“What did you do?”
“The truth.” He let out a ragged breath. “Sky, Dante Castelli lied. All of it. Eleven years ago, Dante wanted his brother Luca out of the business. Luca had started moving money into legitimate shipping routes with me. He wanted clean books. Clean contracts. Dante wanted control. So he set Luca up, had him killed, and pinned the collapse on me before I could speak.”
I stood and paced to the window.
No sound came out.
“I kept records,” my father said. “Wire transfers. Shipping manifests. Insurance papers. Copies Luca hid with me because he didn’t trust his brother. I buried them. I told myself it was survival. But the truth is I was afraid.”
“Why now?”
His answer was so simple it nearly broke me.
“Because I watched my daughter leave that ballroom tonight looking like someone had taken the ground out from under her, and I decided I was done being afraid.”
I leaned my forehead against the cool glass.
“What did Roman say?”
“Not much. He listened. Asked for the documents. Then he said he should have found you sooner.”
I closed my eyes.
Hope is a dangerous thing when you have already been cut by honesty once.
But it moved anyway.
The next evening, I drove to the Castelli estate.
No warning. No text. No invitation.
Cora opened the front door before I could knock twice. She took one look at my face and stepped aside.
“He’s in the garden,” she said.
Of course he was.
I crossed the house by memory. Through the hall. Past the library. Through the glass doors.
The garden was washed gold by the setting sun.
Roman stood near the fountain with his back to me, hands in his pockets, looking toward the east corner where the trumpet creeper climbed the wall exactly as if no time had passed at all.
He turned at the sound of my steps.
And just like that, every cold week, every distance, every lie told to both of us shattered.
“Sky.”
“My father told you.”
“Yes.”
“Is it true?”
