Chapter 10 - A Legacy of Hearts
Five years later.
The Rossi estate was filled with the sound of laughter—light, musical, and entirely untainted by fear.
In the sprawling green rose garden where Carmela had once wandered lost in the dark, a three-year-old boy with dark curls and fierce, intelligent eyes chased a golden retriever across the manicured lawn.
"Slow down, Leo!" Skylar called out, laughing as she chased after him, her stride confident and graceful.
She wore a simple blue linen sundress, her hair blowing gently in the afternoon breeze. The past was a distant shadow—her father’s health had fully stabilized, the Rossi empire was cleaner, more legitimate, and more powerful than ever, and her name was spoken across the East Coast not with mockery, but with absolute respect.
From the shaded veranda, Dominic leaned against a stone pillar, a cup of black coffee in his hand, watching his wife and son with a soft, unbreakable expression of contentment.
Carmela, now seventy-five but sharp-eyed and vibrant, sat in a wicker rocking chair beside him, knitting a small blue sweater.
"You know," Carmela said without looking up from her needles, "when I hired her, everyone thought I was losing my mind."
Dominic took a sip of his coffee, his dark eyes following Skylar as she scooped their laughing son up into her arms, lifting him effortlessly into the air.
"You didn't lose your mind, Mother," Dominic said quietly, a faint smile touching his lips. "You were the only one in this house who knew how to spot a queen."
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Skylar turned her head, catching Dominic’s gaze across the sunlit garden. She didn't look away, and she didn't shrink from his intensity. She simply smiled—bright, radiant, and completely at home—and waved him over.
Dominic set his coffee cup down on the stone table, pushed off from the pillar, and walked across the grass toward his family, stepping into the sunlight without a single shadow left behind.
