Page 52 of Ruthless Silence
The hallway stretches empty and dark. From behind the closed door, I hear her sob once, sharp and broken. The sound makes me press my palm against the wood, fighting every possessive instinct screaming to go back.
She lived. And if she walks away now, at least she'll do it knowing I was never her enemy.
Just the man who loved her enough to become one.
24 - Ana
My stomach heaves. I barely make it to the waste basket before bile burns up my throat, my body rejecting this new understanding as violently as my mind does. The acid taste lingers, mixing with tears and snot running down my face.
It's been hours since Dante left me here with the dissolution papers. Hours since he walked away after showing me everything. The silence stretches through his empty study, heavy with everything we've done to each other. His cologne still lingers in the air, cigarettes and sandalwood.
The truth of it cuts deeper than any blade. Those first months after the massacre, it was the hatred that got me out of bed. The promise of revenge that made me eat, train, survive. Without an enemy to focus on, I would have withered into nothing.
"You were a stranger," I whisper to his lingering ghost, salt coating my lips. "Why would you sacrifice yourself for a stranger?"
Papa. Even dying, even with his killer unknown, Papa was thinking of me. And somehow that duty passed to Dante, who's been protecting me even from the truth. The sob that escapes sounds like an animal in pain.
I can still see his hands forming those words. "You're free, Ana."
Free. The word sits strange in my mouth, in my mind. What is freedom when everything you've built yourself on is a lie? When the foundation of your identity crumbles?
The dissolution papers sit on his desk where he left them. Official seals, legal language that would erase these three weeks like they never happened. He's already begun the process of releasing me.
He told me it was worth it.
Worth the torture? Worth ten years of my hatred? Worth being the villain in someone else's revenge story?
Two stacks of paper on his desk: evidence of his innocence, papers for my freedom. Past and future both rewritten in black ink and official stamps.
"You're free, Ana."
Hours have passed since he left me with those words. The door clicked shut with terrifying finality, leaving me alone with the wreckage of who I used to be.
I finally stand, running barefoot in my nightgown, evidence clutched to my chest. Through the halls where his family might see me undone. Up the stairs where we've walked as husband and wife. Into our suite,oursuite,Dio mio, where his leather chair sits empty.
The bathroom door slams, lock clicking. Finally alone to shatter completely again.
I see myself in the mirror: disaster. Makeup smeared down my cheeks in black streaks, eyes swollen into slits, wearing his shirt over my nightgown. I pulled it on hours ago, needing his scent. The fabric carries cigarettes and cologne, making my nipples harden traitorously.
"Who are you?" I ask my reflection. The words come out in Italian."Chi sei?"
Not Ana Moretti, avenger. That girl is dead. I killed her with the truth. Not Ana Rosetti, wife. How can I be his wife when I've been his torturer?
Nobody, nothing, empty. Without revenge, I'm hollow. Ten years of purpose, gone. What fills that space?
The photos spread across the bathroom floor as I study each one again, burning them deeper into memory. The timestamp that clears him. The torture report, three days. Three days they had him, and he didn't break. Wouldn't lie even to save himself.
His written words on one document catch my eye again: "Ana needs an enemy to survive."
He sacrificed for me: stranger, enemy, the girl who would grow up to hate him. No, not stranger. Protector. Even then, he was protecting me.
"Why didn't anyone tell me?" I scream at the photos, my throat raw. "Why did they let me become this?"
But I know why. Because a fifteen-year-old girl needed something to live for. And hate is easier to sustain than grief.
More hours pass. Or minutes. Time means nothing when your world stays inverted. I'm still on the bathroom floor, the marble cold against my bare legs, when Maria's knock echoes through the suite.
"Mrs.Rosetti? You need food?"
