Chapter 7 - The Flight Home
Elena stayed one day.
Then another.
Then seven.
On the eighth morning, she walked into Matteo’s study.
“I need to go home.”
His expression fell.
But he nodded.
“All right.”
“You’re not going to argue?”
“No.”
“That’s suspicious.”
“I’m learning.”
She smiled.
“I need to go back to Chicago.”
“I understand.”
“I need to see my apartment.”
“Yes.”
“I need to open the nursery.”
Matteo slowly stood.
Elena’s voice trembled.
“I’ve been running from it.”
He walked toward her.
“You don’t have to do it alone.”
“I know.”
That was the difference now.
She knew.
Three days later, Elena stood outside the nursery door in her Chicago apartment.
Matteo waited in the hallway.
He had offered to remain downstairs.
Elena asked him to stay.
Her hand rested on the doorknob.
“I can’t.”
“Yes, you can.”
“You don’t know that.”
“No.”
Matteo stood beside her.
“But I know you don’t have to do everything today.”
Elena opened the door.
Two cribs.
Two stuffed bears.
A wooden sign reading LUCA & NOAH.
Elena covered her mouth.
Matteo said nothing.
He did not tell her to be strong.
He did not tell her the pain would pass.
He simply stayed.
Elena picked up one of the blankets.
“I was angry at them.”
Matteo frowned.
“For dying.”
Her voice cracked.
“Isn’t that horrible?”
“No.”
“I was angry at my husband too.”
“Why?”
“He was driving.”
Matteo remained silent.
“The police said there was nothing he could have done. The truck crossed the line.”
She looked at him.
“But sometimes I still blame him.”
“Grief isn’t a courtroom.”
Elena stared at him.
“That was unexpectedly intelligent.”
“I have occasional moments.”
She laughed.
It was small.
But real.
Months passed.
Elena returned to nursing.
Not because she wanted her old life back.
Because she wanted a new version of it.
She joined a neonatal support program helping mothers struggling with feeding after complicated births.
Matteo established a foundation in Anna’s name supporting families affected by trafficking and organized crime.
Nikolai took over portions of the legitimate family businesses under strict outside oversight.
And Sofia grew.
At six months, she had Matteo’s dark eyes and Elena’s complete ability to control him.
One evening, Elena entered Matteo’s apartment carrying Sofia.
Matteo looked up from his desk.
“Why is she wearing that?”
Sofia wore a tiny shirt that read DADDY’S BOSS.
Elena smiled.
“Accuracy.”
“You bought this?”
“Mia did.”
“I’m firing your sister.”
“She doesn’t work for you.”
“I’ll hire her first.”
Elena laughed.
Matteo walked over and kissed Sofia’s forehead.
Then he looked at Elena.
“There’s something downstairs.”
“What?”
“Come with me.”
The elevator descended to the private garage.
Elena expected a car.
Instead, Matteo led her outside.
A jet waited at the private terminal.
Elena stopped.
“You cannot be serious.”
“Before you become angry—”
“I met you on a private jet.”
“I remember.”
“You effectively kidnapped me on a private jet.”
“Legally debatable.”
“We already established that it wasn’t.”
Matteo smiled.
“Come.”
They boarded.
No bodyguards crowded the cabin this time.
Mia was already seated inside.
Nikolai sat opposite her holding Sofia’s diaper bag.
Elena stared at them.
“What is happening?”
Mia smiled.
“We’re going to Italy.”
Elena looked at Matteo.
“Why?”
“Because the first time you boarded a plane with me, you didn’t get to choose where you landed.”
He handed her an envelope.
Inside were four tickets.
New York to Rome.
Elena looked at him.
“You remembered.”
“You wanted to go there before all this happened.”
She had.
Before Sofia.
Before the betrayal.
Before everything.
Elena looked at the ticket.
Then at Matteo.
“Is this your strange billionaire-mafia version of apologizing?”
“Former mafia.”
Nikolai laughed.
“That distinction is doing heroic work.”
Matteo ignored him.
Elena smiled.
“You’re impossible.”
“I’ve heard.”
