The front door barely closes behind us before Matteo explodes.
"Your little boyfriend thinks he can just show up here?" He pulls away from me, pacing the foyer like a caged animal, amber eyes blazing with barely contained fury. "Demand to take what's ours? Make threats at our gates?"
"Leave it, Matteo. Everything is over now."
"I should have gone out there myself."
His hands clench into fists at his sides. "Taught him what happens to men who touch what belongs to us. Who think they can just waltz in and take you away like you're some damsel waiting to be rescued."
Something snaps in me.
"I'm not yours." My voice cuts through his tirade like a blade. "I haven't chosen. Remember? That was the deal. I get to decide. And until I do, you don't get to act like you own me."
Matteo stops pacing. Stares at me like I've slapped him across the face.
"You're defending him?"
"I'm defending myself!"
I'm shaking now, all the emotion from Nico's confrontation boiling over—the grief, the guilt, the exhaustion of constantly being fought over like territory.
"I just sent away the only person from my old life who actually cared about me. The only one who came looking. Who worried. And you want to make this about your wounded pride?"
"Wounded pride?" His voice drops, dangerous. "You think that's what this is?"
"Isn't it? You couldn't stand watching me talk to another man. Couldn't stand that someone else might want me, might try to take me away from your little arrangement."
I step toward him, fury making me brave. "Don't make me regret staying, Matteo. Don't make me wonder if I chose wrong."
The silence is brutal.
Santo hovers in the doorway to my left, pale green eyes darting between us, clearly uncertain whether to intervene. Luca watches from the stairs, expression unreadable as always, arms crossed over his chest.
Matteo's jaw works. I see the struggle playing out across his face—the anger warring with something else, something softer he doesn't want to show.
For a moment I think he'll say something cruel. Something cutting that will slice right through whatever fragile thing is growing between us.
Instead, he turns on his heel and storms away. A door slams somewhere deep in the house, the sound echoing through the marble halls like a gunshot.
I stand there trembling, adrenaline draining away and leaving nothing but exhaustion in its wake.
"Gianna." Santo steps forward, reaching for me. "Are you okay? Do you want to talk about—"
"No." I hold up my hand, stopping him. "I just... I need to be alone right now."
I retreat to my room. Lock the door. Sink onto the bed and stare at nothing.
The ceiling is white. Pristine. Like everything else in this house—beautiful on the surface, hiding all the cracks underneath.
I think about Nico crying at the gates. About my mother's cold demands. About three brothers who want me but don't know how to share, who've never had to compromise on anything in their lives.
I think about the girl I used to be, and whether she'd recognize who I'm becoming.
Hours pass. The light outside my window shifts from afternoon gold to evening gray. I don't move. Don't eat. Just sit and let the emptiness wash over me.
Then—a soft knock at my door.
Not demanding like Matteo. Not hesitant like Santo.
"It's Luca."
I don't answer, but I don't tell him to leave either. After a moment, the door opens.
He doesn't ask permission to enter, but he doesn't crowd me either. Just leans against the doorframe, still in the same clothes from this morning, steel-gray eyes softer than I've ever seen them.
"He loved you," Luca says quietly. "The boy. I saw the way he looked at you through the monitors. The way he grabbed for you through those bars." A pause, weighted. "I understand why."
The admission hangs between us—raw, unexpected from a man who guards every word like currency. Every emotion like weakness.
"You do?"
"You're not easy to let go of, Gianna." He pushes off from the doorframe, crosses to me slowly. "I imagine that's something he and I have in common."
He sits beside me on the bed. Not touching, but close enough that I can feel his warmth. His hand finds mine—not grasping, not demanding. Just resting there, palm up, an offering.
An anchor.
"Matteo's anger isn't about the boy," he says, thumb tracing gentle circles on my knuckles. "It's about losing you. The possibility of it. We all feel it."
"Feel what?"
"Fear."
The word sounds foreign in his mouth. Wrong, almost, coming from a man who's never seemed afraid of anything.
"This thing between us, between all of us, none of us know how to do this. We've never shared anything we weren't willing to lose."
"And me?" I ask quietly.
His eyes meet mine, and I see it there—the crack in his armor, the vulnerability he guards so carefully. "You, we're not willing to lose."
I don't know what to say. So I lean into him instead, letting my head rest against his shoulder, breathing in the scent of him—expensive cologne and something darker, something that's just Luca.
He wraps an arm around me.
Careful. Almost hesitant. Like he's not used to offering comfort without conditions, without expecting something in return. Like tenderness is a language he's forgotten how to speak.
We stay like that for a long time. My head against his shoulder, his fingers tracing slow patterns on my arm. The room darkens around us as evening turns to night.
No heat. No demands. No power plays or seduction.
Just Luca Moretti, the ice king, letting me see the man beneath all that armor. The boy who lost his mother at fourteen and had to become a father to his brothers. The man who's carried everything for so long he's forgotten how to set it down.
"I'm sorry about earlier," I murmur against his shoulder. "What I said to Matteo. I didn't mean…"
"You meant every word." His voice is gentle, not accusing. "And you were right. We don't own you. None of us do. You get to choose. That's always been the deal."
"Even if my choice hurts one of you?"
"Even then." His arm tightens around me. "Though I hope it doesn't come to that."
When he finally stands to leave, he pauses at my bedside. Looks down at me with those steel-gray eyes that see everything—every crack, every wound, every piece of me I try to hide.
Then he leans down and presses a kiss to my forehead.
So gentle it makes my chest ache. So tender it threatens to undo me completely.
"Get some sleep, Gianna. Tomorrow will be easier."
He leaves, closing the door softly behind him.
I lie back against the pillows, pressing my fingers to the spot where his lips touched my skin. And I realize something that terrifies me.
Santo makes me feel cherished. Matteo makes me feel desired.
But Luca—Luca makes me feel understood.
It's the closest thing to tenderness I've ever seen from him. And somehow, it undoes me more than any passion ever could.