Giada didn't flinch. Instead, she smiled as if I had just paid her a compliment.
"Oh, come on, Seraphina," she said, almost playfully. "Don't be mad. If you really loved Nico, you'd want what's best for him, wouldn't you? Even if that means stepping aside."
Nico let out an impatient scoff, clearly annoyed by the delay.
"Hurry up and sign the papers already," he said coldly. "Stop dragging this out."
I looked at him then, really looked at him, and suddenly, the man standing in front of me blurred, replaced by the boy he used to be.
The nobody from a dirt-poor fishing village in Southern Italy. The one who was too proud, too ashamed to ask anyone for help. I remembered how he used to sit alone in the back rooms of the social club my father let him sweep, eating stale bread because it was all he could afford. His hair had been dry and brittle, his face pale, his shoulders hunched under the weight of hunger and quiet humiliation. A kid with shirt cuffs too short, always tugging them down over his wrists.
I remembered the day he collapsed during a pickup game behind the compound.
Everyone else froze, unsure what to do.