Lucia’s POV
When I finally reached the estate and pushed the heavy front door open, Adriana’s sobs poured out of the sitting room like a blade dragged across my nerves.
She was curled up on the sofa, trembling, her face buried against Bruno’s chest. His arms wrapped around her instinctively, protectively, as if she were something fragile that might shatter if he loosened his grip even slightly. The room smelled of her perfume, sweet, pitiful, carefully measured, so different from the sharp bitterness of iron and cold stone clinging to my own clothes.
“Bruno…” Adriana cried hoarsely. “I don’t want to go through with the alliance union. I don’t want to be handed to that madman. He’s cruel. Brutal. The women married off to seal his last two truces… they all ended up in the ground.” Her fingers clenched in his shirt. “Why does it have to be me? Why can’t it be Lucia instead?”
Her words landed with surgical precision.
Bruno’s hand moved slowly, soothing her back in steady circles, the way a man calmed something frightened. His voice dropped into that gentle register he only ever used for her.
“Don’t be afraid. With me here, no one forces you into anything.” He paused, then added with quiet certainty, “No matter whose name goes to the Commission, it won’t be yours.”
My parents echoed him at once, the weight of the Barsanti name wrapping around Adriana like armor.
“Don’t worry, sweetheart,” my mother said softly. “We would never send you to that Family.”
“We’ll protect you,” my father added. “No matter what.”
I stood in the doorway, half in shadow.
No one looked at me.
Not Bruno. Not my parents. Not even Adriana, who wept so convincingly in his arms. It was as if I were already invisible, already chosen as the unspoken price to be paid.
Without saying a word, I walked past them and went straight to my room.
The door clicked shut behind me, and the silence cracked something open inside my chest.
Memories flooded in without mercy.
I remembered the night I had mentioned, only in passing, that I wanted to watch the sun rise above the clouds. That same evening Bruno had a private plane fueled and waiting. By dawn we stood on a cliff on some remote island, an observation deck built overnight so I wouldn’t have to stand in the cold sea wind.
He had once burned through a fortune without blinking, just to make me smile.
He took me skiing through the Alps, held my hand while we chased the aurora across frozen plains, cooked for me when I was too tired to eat, carried me off to places most men in our world never see. He photographed every trip, every laugh, every quiet moment, as if he were afraid time would steal them from him.
Back then, I truly believed he was mine.
Now I understood the truth.
I wasn’t irreplaceable. I was just new.
A novelty. A distraction that had lasted longer than expected.
I wiped my tears away quickly, refusing myself the luxury of breaking down. My hands moved with practiced calm as I reached into my pocket and drew out a small recorder. I removed the memory card, then slid it into an envelope with a copy of the detention block’s security footage.
I sent everything to my contact with a single tap.
As the bar crawled across the screen, a bitter taste rose in my throat.
At first I had only meant to capture Adriana’s pitiful performance in front of Bruno and my parents. Insurance, nothing more. But fate had been cruelly efficient. I had also caught her ordering those men to “teach me a lesson.”
When the files finally went through, my screen dimmed.
Footsteps sounded outside my door.
My heart tightened.
The door opened quietly, and Bruno stepped inside. His tall frame filled the doorway, his presence as familiar as it was unbearable. Before I could react, he crossed the room in long strides and pulled me into his arms.
The scent of cedar and night air clung to him, the same scent that once made me feel safe. Now it only made me feel trapped.
He rested his chin against the top of my head, his grip firm, almost desperate.
“Forgive me, Lucia,” he whispered weakly.
I froze in his embrace.
My lips pressed together, every word lodged painfully in my throat. I didn’t answer. He didn’t seem to need me to.
“Don’t be so hard on Adriana,” he went on softly, as if soothing a child. “She’s different from you. You’re the Barsantis’ blood daughter. You already have everything.”
He hesitated, then added, “I’ll marry you one day.”
My fingers curled slowly. Somewhere behind me, I heard him twist the signet ring around and around his finger.
“But Adriana…” His voice gentled further. “She has nothing. It’s only natural for her to be sensitive. You should try to understand her. Be patient with her.”
“I have everything…”
The words slipped out of me in a whisper so bitter it made my stomach churn.
So this was his apology.
He hadn’t come to admit fault. He hadn’t come to acknowledge what had been done to me in that cell. He had come to excuse Adriana, and to remind me of my place.
Bruno truly believed that an embrace and a few soft words could erase everything. That no matter how deeply he cut me, I would forgive him the way I always had. Even though only yesterday he had sent me home bruised, broken, and bleeding.
In his eyes, he could strike me ninety-nine times, then toss me a single bone and expect me to crawl back, grateful.
I lifted my head and looked at his face.
My heart ached so fiercely it felt like it might splinter apart.
Slowly, I understood something that mattered.
Bruno was wrong.
And this time, I would not come back.
