SERENA POV
"You're actually cooking," he said from the doorway.
"I told you I would," I said, keeping my eyes on the counter. My fingers were slick with oil, working a mound of flour and eggs that felt heavy and stubborn under my palms.
"I thought you meant reheating something."
"Sit down, Adriano."
He sat. The heavy scrape of the oak chair, the shift of his weight, and then that thick, uninterrupted silence that always meant he was watching me. Usually, it made me defensive. Tonight, it just felt grounding.
I was making pasta from scratch. It was the only thing my father ever taught me that didn't involve a ledger or a threat. A person who cannot feed themselves, he used to say, cannot be trusted to feed an empire. I hadn't made it since the night he died. Standing here with flour d
