter and the key my true parents had left behind.
After writing down the address, I was tucking the slip of paper into the back of my phone case when I heard the door open.
Dante pushed it wide and walked in.
The smell of liquor came in with him, heavy and expensive, the kind they poured at a sit-down when men were pretending to be friends.
Before I could say a word, he dropped onto the bed beside me, eyes already closed. "Nonna told me I'm to make a proper life with you from now on," he muttered.
The words went through me like cold water.
Nonna Falcone had given me her word she'd arrange my release from the Family. Why had she changed her mind?
Unease crawled up my spine. I threw back the blanket, ready to go find her and demand she explain.
But Dante suddenly rolled over and caught my arm. His face hardened, and he scolded me low. "Do you understand you can't catch a chill right now? You're a mother. Take better care of yourself."
The sudden concern chilled me worse than the cold ever could.
I pulled free on instinct, putting distance between us. "I understand. You should go back to your own room. I need to sleep."
He caught the rejection, and a bitter laugh twisted his mouth into a sneer. "Don't flatter yourself. You're a woman who just gave birth. Your body's ruined. It's not as if I couldn't find someone better."
I swallowed whatever I might have said.
Through the pregnancy the doctor had warned me I wasn't taking in enough. I'd forced down every supplement they gave me to keep the baby healthy, gaining just enough to reach the low edge of normal.
Now, after, soft flesh still clung stubbornly to my waist.
I looked at him, said nothing, and lay back down with my back to him, telling myself I would ask Nonna in the morning.
Somewhere in the dead of night I woke, foggy, and found no one beside me.
Reaching for my phone, I saw a message from the girl Dante kept, sent three minutes earlier.
The photo showed him driving, his profile lit by the glow of the dashboard.
Her text read:
[So what if you've got a child now? If he doesn't love you, he doesn't love you. I missed him for a moment and called, and he left with me the second I asked.]
[Serafina, you're the only one who ever took this ridiculous marriage seriously. You've lost.]
She was right. I had lost completely.
But what Dante would never know was that the first time I stood before Nonna Falcone, she was the one who told me about him.
He would never learn that we had walked the same halls since we were children.
For years I had loved him in silence, following the shape of his life from a distance, never once intruding on it.
So when Nonna proposed, after I finished my schooling, that I be blood-bound to him, I was so happy I couldn't sleep the whole night through.
But my happiness had been built on the ruin of his.
And since that was the truth of it, it was time to set us both free.
I didn't answer the girl's message.
In the compound I ate well, I rested well, I tended to myself.
Soon enough the last day of my confinement came.
At dinner, Nonna, true to her word, set before me a release from the Family bond, signed in Dante's own hand. Her voice wavered with a reluctance she couldn't hide, and the beads of her rosary went still in her lap.
"Tomorrow is the child's one-month blessing. Could you stay for it before you go?"
I shook my head, firm. "No. I've already booked the morning passage out."
"But the child—"
"Nonna, I leave this Family in your hands now."
I cut her off gently, and I smiled.
She read the resolve in me and wiped at her eyes. "All right. I'll raise your baby well. Don't you worry."
I took the papers from her just as Dante came down the stairs.
He frowned at the sight of my hands. "What is that you're holding?"
I gripped the agreement tighter and shook my head. "Nothing."
His eyes narrowed, suspicion flickering there as he stared at me, and for a moment the room seemed to hold its breath the way a room does when the Don's attention turns.
But I stayed composed.
Mercifully, he let it go, turning instead to the matter of tomorrow's blessing.
"I have something to handle tomorrow," Dante said, indifferent. "I'll be late to the hotel. If there's a problem, ask Nonna."
Nonna frowned in open displeasure. "What could possibly matter more than your own son's one-month blessing? You—"
"It's fine. It doesn't matter. If you have business, go and see to it," I said, calm. His presence or his absence made no difference to the child.
He hadn't spared the boy a single glance since the birth. No more than his father ever had.
Nonna opened her mouth to argue, then stopped when I gave her a small reassuring smile and shook my head.
The day of the blessing came. The compound was quieter than I'd expected, the soldiers at the gate speaking in low voices.
Holding the baby, Nonna made ready to leave. One of the house women hesitated, then asked, "Signora, shouldn't we wait for the young Signora to come with us?"
Nonna froze, her gaze drifting up toward the empty hallway. Something in her face gave way, but she only shook her head, a small broken breath escaping her.
What she didn't know was that I was already gone.
The night before the child's blessing, I had boarded a plane and flown beyond the reach of the Family's eyes, the one thing they all swore no one could do.
I was long gone by the time Dante finished his business and came looking for me, searching the room for my face.
An inexplicable panic gripped his chest, and he turned on his mother, asking again and again, "Where's Serafina? Where did she go?"
