Burned Out of the Moretti Name Chapter 09

Burned Out of the Moretti Name Chapter 09

I moved into the company housing.

My manager was heading north for a new project and wanted me there to learn the process, so I went with her.

I had barely checked in when my mother called.

“He came to see me.”

I stood in the hotel corridor, keycard in hand, and said nothing.

“He didn’t ask where you were. Not directly. He asked about the fire. About the days before it. Whether you’d ever mentioned leaving Naples. Whether I’d noticed anything unusual.” She paused. “He still hasn’t gone back.”

I looked down at the card between my fingers and felt only a dull flicker of irritation.

What did it matter?

Only after I was gone had he learned how to value me.

My mother told me to keep my head down for a while. I told her I would.

That evening, my manager took me to a hotel by the lake to meet the project team.

Before we went in, I stepped out onto the terrace for air.

The wind coming off the water was cold.

I had just tucked my hair behind my ear when I heard a familiar voice behind me.

“…still nothing?”

I froze.

Then I turned and saw Lorenzo.

He stood only a short distance away. He looked thinner than the last time I had seen him. Harder.

Exhausted in a way that seemed to go deeper than sleep.

My first instinct was to leave.

Then he saw me.

He stopped dead.

A second later he was moving toward me, fast enough that I didn’t have time to think.

He stopped in front of me and stared as if he no longer trusted his own eyes.

“Sofia.”

His voice was rough.

I forced my face to stay calm.

“You’re mistaken.”

He didn’t move.

“You’re alive,” he said.

“I don’t know you.”

Then his eyes shifted to the spot just behind my left ear.

There was a faint crescent scar there, almost invisible unless my hair was up. Years ago, stepping off a

boat at the coast, I had slipped. He had reached for me too quickly, and the pearl earring he had given me tore the skin behind my ear badly enough to need stitches.

Most people would never notice it.

Lorenzo did.

I saw the truth settle in his face.

“It’s you,” he said, almost under his breath.

I said nothing.

“I thought you were dead.” His voice shook now. “I stood outside that fire and thought I’d lost you for

good.”

I turned my face slightly, refusing to answer.

He stepped closer.

“You can hate me. You can blame me for all of it. I won’t argue.” His voice dropped lower. “But don’t do this. Don’t stand here and pretend you don’t know me.”

I finally looked at him.

“What exactly do you want from me?”

His expression tightened.

“One conversation,” he said. “That’s all. Just let me speak to you.”

I held his gaze for a moment.

Then I said, quietly, “No.”

Before he could answer, I turned and walked back inside.

I didn’t look over my shoulder.

For the next few days, I did my best to act as though nothing had happened.

But Lorenzo did not stop.

He went back to my mother.

Then he called her.

Then he sent word through people who had known our family for years, asking for one meeting. A few minutes. One chance to speak to me face to face.

My mother refused him each time.

Still, he kept asking.

On the third day, she called me again.

“He says he’ll wait as long as it takes,” she said.

“He says he knows he has no right to ask anything of you,” she went on. “He says he only wants to see

you once.”

“I’m not seeing him,” I said.

“I know.”

She was quiet for a beat.

“I haven’t told him where you are. I won’t.”

“Thank you.”

When the call ended, I set the phone aside and sat there for a long time, staring at nothing.

A few days later, my manager stopped by my desk just before lunch.

“I’m stealing you for dinner tonight,” she said.

I looked up. “That sounds suspicious.”

“It probably is.” She smiled. “An old family acquaintance is in town. Good man. Easy company. You’ve

met before, though it was a long time ago.”

This time, I almost refused.

Then I thought better of it.

Dinner was safer than memory.

So that evening, I went.

When I stepped into the restaurant, my manager rose from the table at once.

“There you are,” she said. Then she turned to the man beside her. “I believe you two already know each

other. At least in theory.”

He stood.

For a second, I only stared.

Then I laughed softly in surprise.

Matteo Ferri.

I had known him as a child, back when he spent summers near my grandmother’s house,he was round- faced, awkward, forever trying too hard. The man standing in front of me now looked nothing like that

boy.

Still, the smile was the same.

“You remember me,” he said.

“Apparently I do.”

My manager looked between us, pleased with herself.

“Good,” she said. “Then I won’t have to do all the work.”