Page 210 of Legacy

He doesn’t say where we’re going.

Just drives.

Until we turn down a side street. A little more run-down. Older.

We pull in front of a narrow brick townhouse. Faded red. Three stories. Cracked window frames. The vines crawling up the side are overgrown, wild, like the building is trying to disappear.

He shuts off the engine.

I watch him.

He’s staring at the house like he’s seeing something no one else can.

“This was my mother’s childhood home,” he says softly. “I used to play here when I was a kid.”

I look back at the building.

“You… grew up here?”

He shakes his head. “No. We grew up at the estate. But she always said this one felt like home to her. My father bought it outright for her early in their marriage. She’d come here when she needed quiet.”

His voice dips into something almost reverent. “This is the house I picture when I think of her happy.”

My chest tightens for him.

After he first mentioned his mother’s passing, I did my research. What happened to Lucia Amato is horrific. The kind of story whispered between powerful men when they warn each other about the cost of this life. The reason my father was always so guarded. The reason Luciano taught me how to fight.

He opens the car door for me and offers his hand. I take it, letting him lead me up the steps. A keypad on the door—numbers punched in, a soft beep, and the lock clicks open.

The townhouse creaks like it remembers him.

Dust drifts in the slats of morning light, swirling above the wooden floors like whispers. Like ghosts.

I follow him into the front room, where white sheets still hang over the furniture like old bones draped in linen. The place is beautiful in that way timeworn things often are, edges softened by years, corners haunted by silence.

“She used to read in that chair by the window,” he says, voice quieter now.

I look toward it, sunlight hitting the armrest, golden and forgiving.

“She came here a lot?” I ask.

He nods. “She came here when she wanted to feel… normal.”

I glance around again. It doesn’t feel normal. It feels hollow, but holy. Like a chapel built on broken prayers.

“It looks like it’s been empty for years,” I say. “What do you use it for now?”

He hesitates.

His body stills—just enough for me to notice.

Then he turns toward the hallway.

“Come on,” he says. “I’ll show you.”

He leads me down a narrow corridor where the wallpaper is more peeled, the air colder.

A door creaks open under his hand.