His expression eases. His hand slides to the small of my back, warm and familiar.
“Good.”
We step into the café together a moment later, Lorenzo carrying Stefano, me carrying Sienna Rose, all four of us taking up too much space and none of us caring.
Later, when we’re back out on the sidewalk with coffees and a hot chocolate Lorenzo absolutely should not have bought for Stefano, our son chatters nonsense, Sienna Rose wakes and blinks sleepily up at the sky, and I find myself reaching for Lorenzo’s hand without thinking.
He threads his fingers through mine immediately.
As we walk toward the car, the city golden around us and our children safe between us, I think about Francesca’s smile. About the little girl in the stroller. About how strange and beautiful it is that some women survive each other and become, if not friends, then something quieter. Witnesses, maybe. Proof that we made it out.
Sienna Rose makes a soft sound, and Lorenzo immediately leans in to check her again.
I laugh. “You’re hovering.”
“She’s breathing strangely.”
“She sighed.”
He considers that. “Still suspicious.”
I shake my head, smiling, and lean into him as we walk. This is not the life I thought I’d have. It’s better. Messier. Hard-won. Full of scars and softness in equal measure.
But better.
And when Lorenzo bends to kiss my temple while Stefano chants “cookie, cookie, cookie” from his arms and Sienna Rose blinks solemnly at the sunlight, I know with absolute certainty that I would choose it all again.
Every terrible, beautiful piece of it.
Because in the end, we didn’t just survive.
We built something worth protecting.
EPILOGUE #3
Birdie
*** Later that night ***
I close our bedroom door now that both kids are down, but I know there’s a chance Stefano will wake, so I press the lock. The click sounds louder than it should, making my pulse spike. Because I’m about to rock my husband’s world in more ways than one.
Lorenzo is in bed, readers on, papers spread across his lap like he isn’t the most dangerous thing in the room because he’s spent years learning every soft, needy, ruined part of me.
Slowly, I walk toward him, undoing the tie of my robe.
“Lorenzo,” I say.
He looks up immediately. One word. That’s all it takes. His attention lifts from the papers and lands on me with enough heat to make my skin prickle.
“I need something from you.”
I let the robe slip from my shoulders. It falls to the floor in a whisper of silk, pooling around my feet, and Lorenzo goes completely still. His eyes move over me slowly. From my barebreasts to my waist, lower to the small strip of lace between my thighs, then back up again. His mouth parts, barely, and the hunger that crosses his face is so raw it sends a pulse straight through me.
He removes his readers, setting them down on the nightstand. Then the papers, as if he is giving me time to change my mind. As if he doesn’t know I locked the door because I have no intention of escaping him.
“What do you need,cara?” he asks, voice low.
I step closer. “You.”
