Page 24 of Modern Romance Collection February 2025, 1-4

He pulled his hands back, shattered.

As if he had never known himself until this moment.

And he would never be whole again.

“I wish that I thought this was a good thing,” he said, and his voice came out little more than a rough whisper. “But I can only look back on my own childhood and wish that this had never come to pass. No child should have to go through the things I did.”

Her gaze shifted to something almost solemn, and he thought she held herself a bit more stiffly, as if he had hurt her. But if he had, she didn’t show it in any other manner. “What is so terrible about this place? What happened to you, Alceu? It can’t all have been chickens, can it?”

It was so late. And it was only the two of them, standing here surrounded by echoes in an abandoned ballroom polished to a shine by his own hands. He should know better than to allow the kind of intimacy that he could feel wrapping around them.

Hedidknow better.

Because it was so late. Because outside the windows, there was nothing but darkness for kilometers in all directions. Because he knew that everyone else in the castle was fast asleep.

Alceu had never beentorn.He did notshatter.He had known his mission in life since he was small.

This was an aberration and he could not make sense of it.

He could not understand why it was only Dioni who brought this out in him. Only Dioni who he could look at, think of the right thing to do, and then...not do it.

Tonight was only the latest example, and not nearly the worst. There had been ample opportunity for him to walk away from her on the terrace outside the Hotel Andromeda.

But he had moved closer instead. And tonight he stayed where he was, which was the same thing. “I have no memory of my parents ever getting along,” he told her shortly. “They had despised each other, always, as far as I was aware. But I have heard many stories of their younger years, when they confused that dislike for passion and made all of Europe witness to their explosions. Their theatrics.” He blew out a breath, yet couldn’t manage to make himself stop. “As it soured, they took lovers and flaunted them at each other, trying to cause the most damage. And they did. Over and over again. Since all they cared about was hurting each other, they paid no attention to the destruction they left behind them as they went. My father bullied and raged his way through his life, leaving only the walking wounded behind him. My mother’s many lovers fared little better when she was done with them.”

He stepped back, looking for condemnation, but all Dioni did was gaze back at him.

“I hope,” she said, quietly, “that no one judges me for my father’s behavior. You already know that he married my best friend. And while she and I never talked about it too closely, he was not exactly kind to her. He was Spyros Adrianakis and his legend was the only thing that mattered to him. Are you expecting me to judge you for your parents’ behavior?”

Maybe he was, because it threw him that she did not. Even as he understood that if she had, it would have helped. He would have been able to step back, to rethink.

Instead, he kept going. “I was only a boy when I realized that my parents did not contain their little games to the mainland,” Alceu told her. “Eventually I would learn the truth. My father was obsessed with power, and exerted his over everyone who came into contact with him, little caring if that meant he ground them underfoot. My mother, to this day, enjoys nothing so much as worming her way into other people’s marriages, for sport and entertainment. Then sitting back, laughing all the while, at the wreckage she leaves behind. But then, as a child, all I knew was that when I walked into a village I was greeted by people who spat on the ground, crossed themselves, and whispered that I was a devil.”

“That doesn’t make you one,” Dioni said at once, frowning. “It makes you a pawn, perhaps.”

Alceu couldn’t say that he liked that description. But he couldn’t argue with it, either.

These were not things he discussed. These were not stories he told.

But this was his wedding night.

This was Dioni, who could not seem to be dissuaded from looking at him as if she could, by the force of her gaze alone, make himgood. When he knew better.

And so he had no choice but to tell her the rest.

“The summer before I left for university I met a girl from the village at the base of the mountain.” His voice was hoarse. This wasn’t a story he had ever told anyone before. Not even her brother. “Her name was Grazia. I believed that I could rehabilitate my family name by engaging with the villagers. I helped build houses, I volunteered, and I tried to show that I was not like my family. And I thought that I was making strides, especially when I met her. She was a sweet, kind, happy girl.” He hated this story. There was a reason he never told it. “Grazia and I had an understanding when I left for university, and I counted the days to my return at Christmas so that I could see her again.” He shook his head, the memories too vivid, even now. “I had it all planned. I would propose. We would marry and she would come abroad with me. Then we would come back and, together, we would show the whole of Sicily that the Vaccaro family could be trusted again.”

He didn’t want to say these things. He didn’t want to think about that time.

But there was nothing around him but ghosts, and Dioni, and the child she carried that meant that there would be a future despite everything.

And she said nothing, still watching him intently, so he could not seem to help but go on.

“When I came home that Christmas, everything was changed.” His throat was dry. He made himself swallow, but it didn’t help. “My father had taken her to his bed. Sweet, kind Grazia never stood a chance. Because he could not abide even the faintest hint of happiness. And because there was no greater way to exert his power over me.”

“Alceu...” Dioni only whispered his name, her eyes wide. “I’m so sorry.”

“She didn’t matter to him,” Alceu bit out. “He made certain I walked in on them. Then he laughed. And then, when she ran from here, overwhelmed with the shame of it, andaccidentally fellfrom the cliff to her death, he only shrugged.” Alceu stared at her, so she would understand that he was not exaggerating. He could still remember his father’s laughter. The dismissive wave of his hand. The deep, disgusting understanding that it was more than likely that Grazia had jumped. “He told me that I should know better than to mess about with peasants.”

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