Morning Shadows
Luca woke with a strangled gasp. The first thing he noticed was sunlight spilling from behind the curtains, casting the bedroom in a pale Tuscan gold. But his chest heaved like it was filled with fire, lungs refusing to obey.
He was twelve again.
The sound came first in the dream—gunfire cracking through marble hallways, echoes shattering the villa’s silence. His mother’s hand on his shoulder, shoving him beneath the staircase, her eyes wide with terror and love. Then muffled shouting. The distinct sound of pain and silence.
A silence that should have held a newborn’s wail but never did.
Luca tried to claw himself out of it, but the memory had teeth. His mother’s blood, her trembling body hunched over a wound that had nearly killed her. And the truth whispered later by doctors and housemaids alike: the baby hadn’t survived. His baby sister. The one he had named in his head promised to protect even before she was born. Gone before she took her first breath.
He heard himself whisper her name now, broken and raw, though he had never dared to speak it aloud. His face was wet before he even realized he was crying.
A hand cupped his cheek, warm and calloused. Marco’s voice pulled him from the nightmare like a rope in a storm.
“Luca.” Rough with sleep, but steady, immovable. “Amore. You’re here. Look at me.”
Luca blinked against the blur of tears. The room came back in pieces—the sheets tangled around his waist, the pink chicken plush squashed tight against his chest, Marco’s looming presence, hair mussed, eyes sharp and focused entirely on him.
But his body still shook, braced as though expecting bullets.
“I couldn’t save her,” he whispered hoarsely. His throat closed around the words. “I couldn’t save anyone. Not her. Not him. Not—”
“Shh.” Marco’s thumb brushed away another tear. He leaned closer, gaze steady as stone. “Luca. You were a boy. It wasn’t yours to carry then.”
Luca’s breath hitched. “But it feels the same. The chemist—the way they took him—I wasn’t fast enough. I’m never fast enough.”
Marco didn’t flinch, didn’t let the words pierce him. Instead, he pulled Luca forward, arms wrapping around him with the same ferocity he gave his men in battle. “No, tesoro. Listen to me. You are not that child anymore. You are not helpless.”
He pressed a kiss into Luca’s curls, his hold fierce, anchoring. “Breathe with me. Right here. Right now.”
Luca sagged into him, trembling, his face buried against Marco’s chest. His heartbeat thundered in his ears, but Marco’s was steady, solid, something to cling to. Slowly, painfully, Luca forced air into his lungs to match Marco’s rhythm. In, out. In, out.
“Good,” Marco whispered, his hand rubbing circles into Luca’s back. “That’s it. Just us. Just now.”
Luca clung tighter, muffling his voice. “I don’t want to think anymore.”
Marco shifted slightly, easing them back against the pillows.“You don’t have to think about the war today. Not about plans, not about losses. Let me take it for a while. Let me take care of you.”
The words cut straight through Luca’s defenses. He was always the Don. The one who carried the weight, who made the choices, who bore the guilt. But right now—just now—Marco’s voice made it sound possible to let go.
“There’s my boy,” Marco whispered, rocking him slightly, kissing his curls. “You’re safe. With me. With Henrietta.” He tapped the plush between them, voice teasingly soft. “You think she wants breakfast? Or BunBun to join her?”
A broken sound left Luca, something between a sob and a laugh. “Henrietta’s enough.”
Marco smiled against his curls. “Henrietta, it is.”
They stayed like that for a long moment, wrapped in sunlight and silence. Then Marco shifted again, coaxing.
“Come on,” he murmured, tugging gently at Luca’s hand. “Kitchen time. I’ll make you toast with honey, the way you like it.”
“Marco…” Luca’s voice was small. “Don’t leave.”
“I won’t.” Marco kissed his temple, firm as a vow. “Ever. You’ll sit on the counter, feet swinging, Hen in your lap. I’ll do the work.”
It was ridiculous. Luca knew it was ridiculous. Don Valeri didn’t sit on countertops like a child waiting for breakfast. But the exhaustion in his bones, the ache in his chest, the quiet in Marco’s voice—he let himself be guided anyway.
Ten minutes later, he sat perched on the marble counter, drowning in one of Marco’s t-shirts, shoulder slipping bare, scar barely visible, Henrietta clutched tight against his chest. His legs dangled, brushing the cabinets, feet swinging aimlessly.
Marco moved around the kitchen with practiced ease, barefoot, humming under his breath as he buttered toast and sliced strawberries. He glanced up every so often, making sure Luca hadn’t drifted too far into the storm again.
“You want coffee or milk, cucciolo?” Marco asked lightly.
Luca hesitated. “Milk.” His cheeks warmed at the word choice, but Marco only smiled like it was the most natural answer in the world.
“Milk it is.” Marco poured a glass and slid it across the counter, careful and deliberate. “Cold. Just like you like it.”
Luca wrapped both hands around the glass, sipping quietly. The world narrowed to simple things—the taste of milk, the weight of Henrietta, the hum of Marco’s voice.
For the first time in days, he wasn’t Don Valeri planning a war. He was just Luca, a boy with his plush, being fed honey toast by the man who refused to let him drown in ghosts.
When Marco finally slid the plate toward him—toast golden, drizzled with honey, topped with strawberries—Luca felt the tightness in his chest ease another fraction.
Marco leaned his elbows on the counter across from him, watching with quiet satisfaction as Luca took the first bite. “Good?”
Luca nodded, cheeks full, and Marco chuckled. “My boy.”
They stayed there for a while, sunlight warming the tiled floor, the world outside temporarily forgotten. Marco talked idly about nothing—whether the lemon tree in the courtyard would fruit early this year, how Antonio had finally fixed the espresso machine. Luca listened, chewing slowly, letting Marco’s words wash over him like steady waves.
Eventually, Marco reached over, brushing a crumb from Luca’s cheek. “After breakfast, we’ll sit in the garden. You can hold BunBun, too, if you want.”
Luca glanced at him, hesitation flickering. “Just…sit?”
“Just sit.” Marco’s smile softened. “You don’t have to think about chemists or wars or ghosts. Just me, you, sunshine, and your ridiculous plush family.”
Luca snorted faintly, but the sound was gentler than before. He pressed Henrietta tighter against his chest.