Page 237 of Rosetti Family New York
The memory floods back, vivid and sharp. The narrow alley, the scent of rain on concrete, the look of dawning horror in the man's eyes as he realized what was about to happen. The way my hands trembled afterward, not from fear, but from the shock of how easy it had been.
I flex my fingers, remembering. I hold my hands out, feeling the heat of the fire, remembering the cold that night. A hit in December. Against a guy who owed stacks of money and thought he was king enough not to pay up. I stare at my fingers, the same fingers that cracked in the cold, the same fingers that cracked his skin.
The crack of the fire echoes in the room, and the silence booms louder than her questions did before.
She doesn't flinch. That alone undoes something in me. Like maybe she could take all the ugly history, the worst parts of me, and hold them close, cradle them in those unflinching hands. She absorbs my story like she absorbs the warmth from the fire, like she might even expect something worse. Maybe she should. But she stays steady, and the wild, hopeful part of me thinks I could get used to her being here, to her not looking away. Her calm is a challenge, and I meet it with all the things I've never told.
No one has seen me this exposed since Alisa, and that ended in flames. Alisa had thought she wanted the bad boy, the danger, until she actually saw what that meant. She'd looked at my hands, these same hands, with horror, with disgust, when she realized what they'd done.
But Sloane is looking at them like they're just hands. Imperfect, scarred, but not monstrous. Not beyond redemption.
"They shook after. Not from fear. From adrenaline. From how… alive it made me feel."
I look up. She's still watching.
"I started wearing gloves so I wouldn't forget what I'm capable of."
"Are you scared of your hands?" she asks softly.
"No."
Yes.
"I'm scared of what I'll do if I stop pretending they're clean."
She leans in. Gentle. Stupid. Brave.
"They don't look dirty to me," she says.
Her fingers slide over mine. Slow. Careful. I let her.
She's the only person alive I'd let touch me like this. The only one who might not burn from it.
"Don't look at me like that," I say.
"Like what?" she asks, edging closer.
Soft, stupid, brave.
"Like I'm not a monster."
Her fingers lace through mine. They are warm. Steady. Unafraid.
"I don't think monsters stay up all night to protect people who've already lost too much."
The words hit harder than they should.
I've lived in shadows. I've killed in silence. I've worn the gloves, the mask, the role. But tonight, wrapped in firelight and her goddamn kindness, I feel human. And it terrifies me.
Sloane isn't looking at me like I'm something to be afraid of. She's looking at me like I might be worth saving. The thought is both terrifying and intoxicating. No one's ever looked at me like that before, like they see the darkness and aren't running away.
I feel naked under her gaze, stripped of all my defenses. And the strangest part is, I don't want to put them back on. I don'twant to go back to being untouchable, unreachable. Not with her.
"I've never..." I start, then stop, the words catching in my throat. "No one sees me without them."
Her hand tightens around mine, a gentle pressure that anchors me to this moment, to her.
I've spent years making sure no one could see me, the real me, beneath the Rosetti name, beneath the violence and the fear. And here she is, this slip of a woman, with her nightmares and her guilt and her unrelenting kindness, looking right through all my defenses like they're made of glass.
