Page 25 of Until You Break

A boy on a balcony pinned a sheet to the line, forgetting the clothespin in his hand. His mother appeared, saw Damiano, and pulled him inside without a word.

By the next corner the street noise had shifted, voices lower, footsteps quicker, air leaning to listen.

“You’re quiet,” Damiano said, matching my pace.

“I’m saving it.”

“For what?”

“In case you make me talk to people.”

He huffed something like a laugh. “I like you talking to me.”

“That’s not people.”

His palm pressed warmer at my back. “Better.”

We crossed into blocks that wore their years, pavement cracked, balconies rusting at the edges, potted plants leaning in crooked arrangements. A window above released cigarette smoke and the scratch of an old record, a woman’s voice stitched to static.

I knew these smells. Bread proofing heavy with yeast. The city always spoke to me through my nose first. The scents tangled with memory.

Yeast and stone dust, wet iron from the tram rails, the faint drift of paint thinner my mother always carried on her sleeves.

I used to sit on these steps with a box of chalks she’d bartered from Marta’s shop, drawing crooked lions and doorways until my fingers turned the color of dust. Enzo would steal rolls still warm from the baker’s window and drop half in my lap, grinning like he’d invented hunger.

Some afternoons my mother would lean out the window, sketchbook balanced on her knee, and whistle for us to come back before the light shifted.

The air tasted the same now, but different too, because Damiano’s hand was at my back, not hers.

Because the only thing in my pocket was a leash, not chalk.

“Emilietto?” a voice called, soft with surprise.

I turned. Signora Rosa stood at the bus stop, market bag hooked in the crook of her elbow, the same thin blue scarf she wore every winter. She used to offer me a seat when the 103 was crowded, pressing candies into my palm and telling me to eat more or the wind would carry me away.

“Signora,” I said, and the word tasted like childhood.

Her eyes shone. “Madonna, look at you. Your mother would—” She broke off, glancing at the men around us. The smile steadied. “You come back to paint our doors, eh?”

“I…maybe,” I said, smiling before I could stop myself. “If I can find the colors.”

Damiano’s hand tightened at my back, not cruel, just impatient, a clock striking. “Later,” he said, polite enough to be a warning.

The word clamped over my ribs.

I had been away for years, Paris and its classrooms, the city I never truly returned from because the first night back, they took me. Palermo had lived without me, but the streets still remembered.

Signora Rosa’s hand was warm on my wrist, the kind of touch that used to anchor me to streets instead of chains. His interruption turned it foreign, like he’d put a price tag on kindness. Her gaze slid to him and back to me, a dozen questions choosing silence.

“Good boy.” Damiano’s voice softened, steering me away with the pressure of his hand. He guided me forward, and I let him.

The old church appeared like a ghost that hadn’t learned it was dead. Boards on the windows cast slatted shadows, gold paint on the trim curled like petals. In my mind the candles still burned, amber light chasing itself along the nave through the night.

I’d been inside a hundred times. Perfume clinging to red velvet chairs. My mother in the lounge, sketchbook on her knees, wine leaving a ring on a cocktail napkin. She always said the trick was catching faces when they thought no one was looking.

Damiano followed my gaze. “You’d paint that.”

“The building,” I said. “And the ghosts in its lungs.”

“Both,” he agreed, mouth near my temple. “We’ll hang it where it outlives Riccardo’s name.”

Two men loitered outside a shuttered shop, voices low. One tipped his chin, not greeting, not insult, just a mark. Damiano didn’t return it. He watched them the way you watch weather.

We passed a wall worn back to its first layer: the Valenti crest, faded but stubborn, almost gone.

“Some lines don’t fade,” he said softly. “Some people don’t forget.”

“Should I?”

“Not yet.”

A cluster of older men fell silent as we approached. One’s mouth tightened, another stared into his espresso as if it had answers. No one spoke. Everyone watched.

“What do you think happened to your mother?” Damiano asked, his emphasis deliberate, turning the words into a knife.

The question was clean and sharp. It landed and stayed.

“My father said it was your mother,” I said flatly. “All of you.”

“And you believed him?”

“When the man with a gun sits at your table, you believe what he wants.”

“And now?”

I watched my breath cloud. “Yes. It was the only truth we knew.” The admission scraped raw, and the ache of missing her hollowed through me.

Grief pressed hard, so sharp I wanted to fold into myself, to hide from it, to find some other pain I could control instead.

Damiano’s eyes caught mine, too sharp to miss the flicker.

His thumb pressed firmer at my nape, a silent command not to disappear into myself.

“Mama would never have hurt your mother,” Damiano said, the words low but honest. “She was the only person she loved beside us.” His voice smoothed after, edge gone where others could hear. The thought scraped at me, but I let it linger in the back of my mind for now, too raw to touch. “Walk.”

