Chapter 7
Marcus came back without the capo pin.
Not asking for it.
Better.
He sat across from me.
“I keep remembering something.”
I waited.
“When I was nine, I broke my wrist.”
Victoria said nothing.
Marcus continued.
He fell from a horse.
Cried.
Victoria told him:
“Bellandi men finish what they start.”
So he climbed back onto the horse before anyone took him to the doctor.
The wrist worsened.
He wore a cast longer than necessary.
Family told the story for years as evidence of toughness.
I remembered laughing.
Damn.
“What do you think now?”
Marcus stared at his hands.
“I think I was nine.”
There.
Progress.
Then:
“When Isabella cried behind the wall, I thought Mother would open it after she calmed down.”
“You heard her?”
His face tightened.
“Yes.”
That was worse.
He heard my daughter.
Did nothing.
“Why?”
“Because Mother said she was teaching her.”
“And?”
Marcus swallowed.
“I believed her.”
Not enough.
“Why?”
Because if Victoria’s methods were wrong, Marcus had to reinterpret his own childhood.
The horse.
The hunger games.
The silent punishments.
Every story he used to prove he was strong.
If those things were abuse instead of training—
then what did that make all the pride built around surviving them?
He whispered:
“I don’t know who I am without those stories.”
I looked at him.
“That’s your problem now.”
He nodded.
No comforting him away from it.
Then he said:
“I don’t want the capo pin back yet.”
Interesting.
“Why?”
“Because I don’t trust my idea of strength.”
Best answer he had given.
So he worked under Rafe.
No command.
No humiliation.
Observation.
Responsibility without prestige.
May you like
Harder for him than punishment.
Useful.
