A week after I reactivated my university enrollment, a box of textbooks arrived at the Valenti estate.
Adrian did not mention them.
Matteo carried them to the east wing himself.
"You know there are people who work here," I said as he set the box on my desk.
"I know."
"And yet you're doing manual labor."
"Try not to tell anyone. I have a reputation."
I smiled despite myself.
Since the argument over school, he had become the easiest person in the house to be around. He did not ask me what was wrong every time I went quiet. He did not explain Adrian to me. He did not tell me Camille meant no harm.
He simply showed up.
Sometimes that meant coffee while I filled out forms. Sometimes it meant sitting at the other end of the library while I studied, answering emails on his own laptop. When I grew frustrated with the amount of work I had missed, he treated the problem like a problem instead of a personal failure.
"One assignment at a time," he said. "You don't get extra points for suffering dramatically."
"That's unfortunate. I'm getting very good at it."
He laughed.
The sound made something inside me loosen.
That evening, the family gathered for dinner.
Camille had stayed at the estate after her accident because Teresa insisted she should not be alone while her car was being replaced. By then, the cut at her temple was almost gone. She had also stopped wearing Adrian's clothes, which I appreciated more than I wanted to admit.
Dinner began normally.
Then Camille looked across the table at Matteo.
"Do you still hate antique vases?"
Matteo paused with his fork halfway to his mouth. "What?"
"The blue one in the old lake house. You knocked it over when we were kids."
Nico snorted. "That was you?"
"He thought his father was going to kill him," Camille said. "So I said I broke it."
"You volunteered before I could stop you," Matteo said.
"And you spent the rest of the summer doing everything I asked."
"That sounds less like sacrifice and more like extortion."
Everyone laughed.
I did too, because the story was funny.
But I understood what Camille was doing, whether she meant to or not.
Each memory placed another brick in the wall between her history and my present. She had saved Nico from punishment. Covered for Matteo. Danced with Adrian at every Founder event. Sat with Teresa through illnesses and funerals. Even Luca, who seemed to distrust everyone, had once apparently broken a boy's nose because he insulted her at school.
Camille belonged to their before.
I had arrived in the after, wearing a ring negotiated by attorneys.
I left the table early.
The sitting room in the east wing was empty and dark except for the fire. I poured a glass of water and stood near the mantel until footsteps sounded behind me.
"You disappeared," Matteo said.
"I wasn't aware attendance was mandatory after dessert."
"It isn't."
He came no closer.
That was another thing I liked about him. He understood distance without treating it as rejection.
I stared into the fire.
"Why does everyone in this house make me feel like a guest?"
Matteo was quiet for so long that I finally looked at him.
"Because most of us have been unfair to you," he said.
The answer caught me off guard.
"That's not a very loyal-Valenti response."
"You didn't ask me to be loyal to the family version of events."
I turned the glass between my hands.
"Camille has a history with all of you. Adrian has made it clear that history matters more than anything I can do now."
"Not to everyone."
"Matteo—"
"Do you remember the St. Vincent charity fair nine years ago?"
The question came from nowhere.
I frowned. "Barely. I was fourteen. My father made me go because the Morettis were sponsoring one of the booths."
"I was sixteen."
He lifted his left hand and showed me a faint pale line near the base of his thumb.
"A display case broke. I tried to catch it like an idiot and sliced my hand open."
A memory stirred.
A teenage boy behind a service tent. Blood on his fingers. A white scarf wrapped badly around his palm.
"That was you?"
Matteo smiled. "You didn't know my name."
"You wouldn't tell me."
"Because I knew yours. I thought if you realized I was a Valenti, you'd leave me there."
I stared at the scar.
"I remember telling you that you were stupid for grabbing glass."
"You also stole a first-aid kit from the volunteer station and stayed until the medic came."
"I did not steal it."
"You definitely stole it."
A laugh escaped me.
Then his expression softened.
"Camille isn't the only person with a history in this house, Bella. I remembered you long before Adrian married you. I remembered the girl who helped somebody she had every reason to hate."
The room went very still.
It should have been comforting.
Instead, it felt dangerous.
"Why didn't you tell me before?"
"Because you married my brother."
The words were quiet.
Honest.
I looked at him.
He looked back.
For one reckless second, I forgot the ring on my finger.
Matteo took a step toward me, then stopped, as if waiting for me to decide whether the space between us should close.
I should have walked away.
I didn't.
I put the glass down.
"Bella," he said.
It sounded like a warning.
I kissed him anyway.
The kiss was not planned or graceful. It was one hard, startled moment of truth after weeks of being treated like an obligation. Matteo froze before his hand came up to my jaw. He kissed me back once, carefully, like he knew exactly how wrong it was and could not quite make himself regret it.
Then someone hit him.
Matteo crashed into the edge of the sofa.
Adrian stood between us.
His fist was clenched. His face was white with fury.
"Don't touch my wife."
Matteo straightened slowly. "Now she's your wife?"
Adrian swung again.
This time Matteo blocked him.
They slammed into the table, sending a lamp sideways. I shoved between them before either could throw another punch.
"Stop!"
Adrian grabbed my arm, not hard enough to hurt, but hard enough to pull me behind him.
I tore free.
"You left me alone on my birthday for another woman," I said. "You let her wear your clothes. You let her take my place at our wedding. And now you're furious because someone else stayed when you didn't?"
Adrian's chest rose and fell.
"You're my wife."
I laughed once, bitter and breathless.
"Only when another man touches me."
His expression changed.
Matteo stepped beside me, not touching me now.
Adrian looked from him to me.
"Tomorrow night," he said, voice low enough to be frightening, "this family settles this. No brother of mine is going to touch my wife again."
I held his gaze.
I was no longer afraid of what he might decide.
I was angry that he still believed the decision belonged to him.
