Page 10 of Ruthless Silence
Room service arrives. I point at the menu again, too exhausted for words, and the waiter nods with the patience of someone used to foreign guests. When he leaves, I pull out my origami paper, needing the familiar comfort of folding, of creating something precise and controlled.
My fingers work automatically, creasing and folding while my mind replays every moment of that meeting. The way the room shifted when they entered. His thumb finding my pulse like he was marking the spot to cut later. Or kiss. The fact that I can't decide which he intended makes me want to scream.
That almost-smile when I threatened to study him. Like I'd offered him something he'd been craving.
I reach for another paper and freeze. This isn't origami paper. It's the contract copy from my portfolio. But it's the old one, with his father's signature. Rosetti. His son's signature sits fresh beside mine on the new pages, but it's the father's name that haunts me. The ghost who bound us together twenty years ago.
But my hands need to move, need to create, so I fold it anyway. The paper is too thick, fighting against the creases, but I force it into shape. A crane emerges, Antonio Rosetti's signature now fractured across its wings, broken into geometric patterns that somehow make it more present, not less. The sins of the father, carried on paper wings.
I set it on the nightstand next to Papa's photo. The crane sits crooked, one wing higher than the other, because my hands won't stop shaking. No matter how many times I smooth the paper, it lists to one side like it's trying to fly away but can't quite remember how.
My body is a traitor. Every cell remembers the heat of Dante's palm, the way his thumb found my pulse like he was marking what's his. The memory sends heat pooling between my legs, and I press my thighs together, trying to stop the ache.
I fold another crane, this time from the room service menu. Each crease is a promise. I will not break, I will not bend, I will not spread my legs for the enemy. But my hands shake because my body has already betrayed the last promise, growing wet just from the memory of his touch.
The crooked crane with his father's signature watches me from the nightstand, a reminder that some things, once folded, can never be made smooth again. The Rosetti legacy is part of my origami collection now, twisted into something I created with my own shaking hands.
Three days. The words echo in my head in English, Italian, and the silent language of signs. Three days to remember why I came here.
To forget the way he looked at me like I was something precious and dangerous all at once.
To prepare for a marriage that will either destroy him or destroy me.
But as I stare at Antonio Rosetti's fractured signature on the paper crane's wings, a terrible truth settles in my bones. Destruction might feel exactly like desire, and I'm no longer sure I'll recognize the difference.
5 - Dante
The Hadley representatives shift nervously across the conference table. Marco sits beside me, letting me handle the negotiation—enforcement is my domain.
My fingers fly across the tablet: "Your shipment arrives Friday during the wedding. We'll be occupied. Try to fuck us over, and I'll personally visit each of your families."
Marco reads it aloud, his voice adding weight to my threat. The lead representative, Hadley's nephew, tries to maintain eye contact but fails. They all break eventually.
"We wouldn't dream of—" he starts.
I slam my hand on the table, making them all jump. Then I pull up surveillance photos on my tablet—not of Ana, but of the nephew's daughter at her private school, his wife at her yoga studio. Legal activities in public spaces, but the message is clear.
I type again: "Thirty million in product. Clean transfer. No games."
The nephew nods rapidly. "No games, Mr.Rosetti."
After they leave, Marco lights a cigarette. "You're distracted. The Moretti girl?"
I don't respond, but he knows. In ten years of silence, I've never been distracted during business. Now I'm checking my phone between threats, watching her hotel's security feed while negotiating territories worth millions.
"Handle your business," Marco says, standing. "All of it. The Family needs you focused, not mooning over surveillance footage."
I give my brother a death stare, but it doesn't stick. "I'm not mooning," I sign.
But I know exactly what she's wearing and where she is. The electric handshake from yesterday's meeting still burns through my palm, phantom heat that makes me clench my fist. She's in her hotel room now, exhausted enough that she'd be easy prey. Her guard is down, eyelids heavy from the jet lag still clinging to her. I could be there in twenty minutes, could have her pinned to that hotel bed before she fully woke. The thought makes me grip the desk edge hard enough to hurt.
I walk to the cupboard and pour myself a large whiskey, letting it burn down my throat where the scar tissue aches tonight. The surveillance team I assigned sends constant updates, but I need to see her myself. Need to watch her prepare for Friday like she's preparing for war.
Marco settles into the leather chair across from me, authority radiating even in casual observation. "You're obsessed."
I pull my tablet closer, writing quickly: "Know your enemy." My brothers know ASL, but only the basics. For more complex concepts, I need to write.
"Is that what she is?" Marco's question hangs between us.
