Chapter 45 -
He stubbed out his cigarette and immediately lit another one, the movements automatic. The actions of a man who used nicotine the way other people used alcohol or drugs. The way Leo probably used control and violence. The way Nia had started using Gabriel's company and Lucia's friendship. Everyone in this house had their vice, their coping mechanism, their way of pretending that the pressure was not slowly crushing them from the inside out.
"Christian is different," Micheal continued, his gaze fixed on the city lights sprawling out below them. "He accepted it. He embraced the role the Don gave him. He is angry all the time, but that anger is directed inward, you know? He hates himself for being part of this, but he hates the idea of leaving even more. So he takes it out on everyone around him. On Lucia. On his marriage. On anyone weak enough to not push back.".
"And Leo?"
"Leo decided to be the best at what they wanted him to be." Micheal turned to look at her, and his expression was achingly sad. "He thought if he was good enough, if he was ruthless enough, if he was perfect enough, then maybe he could protect us from the worst of it. Maybe he could be big enough to shield us from the machine we are all caught in.".
"Did it work?"
"Not even close." Micheal shook his head. "But that did not stop him from trying. That is why he is so intense, Nia. That is why he looks at you like you are a problem that needs solving or a threat that needs eliminating. Because his entire worldview is built on the premise that love is danger and attachment is weakness. Andrea was his one exception. His one moment of believing that maybe he could have something real in spite of everything.".
The name hung in the darkness like a curse. Andrea. The dead fiancée. The ghost who had rewritten Leo's entire personality and sent him back to the beginning of his emotional destruction.
"What happened to her?" Nia asked, though she was not sure she wanted to know the answer. She already understood that Andrea's death had fractured something fundamental in Leo. She could see it in the way he looked at Gabriel, could feel it in the distance he maintained from everyone who got too close.
"That is Leo's story to tell, not mine," Micheal said, and she heard the firmness in his voice. The boundary he was establishing. "All I will say is that she was good. She was real, the same way you are real. And losing her convinced Leo that real things could not survive in this world. That goodness was fragile. That love was just another way to be destroyed.".
They stood in silence for a long moment. The music inside had shifted again, something with a harder edge. Somewhere in the ballroom, men were making deals and promising loyalty and planning violence. The machinery of the DeSanto family was humming along, operating on routines that had been established before Nia was even born.
"He is not going to save you," Micheal said finally, and his voice was gentle despite the cruelty of the words. "I know you are hoping that somehow, because he defended you against Santiago, because he reads bedtime stories to Gabriel, because he has shown you moments of humanity, that maybe he will choose you over the Don. But he will not. When the moment comes, when the pressure gets high enough, he will do what he has always done. He will prioritize the family. He will prioritize his promises. He will prioritize everything except the actual people he is supposed to protect.".
"I know," Nia said, and she did know. Somewhere deep down, beneath all the hope and the foolish belief that maybe someone could be saved by kindness, she had always known. "I know he will not save me. I just thought maybe he might see me as something other than a tool. Maybe as a person.".
"He does see you as a person," Micheal said quietly. "That is the tragedy of it. He sees you clearly, and it terrifies him. Because if you are real, then your suffering is real. Your fear is real. Your right to have a life outside of this mansion is real. And Leo cannot afford to acknowledge any of that because it would require him to admit that what he is doing is wrong.".
Nia felt tears start to slide down her cheeks. She let them come, did not bother to wipe them away. What was the point of maintaining her armor here, alone on a balcony with Micheal, who had already peeled back his own carefully constructed facade?.
"I do not know how to survive this," she whispered.
"Yes, you do," Micheal said, and his voice was fierce with certainty. "You have been surviving since you were seven years old. You survived foster care. You survived abandonment. You survived heartbreak. You survived being kidnapped by a mafia family and kept prisoner in their mansion. You are the strongest person I have ever met, Nia Wallace. And you are going to survive this too.".
He pulled her against him, and she let herself lean into his embrace. Not because she believed him. Not because she thought that believing in herself could somehow change the mathematics of her situation. But because sometimes, survival was just about getting through the next moment. And the next moment after that. And the next moment after that.
The balcony door swung open with enough force to rattle the glass in its frame. The sound cut through the night like a gunshot, sharp and unmistakable. Nia felt Micheal's arms stiffen around her a fraction of a second before she registered the presence in the doorway.
Leo DeSanto filled the space like a gathering storm. His white dress shirt was partially unbuttoned, the fabric wrinkled in a way that suggested he had been tearing at it. His jaw was clenched so tightly that Nia could see the muscle working beneath his skin, jumping with the effort of containment. But it was his eyes that made her breath catch. Those gray eyes had turned the color of winter steel, cold and cutting and absolutely furious.
"The party is over, Micheal," Leo said, his voice so quiet it was almost conversational. Which meant it was far more dangerous than a shout could ever be. "Micheal, you understand me?"