They took off near sunset.
Several hours later, Sofia became restless.
Matteo immediately reached for a bottle.
Elena watched him warm it, test the temperature against his wrist, and settle Sofia into his arms.
The baby drank without protest.
Elena smiled.
Six months earlier, this same man had looked terrified holding his own daughter.
Now he fed her while discussing diaper brands with the seriousness of international diplomacy.
When Sofia finished, Matteo lifted her to his shoulder.
She burped loudly.
Nikolai applauded.
Matteo glared.
“Say nothing.”
“I said nothing.”
“You applauded.”
“I was proud.”
Elena laughed.
Eventually everyone fell asleep except her and Matteo.
The Atlantic stretched black beyond the windows.
Matteo sat beside her.
“Do you remember what you said that night?”
“I said many things.”
“You told me I couldn’t expect you to become Sofia’s substitute mother.”
Elena looked toward the sleeping baby.
“I remember.”
“You were right.”
“She already had a mother.”
“Anna.”
“Yes.”
Matteo nodded.
Elena continued.
“I don’t want Sofia growing up thinking Anna disappeared because I came along.”
“She won’t.”
“We’ll tell her?”
“Everything.”
“About her mother?”
“Everything good.”
“And the bad?”
“When she’s old enough.”
Elena smiled.
“Good.”
Matteo reached into his jacket.
Elena immediately narrowed her eyes.
“No.”
He stopped.
“You don’t know what I’m doing.”
“You’re reaching dramatically inside your jacket at thirty thousand feet.”
“I’m getting something.”
“If that is a ring, put it back.”
Matteo stared.
From three rows away, Nikolai’s eyes opened.
He immediately closed them again.
Matteo slowly removed his hand.
Empty.
Elena burst out laughing.
“You actually had a ring?”
“No.”
“You’re lying.”
“I have established that I’m excellent at lying.”
“Matteo.”
He sighed.
“Yes.”
Elena laughed harder.
“You were going to propose?”
“Eventually.”
“We’ve known each other six months.”
“I’m decisive.”
“You once needed me to explain which side of a diaper was the front.”
“That has nothing to do with marriage.”
“It has everything to do with marriage.”
Matteo smiled.
Then Elena took his hand.
His expression softened.
“Not yet,” she said.
“I know.”
“But someday?”
He looked at her.
“I can work with someday.”
She rested her head against his shoulder.
Outside, dawn slowly appeared over the Atlantic.
Months earlier, Elena had crossed the same ocean believing her life was already over.
She had been a widow.
A grieving mother.
A woman whose body continued producing milk for children she could no longer hold.
Then a starving baby had cried inside a private jet.
Elena had walked forward.
That single decision had brought guns, betrayal, danger, and a family powerful enough to terrify entire cities into her life.
But it had brought something else too.
Not replacement.
Not forgetting.
A second beginning.
Sofia stirred.
Matteo immediately looked down.
“She’s waking up.”
“She’s fine.”
“Are you sure?”
Elena smiled.
“Yes, Dad.”
He relaxed.
A moment later, the pilot’s voice came through the cabin.
“We’ll be landing in Rome in approximately forty minutes.”
Elena looked out at the sunrise.
Matteo squeezed her hand.
“The first time we flew together,” he said, “I told you that you couldn’t go home.”
“You did.”
“I was wrong.”
“That happens often.”
“Apparently.”
He smiled.
Then his expression became serious.
“You can always go home, Elena.”
She looked at Sofia.
At Matteo.
At the photograph of Luca and Noah she still carried inside her purse.
Home no longer meant choosing between the people she had lost and the people she had found.
She could carry both.
Elena leaned over and kissed Matteo softly.
When she pulled away, he looked surprised.
“What was that?”
“Don’t ruin it.”
“I was only asking.”
She smiled and turned toward the sunrise.
“Take me to Rome, Matteo.”
He took her hand again.
“Anywhere you want.”
And this time, when the private jet carried Elena Rossi across the sky, no one told her she could never go home.
May you like
Because this time, she was not being taken anywhere.
She was choosing where her life went next.
