CHAPTER SIXTY

CHAPTER SIXTY
The gallery had quieted after the last tour group left. Alessia remained in the restricted wing with Mr. Callen, her hand grazing the edges of Serafina’s oldest canvases. The smell of varnish and dust clung to the air, heavy and familiar, though her mind would not rest. Mr. Callen had been studying one of the larger paintings, his flashlight angled carefully across the surface. He was not speaking at first, only tilting his head and muttering under his breath. Alessia frowned and stepped closer.

“What is it?” she asked.

He moved his hand slowly over the canvas, not touching, just following lines of color. “This shade here. And here again. At first I thought it was age. But it is deliberate. Pigment codes. She hid them inside the brushwork.”

Alessia blinked at him. “Codes?”

“Yes,” he said simply. He looked at her then, his gaze sharper than usual. “She layered certain strokes in sequences. These are not random. They are tied to letters. Numbers. A system.”

Alessia’s chest tightened. She stepped closer, her breath clouding faintly against the cool air of the vault. “You are saying she left a message in her paintings?”

“That is exactly what I am saying.”

Her hand trembled as she traced the air above the painted strokes. The thought of Serafina leaving something here for her, hidden in plain sight, made her throat close. “But why?” she whispered.

Mr. Callen did not answer immediately. Instead, he crouched, opening his notebook and jotting down the pigment patterns, the sequence of strokes. He was methodical, calm, every line of his posture controlled. Finally, he glanced at her again. “These codes align with sections in the De Luca archives. If I am correct, she was not painting for beauty alone. She was creating a trail.”

Alessia’s heartbeat pounded louder in her ears. A trail. To what? To who? She pressed her palm against the nearest marble pedestal for balance.

“What could she have wanted me to find?”

“Not what,” he replied softly. “Who. These codes tie directly to numbered letters catalogued decades ago. And if I am not mistaken, they point toward proof. Proof that you…” He stopped himself, his jaw flexing.

Alessia’s voice caught in her throat. “Say it.”

Mr. Callen’s eyes softened, though his tone remained firm. “Proof that you are not Alba.”

Her breath fractured. The air seemed to vanish from the vault as the words sank into her. Her grip on the pedestal tightened. The world tilted for a second and she forced herself to breathe, shallow but steady. “That cannot be true. Matteo said—”

“Matteo says what he wants you to believe,” Mr. Callen cut in, his voice quiet but edged.

Her eyes snapped to his. “You think he would lie about who I am?”

“I think Serafina left these codes because she knew someone would lie to you. She was building a safeguard. A way for the truth to survive.”

Alessia stepped back, her vision blurring. The old fear, the old ache, returned with claws. She wanted to deny it, to call it nonsense. Yet part of her already knew. Serafina’s hand had written the words on that photograph: For the girl. When she forgets who she is.

Her throat closed.

Mr. Callen reached for her arm, steady but not possessive. “Alessia,” he said, low and certain, “you are not imagining this. She wanted you to see it. That means she wanted you to know.”

Alessia shook her head, tears threatening to surface. “But if I am not Alba, then who am I?”

Silence stretched between them, filled only by the soft hum of the temperature controls. His gaze never left hers. For a moment it almost seemed like he wanted to step closer, to tell her more, but he restrained himself.

“You are not broken,” he said finally. “You are not less. Whatever Serafina left here, she believed you were worth protecting. That alone matters.”

Alessia turned back to the painting, her hand trembling as she brushed the air above it again. Every line seemed heavier now, every color carrying a weight she had never noticed before. She pressed her lips together, her heart stumbling.

A trail. A truth. A lie so deep that her entire identity might have been built on it.

She closed her eyes, drawing a shaky breath. The image of Matteo’s steady gaze filled her mind, his arms around her the night she had cried. His words: You do not need to remember. I will be everything now.

Her chest tightened.

If he had known this truth all along, then every moment between them was built on a foundation of silence. And if he had not known, why did Serafina feel the need to hide these codes in paintings at all?

When she opened her eyes again, Mr. Callen was still watching her. Not with hunger, not with pity, but with something harder to decipher. Something that almost unsettled her more than the codes themselves.

“We cannot tell anyone yet,” he said, his voice steady. “Not until we piece the codes together. If Matteo sees this, he will bury it.”

