He followed.
By the time I reached Nonna Rosa’s quiet neighborhood on the outskirts, my knuckles were bone-white on the grips.
The SUV had disappeared into side streets, but the crawling sensation of being watched clung to me like oil on skin. I killed the engine in front of the pale blue house, legs shaky as I dismounted.
Rosa opened the door before my fist could connect, her sharp, knowing eyes narrowing the instant they landed on me. Flour dusted her black widow’s dress and the faded apron tied around her waist. The scent of espresso and warm vanilla drifted out, wrapping around me like an embrace I hadn’t realized I needed.
“Aurora,” she said, pulling me inside without hesitation or questions. “You look like trouble chased you all the way here, child.”
I forced a smile, brushing hair from my face. “Just needed some air. The house was… suffocating this morning.”
She studied me for a long beat, the kind of look that said she had raised two devils and wasn’t fooled by pretty deflections. But she didn’t press. Instead, she pressed an apron into my hands and steered me toward the kitchen where chaos reigned in the best possible way.
Gemma and Leone were already covered head to toe in cocoa powder, giggling as they “helped” stir a bowl far too big for them. Ladyfingers soaked in espresso lined trays. Mascarpone waited to be whipped into clouds.
“Hands are steadier when they’re busy,” Rosa declared, handing me a spatula. “Come. Make yourself useful.”
I lost myself in it. The rhythmic dipping of cookies. The steady whip of cream. Gemma’s sticky fingers stealing tastes and Leone’s dramatic declarations that he was the best baker in Italy.
Flour floated through the air like lazy snowflakes, catching in my hair and on my lashes. The kitchen smelled like vanilla,strong coffee, and home, the kind of home I had dreamed about in quiet moments before everything burned down.
Rosa worked beside me, her movements sure despite her age. As we layered the tiramisu, she began to speak, voice warm and rhythmic like an old song.
“Santino bit another boy over a toy truck when he was five,” she said with a soft chuckle. “Wouldn’t let go of the thing until the poor child was in tears. Angelo laughed so hard he fell backward into a puddle. Those two were inseparable terrors.”
She continued as we worked, each story painting a picture I had never seen.
Santino at twelve, jumping off a rooftop to impress a neighborhood girl, landing with a broken arm and crying not from pain but from Angelo’s endless teasing.
Suspended from school for fighting when someone spoke cruelly about his mother.
The way he used to hide his tears when Angelo got hurt, thinking no one noticed the twin who carried the weight of the other’s pain.
I paused, fingers sticky with mascarpone, staring at the half-assembled dessert.
Santo.
Not the Devil who had shot a man at my wedding.
Not the ruthless kingpin who had kidnapped me.
Just a boy who loved fiercely and broke things trying to protect what mattered. The stories settled somewhere soft and dangerously tender in my chest.
Rosa noticed my silence. She wiped her hands and turned to me, ancient eyes gentle but piercing. “You love him.”
The denial flew from my lips. “No.”
She laughed, soft and fond, patting my cheek.
“Stubborn. Just like him.” Then she pressed a worn, handwritten recipe card into my palm. It was the family tiramisurecipe, ink faded from years of use. “For you, cara. You’re exactly what that stubborn boy needs. Someone who sees the boy behind the devil mask.”
My throat tightened painfully. I didn’t know how to answer. She pulled me into a tight hug, surprisingly strong for her frame.
Before I left, she held my face between her hands. “Tell Santino about the man following you.”
I pulled back, shocked she’d noticed too. “I don’t want him locking me up again. Treating me like a prisoner.”
Rosa’s expression turned grave. “You think that boy will react calmly when he finds out?”
