Page 45 of Beautiful Evidence

She doesn’t answer at first. The light shifts across her face as a cloud moves past the window. Her expression tightens—not with anger, but with clarity. "I stayed because I thought I could do good. That’s the only reason I ever took the job. But I was wrong. My father's legacy is too big to ever get away from it."

I reach for her hand. She doesn’t flinch. She lets me take it, and I pull her until she comes closer, climbing onto my lap.

"You’re not that person," I say quietly. "You never were." My hand smooths the hair off her face as she settles into my embrace. It's a hard thing watching her spirit not fight back anymore. The part of her that is most precious is the part that seems like it's dying, and I feel fully to blame for that.

Alessia’s voice thins to something raw. "I will be if I stay. Maybe not tomorrow. Maybe not next month. But eventually, I’ll lose the part of me that still cares. The second I stop flinching at a cover-up or lying to a victim’s mother, that’s it. That’s the end of the line."

Wrapping my arms tightly around her waist, I hold her to myself as I say, "Then let me help you find something else."

She snorts. The sound isn’t mean, just tired. "Doing what? Teaching chemistry to bored rich kids? Selling skincare supplements to influencers?"

I shift under her and readjust her position on my lap, then reach up and push her dark locks behind her back. "Come work for me." The solution sounds simple to me, but I know it won't be that easy for her to accept.

That gets a laugh. Alessia picks up a roll of tape, spins it once in her fingers, then sets it back down. "Doing what? Helping you catalog which bullets deform in lake water? More cover-ups? More evidence to destroy?"

"No," I say. My jaw tightens at those words, but I know she doesn't mean to be so cynical. "Helping me make something of your father's legacy and keep your uncle out of hot water."

She finally looks at me full-on. Her eyes are skeptical but alert. "You’re serious. You want me to pretend I don't know what they do?"

I nod. "You don’t have to work for me. You don’t even have to touch anything illegal. But you could consult as an outside specialist. You’d keep your title, your autonomy, and your ethics. Maybe it’s called clinical oversight in your field, or best practices review. Whatever the terminology, it means setting standards and watching the line—something you’ve always done anyway. We'll keep it separate from what I do with the rest of the business. Keep yourself clean. You’d be helping, not hiding anything. And you’d be with me. We wouldn’t have to split our lives down the middle just to be together."

Alessia looks down again. Her voice softens. "You’re talking like we get a future." Her fingers toy with the top button of my shirt. I see how she's chewed her nails down to the quick, and I clasp one hand and bring it to my lips to kiss it.

She doesn’t resist, but she’s tense at first. I wrap my arms back around her and wait. Her head drops to my shoulder after a few breaths.

"You think I don’t know what my father was? What I’ve been?" I ask. I don’t want to say it out loud, but there’s no dodging it anymore—not with her in my arms, not after what we’ve survived. I’ve lived my entire life operating on necessity, not desire, and now I’m admitting that it isn’t enough. That’s the weight I feel—finally choosing something for myself, knowing it might cost me everything else.

Alessia stays quiet, but her hands press lightly against my chest. Her body is rigid in my arms, and I press a kiss to her cheek. Somehow, in the middle of all this shit fight of a life, I found someone I can be with and not have to keep my guard up. I can't let that go, but I won't force her to choose me. She has to do it because she wants me.

"I’m not proud of it. But I did it because I thought it was necessary. I thought being smarter, faster, colder than the next guy was the only way to keep people safe."

She tilts her head slightly. "And now?"

I close my eyes for a beat. "Now I think survival’s not enough." I shrug a shoulder as she leans into me, and I tighten my hold around her. "You can’t build something real if you’re always planning how to cut loose. And you can’t keep a woman like you at a distance and expect her to wait."

Her breath catches. She doesn’t pull away. "I don’t know how to be with someone who lives in your world. Someone who moves through it like violence is currency. Someone like my father…"

"I don’t know how to be anything else," I admit. "But I know what I want, and that's you."

Her fingers curl around my neck, though her grip is uncertain.

"I’m not promising anything, Vincenzo," she says after a while. "I don’t know what this is or what it becomes."

I rest my chin lightly against her temple. "I’m not asking for a promise. I’m asking if you can picture a version of this that doesn’t end here, right now." She has to feel the way my heart is hammering. There are a hell of a lot of things that get my blood pumping, but nothing scares me. Nothing except the idea that she'll walk away and I'll never see her again.

Alessia doesn’t speak for a long time. When she finally turns her head and looks up at me, there’s nothing performative in her expression. "I could tell you all the reasons this is a terrible idea," she says, her tone almost wry.

"Please don’t. I’ve already rehearsed them." I grin and fight a chuckle, and she smiles softly too.

She lifts her hand to my jaw, studies me for a second, then kisses me. The kiss lingers without urgency, no theatrics or hesitation, just the steady, honest weight of a decision made. When she tries to back away, I deepen the kiss.

One hand slides higher up her shirt, fingers finding the warmth of her skin underneath. She doesn't pull away. Instead, she presses closer. Her tongue dances with mine, testing and teasing, before she nips at my bottom lip. I growl low in my throat and deepen the kiss, my other hand molding to the curve of her hip.

As much as I want this, want her, I force myself to move slowly. To savor each touch, each sensation. My fingers drag over the lace of her bra, tracing the outline of her nipple through the fabric. Her breath hitches, and she moans into the kiss. The sound sends a jolt through me straight to my groin.

Alessia's hands make their way to my belt, deftly unbuckling it. I groan as her hands slip inside my trousers, wrapping around my hardening dick. She bites her lip and smirks at me before licking my lip and using her teeth to rake over it.

“Is this part of your plan, Mr. Morelli? You pull me onto your lap and get me worked up, then fuck me until I’m whimpering your name and that makes me yours indefinitely?” Her tone is playful, and I growl into her mouth as she kisses me.

---