Alessia’s pulse stumbled again. She wanted to argue. She wanted to defend Matteo, to say he had protected her when no one else did. But the words caught in her throat, too heavy to speak.

Because deep down, she feared Mr. Callen was right.
Alessia’s breathing quickened the moment Mr. Callen’s words sank into her. Her palms grew clammy and she staggered back from the painting, her body pressing against the cold wall of the vault. The letters blurred before her eyes. She wanted to scream, but the sound caught in her throat like a stone.

Her chest rose and fell too fast, air tearing in and out. The walls of the vault felt smaller, closing in, every frame of Serafina’s work watching her like witnesses.

“I cannot,” she whispered, her voice cracked and fragile. “I cannot be someone else. That would mean everything I know is…”

Mr. Callen took a step toward her, his tone low, measured. “You need to breathe. Alessia. Look at me.”

But she shook her head, clutching her own arms until her nails left marks. “No. No. It is not real. It cannot be. Matteo would never… he would never…”

The sudden sound of footsteps snapped through the vault. Heavy, sure, echoing across the stone floor. Alessia froze.

Matteo.

He filled the doorway before either of them could move. The glow from the hall light framed his figure, his eyes sweeping from Alessia’s trembling form to Mr. Callen still too close beside her. The silence lasted a beat too long, his jaw tightening, before he stepped into the room.

“Piccola,” he said softly, his voice cutting through her panic with unnatural calm. He ignored Mr. Callen completely as though he did not exist. His focus was on her alone.

She gasped in a shaky breath, unable to hide the raw panic on her face. He crossed the distance, his hand rising to touch her cheek, then slipping behind her neck.

“You are safe,” he murmured. “Look at me. Only me.”

His words coiled around her, pulling her out of her spiraling thoughts. Before she could even question it, his mouth pressed against hers in a kiss. Firm, grounding, perfectly timed. Too perfectly timed. Her body softened against him out of reflex, the fear momentarily swallowed by the warmth of his touch. She felt steadied, yes, but also stripped of her breath, as if the kiss itself was both a comfort and a command.

When he pulled back, his eyes searched hers. He smiled faintly, a mask of reassurance. “See? Nothing can harm you while I am here.”

Her lips trembled, but she nodded, swallowing the storm that had risen inside her. He pressed his forehead briefly to hers, then pulled her close, holding her against his chest until her shaking eased.

To Mr. Callen he gave nothing. Not even a glance.

“I will take her from here,” Matteo said, his voice carrying the finality of a locked door. Then, as if it had been settled, he guided Alessia out of the vault with his arm wrapped firmly around her waist.

The walk back through the gallery blurred. Alessia barely registered the hush of the halls, the gleam of the floors, the muted paintings that seemed to watch her with hidden truths. Matteo’s arm was steady, grounding, but her mind twisted around that kiss, around its exact timing.

Why had it felt like he was not simply calming her, but silencing her?

At the villa later that night, after Matteo left her resting with a whispered promise to return, Alessia rose from the couch, restless. The vault lingered in her thoughts. Something inside her insisted she was not finished there.

She returned to the gallery alone. The vault was silent, untouched since she left. The light of her small lamp played over the sculptures arranged along the far wall. Her hands shook as she traced the edge of one statue, its base carved hollow. Something shifted within.

Her pulse thundered.

She tugged at the loosened corner and pulled free a thin, brittle folder. It was sealed with tape yellowed by years. Her breath caught as she peeled it back, the sound loud in the stillness.

Inside, aged papers lay folded, the ink faded but legible. She lifted the top sheet and froze.

The header read: MEDICAL RECORD.

The patient’s name was typed in bold: Alba D.

The folder slipped from her hands, papers scattering across the vault floor.

Her knees buckled as she dropped to the ground, staring at the name again and again as if repetition could change it. Tears stung her eyes, but she could not blink.

Alba.

The room spun around her, the fire in her chest burning so sharp she could barely breathe.

The truth she had begged for now screamed in her hands, louder than her own heartbeat. Serafina’s codes, the photograph, the whispers that she was not who Matteo said she was—every piece collided here.

Her fingers dug into the floor. The weight of the paper seemed un
bearable, its truth more destructive than any lie.

From outside the vault, faintly, a door clicked shut.

She was not alone.