CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE
The cleaner didn’t speak much English. Alessia had noticed that months ago. A quiet girl, younger than most of the staff, with downcast eyes and a scarf always knotted too tightly at her throat. She knocked once before slipping into the study, her gloved hands folded nervously in front of her.
“Signorina,” she murmured, almost apologetic. “This was at the back door. Hidden under the ivy.”
Alessia looked up from the ledger she had not really been reading. The envelope the girl held out was wrinkled and damp at the corners,stained like it had been handled too many times. No name. No seal. Nothing but the faintest smudge where rain had worn away something once written.
The cleaner placed it on the edge of the desk and backed away quickly, already turning toward the door. Alessia blinked. “Wait. Who gave it to you?”
The girl hesitated. “No one. It was… just there.”
Before Alessia could press further, the door had closed again, soft and final.
Silence returned.
She stared at the envelope for a long second. Then her fingers moved. The paper was soft with moisture and peeled open easily. Inside was a small black USB, nothing else. No letter. No instructions. Just that. Her heart pounded harder than it should have. It had been months since she trusted anything that arrived without context. But something about the envelope felt different. Not threatening. Not staged. Just... old. Familiar.
She glanced toward the hallway. Empty. Then she reached for her coat draped over the back of the armchair, slipping the USB inside one of the deep interior pockets. She barely managed to shove it into place before the door opened again.
“Cold today,” Matteo’s voice murmured as he entered.
Alessia turned sharply, her hand still in the coat’s lining. “You’re back early.”
He smiled faintly and crossed the room toward the fireplace, unbuttoning his jacket with deliberate ease. “Meeting was pointless. Men who like to hear themselves talk. No movement on the Giuliana front.”
Alessia nodded, trying to slow her breathing.
Matteo looked at her longer than necessary. Then his eyes drifted toward the desk. “Did something arrive?”
“A cleaner came in. Just dusted.”
He didn’t look convinced. His gaze dropped to her coat still held in her arms.
“Wearing that again?” he asked, voice light, but edged.
“It’s comfortable.”
She watched him from the corner of her eye as she moved to hang it on the stand near the bookshelf instead of tossing it over the couch like usual. He noticed that too. Noted every detail, she was sure of it.
“You’ve been quiet since the event,” he said after a beat.
“I’ve had a lot on my mind.”
Matteo crossed the floor, stopping inches from her. “If you’re feeling overwhelmed, you can always tell me. I want to help.”
Alessia met his gaze. There was nothing but concern in it, sculpted into something careful. Something warm. But something else simmered underneath. Not suspicion. Not yet. Just alertness. That ever-present calculation.
“I’m fine,” she said, forcing a small smile. “Tired, that’s all.”
He reached up, brushing a curl behind her ear. “You’ve done well. People are talking about you again. But I meant it, you know.”
“Meant what?”
“That I’ll protect you. From anything.”
Her throat tightened. His thumb skimmed the edge of her jaw and lingered there. The moment stretched. Too close. Too long.
“I know,” she whispered.
He leaned closer. His mouth brushed her cheek, soft, not quite a kiss. Not quite innocent either. Then he stepped back, adjusting his cuff links as though the moment had not happened at all.
“I’ll be downstairs if you need me.”
She watched him leave. The second the door clicked shut behind him, she turned, walked quickly to the old desk, and pulled out the coat. Her hands trembled as she slipped the USB into her palm.
Whatever this was… whoever sent it…
She needed to know.
Not tonight.
But soon.
When Matteo was far enough away that she could breathe without wondering who was watching.
When she could stop hearing his voice in her head, reminding her that the only danger she faced was outside these walls.
Alessia closed her hand around the USB and held it against her chest for just a moment, grounding herself. Then she slipped it under the floorboard behind the fireplace where Matteo never looked, brushing the wood clean again like nothing had ever happened.
Upstairs, in the surveillance room Matteo believed she had no access to, a screen flickered with the faint image of her back. He watched in silence, eyes unreadable.
