Page 174 of Modern Romance September 2025 1-4

“None, this time around.”

Luliana’s mouth dropped at the crude reminder, but it brought Diego no joy because it was only the truth.

Sadly it wasn’t enough of a truth to dislodge Luliana from doing whatever it was she was hoping to do. Because she kept talking. Determined, clearly, to tell whatever story she’d approached him to tell.

“You weren’t here, but I remember the last ball. My! Aurora got into quite the row with your mother.” The woman dabbed her eyes, but Diego could not find any true sadness there. The dark gaze darted around to the chandeliers, the expensive crystal, likely totaling it all down to the cent.

She’d wanted to buy the castello from him. Had harassed him, in fact, those first few weeks under the guise ofhelpinghim.

He’d forced Amelia to handle it as her first job as his assistant. He blinked once, wondering how he’d forgotten such things. But he’d been…

His first instinct was to call it guilt-ridden, but these days, with Amelia’s influence, he couldn’t seem to pretend it was anything other than grief and depression. And in the depths of that, this woman had poked at him.

He’d have to ask Amelia what she’d done to get her to back off.

“I’ve never seen a child say such nasty things to their parents,” Luliana continued. “Certainly not infrontof people.” She tsked, as if it were a great shame. Instead of the fact that Aurora beingdeadwas the shame.

Diego would have felt anger. Maybe it was kindling underneath the heavy swath of darkness. He wasn’t sure.

But the last ball, the one he was supposed to have attended but had decided last minute not to put himself through it, had been right before they’d died. And Aurora and Mother had gotten into a public fight.

He could only hope they’d made amends before…

It was a dark pall, or it would have been, one that sat there and festered, if Amelia had not interrupted.

She slid into the seat next to Diego, moving her arm over the back of his neck. “My favorite memory of Aurora was the year she performed an entire ballet recital at the Christmas Ball. Did you ever hear about that, Diego?”

He could only stare at her, a bright little light in all this vicious darkness. He didn’t answer, but she went on with the story anyway.

Aurora had meant to perform a piano recital but had never practiced. So she’d made Amelia play while she performed a little ballet routine she’d designed herself. It had impressed everyone, even Mother, who had always wanted Aurora to be a pianist, not a dancer.

The story was bittersweet. Since Aurora was dead and hadn’t gotten to live any life she should have been able to, but something about the laughter, about how easy he could picture Aurora eating up the crowd’s—and their parents’—reactions made it feel as though she lived on. In that memory that had everyone laughing or smilingnow.

Amelia had done that—not just here, he realized in a startling kind of wonder as the decadentstruffoliwas presented to the table. But constantly since she’d threatened him down the mountain.

She had taken all his darkest edges and offered them a kinder edge. Every horrible memory softened with a reason or a better memory. Every stab of guilt he tried to carry, she tried to lift up and away from him.

As if this penance wasn’t his to carry.

She made that seem possible. Amelia made it all seem like he wasn’t deluding himself. He could have a life. One with happiness and joy and people andher, and it wouldn’t be a degradation of the people he’d lost.

When that could never be true.

He made it through the rest of the dinner, noted how easily Amelia kept Luliana busy and away from him, down to escorting her to her room for the night after Luliana claimed there was something wrong with her accommodations.

Amelia insisted on taking care of it herself. And while she did, and everyone else drifted off to their rooms, happily full and a little drunk, merry and bright, Diego found himself alone in the great ballroom, where the ball would be tomorrow. It was dark except for all the Christmas lights that twinkled on the tree.

And he knew, in this darkness punctuated by light, that he had allowed himself too much. This was no longer pain. It was something bigger, something he did not deserve.

So now it was time to cut it off.

He had never shown up for anyone who needed him. He had only caused pain. So he could not take this chance at something more than darkness.

He would see the ball through. He would not makethisharder onAmelia. But after…

After, they would need to come to an understanding. His first instinct was to run. To disappear.

But she’d reminded him of the lesson Bartolo had been so desperate to impart on him. He had a responsibility. He could not run away any longer. His choices, good and bad, were his. And they had effects on other people.