THE SECOND ANIMAL

Luca Moretti, the former boss of the Chicago underworld, was standing in the sunlight, looking at me with a vulnerability that took my breath away.

He reached into his pocket.

“I didn't want to do this in the city,” Luca said, his voice thick with emotion. “I didn't want the ghosts of my past anywhere near this moment.”

He didn't pull out a gun. He didn't pull out a ledger.

He pulled out a small, simple wooden box.

He took a step closer, stopping just inches from me. He didn't drop to one knee—he had already done that once, for a dog, and for a boy, and I didn't need him to bow to me. I just needed him to stand beside me.

“For the last twenty years, I lived in the dark,” Luca said, his dark eyes locked onto mine. “I thought that was all I deserved. But then you walked into my dining room, carrying my dog, and you refused to back down from the monster everyone else was terrified of.”

I felt tears welling in my eyes, blurring the bright green of the vineyards.

“You gave me my nephew back,” Luca continued, his voice breaking slightly. “You gave me my humanity back. You showed me that there is a life after the violence.”

He opened the wooden box.

Inside was a beautiful, vintage diamond ring. It wasn't flashy or gaudy. It was elegant, timeless, and completely perfect.

“Emma Sullivan,” Luca whispered. “I don't have an empire anymore. I don't have a throne. But I have this house, and I have this land, and I have a heart that beats entirely for you.”

He took my hand, his thumb gently stroking my knuckles.

“Will you marry me? Will you help me build a real family here?”

A tear slipped down my cheek, catching the sunlight. I looked at the ring, then at the beautiful stone house, and finally at the man who had traded the world for a chance at peace.

“Yes,” I whispered, throwing my arms around his neck. “Yes, Luca.”

He let out a breath that sounded like a laugh and a sob all at once. He wrapped his strong arms around my waist, lifting me off the ground and spinning me in a circle. I laughed, the sound echoing across the empty, peaceful valley.

He set me down and slid the ring onto my finger. It fit perfectly, a brilliant counterpoint to the heavy emerald necklace resting against my chest.

He leaned in and kissed me, deep and slow, a promise sealed in the warm afternoon sun.

“Ew,” a small voice said.

We broke apart, laughing.

Leo was standing by the open car door, his nose wrinkled in disgust. Bruno was sitting beside him, panting happily, an old tennis ball he had found in the grass clamped firmly in his jaws.

“Get used to it, kid,” Luca smiled, walking over and ruffling the boy’s dark hair.

My mother’s moving truck pulled up the gravel driveway, the air brakes hissing as it parked beside the house. She stepped out, taking in the rolling hills and the beautiful stone house, a look of profound relief washing over her tired face.

She walked over to us, wrapping her arms around both me and Luca.

“Welcome home,” she whispered.

We spent the rest of the day unpacking the few boxes we had brought, leaving the heavy furniture for the movers. Luca and Leo ran through the empty halls of the farmhouse, their laughter ringing off the hardwood floors as Bruno chased them, his old legs finding new life in the country air.

That evening, we sat on the back porch, watching the sun dip below the horizon, painting the sky in brilliant strokes of orange and purple.

Leo was asleep on a porch swing, his golden pocket watch resting safely in his pocket. My mother was inside, brewing a pot of tea in her new, sunlit kitchen.

I sat close to Luca on the wooden steps, my head resting on his broad shoulder, his arm wrapped securely around my waist. Bruno lay across our feet, letting out a long, contented sigh.

I looked down at the diamond on my left hand, then up at the stars beginning to appear over the vineyard.