“No.”
His hand closed around the coffee cup.
“My son was fifteen.”
Elena’s face changed.
Ronan had not planned to say it.
For three years, people around him had learned to avoid the subject.
His men knew better.
Politicians knew better.
Even Marco, who had known him long enough to remember the boy coming into Osteria Luna hungry enough to eat two desserts, never spoke about him.
The silence had become another form of obedience.
Elena set down her cup.
Ronan stared at the dark coffee in his own.
“The bomb was meant for me,” he said.
He heard the rain.
The refrigerator humming behind the bar.
Marco setting his glass down carefully and walking into the kitchen without a word.
Elena did not interrupt.
“I was supposed to be in the car.”
His voice remained even, which somehow made the words worse.
“He took it instead.”
Elena’s eyes filled, but she did not offer him pity.
That mattered.
People had tried pity once.
They had stopped.
“I’m sorry,” she said.
Ronan looked toward the window.
“Everyone said that.”
“I know.”
“They said there was nothing I could have done.”
Elena waited.
“They were wrong.”
“Were they?”
Ronan’s eyes snapped back to hers.
Anyone else would have corrected themselves.
Elena did not.
“If you hadn’t been who you were,” she said carefully, “maybe the bomb wouldn’t have existed.
I understand that.
But if you think punishing yourself every Thursday brings him back, then I think you’re wrong too.”
For a moment Ronan’s face became unreadable.
Elena’s pulse was visible in her throat now.
So she was afraid after all.
She simply had not allowed fear to make her dishonest.
“You think this is punishment?” he asked.
“I think you order the same food, sit in the same chair, drink exactly two glasses of wine, and leave at almost the same time every week.”
“You’ve been studying me.”
“I’m a waitress.
Studying people is most of the job.”
Despite himself, Ronan almost smiled.
Elena saw it.
Then it disappeared.
“You said you got tired of running,” he said.
“I did.”
“What were you running from?”
“My fiancé, at first.
Then the version of myself who stayed too long.”
“That isn’t the same.”