Then the feed blinked out.
Just long enough.
Enough to make her believe she still had secrets.
Alessia did not touch the USB again that day.
Not when the house fell quiet. Not even after Matteo left for a meeting with the new security head he claimed to be interviewing. She waited. Pacing the gallery’s back hallway long after the sun had dipped below the hills. Every shadow seemed to breathe, every corner a silent mouth whispering questions she was not ready to ask.
That night, she could not sleep.Her bedroom felt colder than usual. The heat was working. The windows were shut. But something deeper than temperature sank into her skin. She curled under the covers, wide-eyed, listening to the silence stretch thin across the room. She turned her phone face down. She had not checked it once since Matteo had touched her cheek and smiled like a man without secrets. But her mind would not quiet. It ran in circles. Why had the USB come now? Who had risked passing it through the gate? Why had the cleaner looked so pale, so frightened?
Was she being watched again?
She rose just after two in the morning. The villa slept, or pretended to. Her footsteps made no sound as she moved down the narrow hallway and into the sitting room off the library. A place no one used anymore.
She pulled the floorboard up slowly.
The USB was still there. Cold in her hand. Her fingers trembled as she slid it into her laptop, the screen casting blue light onto her face. A progress bar blinked once. Then again.
Then, it played.
Not surveillance footage. Not security tapes. This was older. Grainier. A home video.
The camera shook slightly at first, settling on a warmly lit room — not the villa, but somewhere smaller, lived in, safe. There were voices in the background. Laughter, faint. A curtain flapping gently near a window.
Then the camera turned.
Alessia’s breath caught in her throat.
It was Serafina.
Not in a photo. Not in a painting. Alive.
Her face was fuller than the portraits Alessia knew. Her eyes softer. Her smile was not the carefully constructed one that had lived in De Luca press photos. This one was real. Her arms cradled a baby — tiny, swaddled, with dark wisps of hair and a tiny frown that melted instantly at the sound of Serafina’s voice.
Alessia leaned forward.
Her own baby pictures had been scarce, always curated, always buried under other memories. But this child. This girl. She felt it. In her bones. In her gut. It was her.
The camera drew closer. Serafina kissed the baby’s forehead and whispered something inaudible at first. Then the camera focused. The words were clear.
“Marco, if she ever finds this…”
Serafina’s voice cracked slightly.
“…protect her from him.”
The footage ended in a blink.
No outro. No explanation. No edits.
Just the ghost of Serafina’s voice hanging in the air.
Alessia stared at the screen long after it had gone dark. Her pulse roared in her ears. Her stomach turned. Something was breaking loose inside her — something that had been anchored for too long in Matteo’s voice, Matteo’s version of the truth.
Who was Serafina talking about?
There had only ever been one man Marco had warned her about.
One man whose protection had come with invisible chains.
One man who watched her even when she thought he wasn’t.
A sound echoed in the hallway.
Alessia jumped, slamming the laptop shut. Her breath caught in her throat. The doorknob did not turn. No one stepped inside. But she could feel it again — that presence that never left. The feeling of being observed. Of being studied like a painting hung in someone else’s gallery.
She turned off the screen, tucked the USB back into her pocket, and pressed her back to the cold wall.
She had to stay calm.
She had to be smart.
The fire in her dreams had returned. No voice this time. Just flames that chased her down endless corridors, smoke clawing at her lungs, and always — the sound of a child crying. Distant. Echoing. Alone.
When she woke, the tears were already on her face. Morning light filtered in soft and slow, but it felt wrong. Her body ached. She reached for the USB.
Gone.
Her chest froze. She tore the sheets aside. Checked the drawer. Checked the lining of her coat.
Gone.
On her pillow, a slip of paper sat neatly folded. She unfolded it with stiff fingers.
Matteo’s handwriting stared back at her.
Some memories are too dangerous.
Alessia sat very still. The villa remained silent. And somewhere in the walls, she felt the eyes again. Only this time, she was starting to wonder who they truly belonged to.