Page 416 of Rosetti Family New York
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Isabella
I've been standing in this hallway for ten minutes, unable to move forward or back.
The rain batters the tall windows, turning Manhattan into watercolor smudges of gray and gold. I pull the cashmere sweater tighter around my shoulders, but Besiana's borrowed clothes can't make me feel like I belong in this glass fortress.
The library door is slightly open, and voices drift into the hallway where I stand frozen. Dom's low rumble, Leo's sharp interjections, Matteo's voice cutting through them both with dangerous precision. They're planning something. Strategizing. Fighting a war I helped start simply by existing.
I should knock. Should ask if there's anything I can do to help. The polite thing, the useful thing. Instead, I hover in the doorway like a ghost, caught between wanting to contribute and knowing I don't belong in their world of calculated violence.
"Isabella." Besiana appears beside me, moving with the same silent grace that runs in this family. "You look lost."
"I was just..." I gesture vaguely toward the library. "They seem busy."
"They are." Her dark eyes study my face with uncomfortable perception. "But that doesn't mean you're not allowed to exist in your own space."
My space. The words feel foreign. Nothing about this mansion feels like mine, despite the way Matteo watches me move through it like I'm something precious he's placed exactly where he wants me.
"Come," Besiana says, linking our arms with easy familiarity. "Let them play with their maps and their phones. We'll find something more interesting to do."
But I can't concentrate on anything more interesting. Can't focus on the book she hands me or the tea she presses into my palms. The afternoon stretches endless and gray. Through the windows, I watch the storm intensify, turning the city into something dark and threatening.
I find myself wandering through the mansion's halls eventually, my bare feet silent on marble and hardwood. The air feels charged with tension, like the walls themselves are bracing for war.
"Isabella?" Matteo's voice startles me. I didn't hear him approach, too lost in my spiraling thoughts.
I turn toward him, taking in the worried set of his shoulders, the way his amber eyes search my face for signs of distress. He's changed from his morning clothes into dark jeans and a black sweater that makes him look younger, more approachable. Less like a predator and more like a man who might actually love me.
But I can see the silver coin flipping between his fingers.
"I'm fine," I say automatically, the lie coming as easily as breathing.
He doesn't believe me. I can see it in the way his jaw tightens, the way the coin moves faster. "You sure? You look pale."
"Just tired." Another lie, smooth as glass. "The storm's giving me a headache."
He studies my face for a long moment, and I have the unsettling feeling he can see right through me. That he knows about the choice I'm struggling to make, about the way I'm fragmenting under the weight of too many impossible truths.
"Come here," he says softly, holding out his hand.
I want to go to him. Want to let him pull me close and promise that everything will be okay, even though we both know that's impossible. Instead, I shake my head.
"Isabella, what's going on?"
The question breaks something loose inside me. "About how you told me you loved me and I don't know how to handle that? About how I feel like I'm betraying everything I thought I knew about myself? About how the man who raised me might be a monster and I'm not sure who I am without him?"
The admission hangs between us like shattered glass. Matteo's expression shifts from concern to something deeper, more complicated.
"Bella—"
"Don't." I hold up a hand, stopping him before he can say something that will break me completely. "Please. I can't... not right now."
He nods slowly, understanding more than I deserve. "Okay. But when you're ready to talk, I'll be here."
"What if I'm never ready?"
"Then I'll wait." His voice is steady, sure. "As long as it takes."
