REINA

Paolo hadn't lowered the gun.

He stood in the destroyed doorway with the weapon trained on his father and his chest heaving and his eyes burning with something I had never seen from him in two years of marriage. Something that had clearly been building for much longer than two years. Much longer than I had known him.

Domenico hadn't moved either.

They faced each other across the room — father and son — and the air between them was so charged and so ancient that I felt like an intruder inside it. Like I was witnessing something that had been building toward this exact moment for decades.

"Paolo."...