UPSIDE DOWN

~ 36 ~

Andrea

My hands couldn't stop shaking long after the call ended.

Victor.

Victor.

I gripped the edge of the marble countertop, trying ground myself and not break apart something under anger.  

I didn't even notice the crack of the marble under my fingers, all I could think of was papa's words. 

"Andrea, Sylvie's not my daughter by blood."

And then the part that stole the air from my lungs, "Victor is."

I had known violence, rage, betrayal—but this? 

This rewrote every memory, every heartbeat. 

Every time Sylvie looked at me with the trust of a sister, every time she asked why our enemies hated her so much, every time she clung to me during her recovery... all of it was now threaded with a poison that I hadn't seen coming.

I slammed his palm down hard against the counter, the sound echoing in the silence.

"Fuck," I barely whispered, eye's were stinging. 

She doesn't know, Papa had said. But she found the old letters. She knows enough to hate me right now.

A door creaked behind him. Francesco stepped in, bleary-eyed, a half-buttoned shirt hanging from his frame. "Bro, you good?"

"No," I muttered. "Sit down. Wake the others too. Now."

Within minutes, all four brothers were seated around the table, Matteo and Luca rubbing their eyes, Aurelio already tense like he could sense the storm coming.

"I'm leaving for the island. Tonight," I said. "Right now."

"What? Is Sylvie okay?" Aurelio's voice was sharp, a warning.

I couldn't bring myself to meet their eyes. Instead, just paced a slow, angry circle before turning to them.

"Victor isn't just the bastard who ordered the hit," he said. "He's her biological father."

The silence was electric.

Francesco was the first to move, chair scraping violently against the tile. "What the fuck are you saying?"

"Angelo's not her father by blood," I repeated. "He just raised her. Covered it up. But Victor, he- he's the reason Sylvie was born. The reason she's been hunted like this. Why they wanted her alive."

Matteo let out a string of curses under his breath. Luca looked like he might be sick.

"No," Aurelio said, voice shaking. "This can't be right."

"I wish it wasn't," I said, silently praying all of this was just a bad dream. "But Sylvie knows now. And she's there. Alone. With him."

My brothers fell quiet, the kind of silence that only came when grief and fury mixed so tightly they were indistinguishable.

"I have to go," I said again. "Before she shuts us all out for good."

Hours later, I sat on the jet, a drink untouched in front of him, eyes fixed on the sky beyond the window.

My fingers hovered over the phone, then pressed dial. I didn't even let himself hesitate.

Sylvie picked up on the third ring.

"Hello?"

Her voice was hoarse. Small. Like it hadn't been used in hours.

"It's me," I tried to say, softly. "I'm coming to you."