Alessia's POV
The world stopped.
The clinking of cutlery ceased. No one breathed.
For a heartbeat, I thought I had misheard her.
Then I saw the look on Adrian's face—his fork frozen halfway to his mouth, his expression fan odd mix between shock and murder—and realized I hadn't.
Engagement.
As in… marriage.
To him.
I blinked. "I'm sorry—what?"
Across the table, Sophie gasped like she'd just won the lottery. "Oh my gosh, really?!"
Carl looked like he might pass out.
Mr. Knight's eyes widened, then narrowed sharply at Mom. "We were not supposed to tell them like this. In fact," he muttered, "after what we just witnessed, we weren't supposed to tell them tonight at all."
Seriously. Was that what he had to say right now?
"Interesting," Luca drawled, leaning back and folding his arms.
I shot him a glare before turning on Dad.
"Oh, really? When exactly were you going to tell us? Is this what you meant by that comment about my cousins in Sicily? And if you were planning to barter me off like a crate of olive oil, why—" I stabbed a finger toward Adrian, "—would you give me to him? Did he ask you? Was this his brilliant plan?"
"I had nothing to do with this," Adrian said quietly, though there was a razor-sharp look he shot at his father. "This must be some kind of joke."
I didn't care. I wasn't done.
"Dad," I said, voice tightening. "This can't be real. You wouldn't do this to me. So what's going on?"
His silence settled over the room like ash, heavy and suffocating.
"Dad!" I snapped, desperation bleeding through the anger.
Finally, he exhaled. "We made a promise to each other when we were young, Allie… and we intend to keep it."
A stupid word—promise. It landed like a hammer on the fault line inside my chest.
"You made a promise," I whispered. "You mortgaged my entire future for a fucking childhood promise?"
Heat surged behind my eyes, hot and humiliating. My voice cracked as fury clawed up my throat.
"You decided my life for me. You hid it. You planned it. You subjected me to the horror of his presence," I spat, pointing straight at Adrian. "And now you tell me… I'm supposed to marry him?"
My voice wavered on that last word, breaking like a bone under pressure.
Dad's expression tightened, but he held my gaze. "Alessia—"
"No."
The word slipped out before I could stop it. Not loud. Not sharp. Just… small. And broken.
And somehow... that was worse.
"You don't get to 'Alessia' me," I whispered. "Not after this."
I pushed my chair back. The legs screeched across the marble, slicing through the silence. No one dared to move. Even Luca's usual smirk had vanished.
My eyes burned. My throat tightened. I refused to let a single tear fall—not here, not in front of him.
Adrian's father cleared his throat. "Perhaps," he said carefully, glancing between Dad and me, "we should revisit this decision—"
"Oh, so now you want to revisit it?" I laughed, a sharp, humorless sound. "What changed? The part where I humiliated your son? Or the part where you realized he doesn't want this either?"
Adrian's jaw ticked, but he didn't speak. He didn't deny it.
He didn't defend himself.
He didn't defend me.
Of course, he didn't.
Anger surged through me, trying to break free from my eyes.
Without saying anything else, I headed for the door.
"Alessia!" Dad called out, but I didn't answer him.
Didn't even look back.
I hate him.
I hate them.
I hated all of them so much!
Worse, no one ever really cared to know why.
***
I stepped inside the Library, which was also the family Treasury, and shut the double-decked doors.
It's been an hour since I went to my room, and it was starting to feel stuffy
The library was the one place in this house that still felt like mine.
I paced between the tall shelves, breathing hard, my palms still trembling with the residue of anger. Twelve years—and now this.
I turned a corner into a quieter section, desperate to be alone, only to freeze.
He was there.
Adrian stood between the stacks, hands in his pockets, as if he belonged here—as if he hadn't been the last person I ever wanted to see.
"What," I said, my voice slicing sharper than I felt, "are you still doing in my house?"
He didn't flinch. Of course, he didn't. "I needed space. Plus, as you know, I loved reading, so it seemed like the perfect place."
I rolled my eyes. I didn't understand what people saw in him.
"Then, I was hoping to talk to you," He added.
My heart did a flip. But I pushed it away.