We did. Two streets over a figure leaned on a parked car, one ankle crossed over the other, cigarette burning slow.

The sight stole my breath. It hit like a fist and a gift at once, shock and elation tangling so hard my chest hurt.

For a second I forgot the guards, forgot Damiano’s hand at my neck.

The whole street thinned to him: the curve of his shoulders, the way smoke curled above his head like time hadn’t dared touch him.

Joy punched up raw and dizzy, my knees nearly giving out.

I hadn’t realized how much of me still believed he was gone until he wasn’t.

He saw me in the same instant. His face cracked open, shock first, then something breaking loose that made his mouth tremble. The cigarette fell from his fingers.

“Mimmo,” he breathed. His eyes flicked once toward Damiano, wary and unwilling, and Damiano’s expression didn’t shift.

“Fratellino.” The word tore out of me, voice cracking under the weight of joy and disbelief.

“You’ve got five minutes.”

The cigarette fell from Enzo’s fingers.

I was already moving, crossing the street like gravity had been waiting for this. He caught me up hard against him, arms around me so fierce they hurt.

“Fuck,” he muttered into my hair, voice rough and shaking. “It’s so damn good to see you. I thought…God, I thought I’d never get this again.”

“I know,” I whispered, clinging tighter. “But I’m here.”

The minutes slipped past too quickly, too precious.

Enzo held me at arm’s length, looking me over with a grin that cracked through his rough edges, then pulled me back in.

We traded half-whispered memories, small laughs, words that didn’t matter except to prove we were both still here.

For those stolen breaths, it was almost like we were boys again on the steps with stolen bread between us.

Enzo squeezed me once more, soft and fierce. “We’ll see each other soon, Mimmo. Perhaps even sooner than you think.” His hand lingered at the back of my neck like he didn’t want to let go. I whispered back, “I can’t wait.”

A sharp whistle cut from the corner. Valenti guards, watching. Enzo stiffened but didn’t look away from me.

Damiano’s grip closed hard, pulling me back against him. “Come now, piccolino.”

I watched Enzo step back toward the alley, his shoulders stiff, every line of him reluctant to go. The whistle sounded again, sharper, and he finally turned, disappearing around the corner with one last glance over his shoulder.

Damiano’s voice cut in low at my ear, meant only for me. “I let you have this. Remember who allowed it.”

“You organized this? For me?” I couldn’t believe it. My heart clenched anyway, touched and irritated at once. “Should I thank you? I should be able to move around as I please,” I snarled.

“Perhaps.” Damiano shrugged, careless. “And one day, you will. I keep what I adore, which means I won’t let you walk through enemy territory without protection.”

“Enemy territory? You’re incredible. This is my home.”

“No. I am your home.” His thumb found the back of my neck and pressed until my pulse jumped under it, a silent brand. He didn’t need to raise his voice; the weight of his hand said he’d already decided whose body left this street with bruises.

Damiano’s voice lowered again, almost satisfied. “Just like I promised you last night, tomorrow you’ll be on your knees for me.”

He pulled back just far enough to look at me, eyes burning like he hadn’t slept since the last time we touched. Protective fury flickered there already, banked but waiting.

Adrian’s head snapped toward the alley. Two blacked-out cars slid onto the main road. “Let’s get the fuck out of here.” His tone was low but urgent, slicing through the standoff.

“Come on, kitten. Inside. Let me take you home.” Damiano pushed me into the SUV. The door shut, engine turning over. The guards shifted outside, knuckles whitening on their weapons before settling, the tension of the standoff still in their hands.

“Thank you for today,” I murmured, still watching the street fade.

Guilt pressed in sharp. I’d left him behind again.

Enzo’s voice still clung to me, softer than the street would ever allow.

I wanted to hold onto it, but Damiano’s presence was heavier, swallowing every thought until nothing was left but him.

“As I said, I keep what I adore,” he said, almost gentle. “You’re for me to worship and to keep.” Damiano’s gaze caught mine in the reflection, unreadable for a beat before it sharpened. “I also keep my promises.”

His zipper rasped slow, deliberate, loud in the hush of the SUV. He leaned back, spreading his thick thighs, a cruel smile pulling at his mouth. “What did I promise you last night?”

Heat crawled up my neck at the memory of him bending me over the table, of fucking me into oblivion. “That I—that I—” I swallowed, throat suddenly dry. My cock throbbed in my pants.

“That I, what?” His eyes flashed, hand guiding his cock free, heavy and flushed. He pushed me onto my knees, tapped the blunt head against my lips, smearing precum like a signature. “Come on, marito mio, thank your husband properly. Spread those pretty lips around my cock.”