A bitter laugh scraped out of me. "Twelve years too late, Adrian. I'm not interested in excavating graves."
He took a step toward me.
Something in me snapped.
My hand moved before my mind caught up. An ornamental knife—more decoration than weapon—sat tucked between old atlases on the nearest shelf. I grabbed it, metal cold against my palm.
"Stay back," I warned.
But he just kept coming toward me like nothing I said—nothing I felt—mattered.
I backed up instinctively, the knife trembling in my grip. His eyes tracked every movement, unreadable, and still calm.
"Stop," I warned, lifting the blade slightly.
He didn't.
The shelves brushed my back. My shoulder hit wood. My breath caught.
I had become cornered.
"Adrian," I snapped, raising the knife higher, "don't come any closer—"
He closed the distance in a single stride.
His hand shot out, faster than my breath, faster than my panic. His fingers wrapped around my wrist, forcing my arm up, pinning it—and the knife—above my head against the wall with a fast movement.
My breath hitched.
Not because he was too close.
But because he dared to look at me like I was the one invading his space.
His other hand braced beside my head, caging me in, fish fingers brushing my skin.
My pulse thundered.
For a moment—for one reckless, insane moment—his face came inches from mine, and the look in his eyes wasn't cold. It wasn't cruel. It was something else. Something hotter. Something that stole the breath from my lungs.
I felt his breath near my cheek.
Felt the tension like a wire pulled too tight.
He leaned in.
My chest tightened. My eyelids fluttered despite every furious instinct I had. I shut my eyes, stupidly, traitorously convinced—
—for one suspended second that...
...he was going to kiss me.
A low sound rumbled from his chest.
Not a sigh.
Not a growl.
A laugh.
A quiet, cruel, and amused laugh.
"I see you're still the same," he murmured, his breath brushing my skin. "The same emotionally weak girl who pretends she's strong."
My eyes snapped open.
His smirk cut like a blade.
"Just so you know," he added, pressing my wrist harder against the wall until the knife trembled uselessly in my grip, "I only kept quiet out of respect for our fathers."
His voice dropped, colder than any steel I could've held.
"But, I would never want to marry someone like you."
My stomach plummeted.
"A Mafia princess?" he finished, tilting his head in mock pity. "No thanks."
He released me—not gently. My hand fell, the knife clattering to the floor in a metallic burst that echoed through the shelves.
I stood there, breathless and burning.
Then he stepped away from me without a second glance.
Not even a pause.
Not even a flicker of regret.
Just turned and started walking toward the exit between the rows of shelves, hands sliding back into his pockets like pinning me to a wall had been nothing but an inconvenience.
I couldn't believe him.
Heat roared up my throat—anger, humiliation, something far uglier twisting in my chest.
Coward.
A coward who could shatter me, dismiss me, laugh in my face, and then walk away like I didn't matter.
He had done this years ago, and he was still doing it now.
And worse, I had let him.
Again!
And who was he to call me emotional? Or a princess?
He had no idea what it was like to be me.
He was a fucking pampered brat who wouldn't no what it meant to walk a day in my shoes.
My eyes burned as everything replayed all over again in my head.
"I HATE YOU!" I screamed.
The words ripped out of me raw and ragged, before I could stop them.
He didn't stop.
Didn't even fucking turn.
My fingers curled around the knife before my mind caught up.
The rage was faster than my thought, faster than my breath.
I hurled it.
The blade sliced through the air with a vicious whistle—
—but he moved.
He was so fast I almost didn't see it.
Adrian snatched something off a nearby table—a heavy metal bookend—and swung it with reflexes honed from a life far different than mine.
CLANG.
The knife hit the bookend instead of his back, ricocheting off with a metallic crack, clattering to the floor.
The blade splintered, a clean, impossible fracture.
Sparks—no, light—streaked up like a tiny starburst.
For a moment, the study was filled with a bright white flare. The sound was not human, but otherworldly, like glass calling to lightning.
Suddenly, my legs gave out, and I collapsed to the floor.
My eyes fluttered open, and I saw my body in front of me...
...staring at me, confused.
Then—everything went dark.