The Vescari ballroom shimmered like a gothic fever dream. Hundreds of masked guests sat beneath dripping chandeliers, their faces half-hidden behind lace, porcelain, and gold. Black roses climbed the walls in thick, thorny ropes, and candles flickered on every surface, casting restless shadows across the marble floor. At the altar, the air smelled of wax, lilies, and expensive champagne.

Enzo Vescari stood in an immaculate black suit, his jaw tight, his blue-grey eyes fixed on the massive doors at the far end of the room. His hands hung loosely at his sides, but his fingers twitched, restless. Behind him, the string quartet had cycled through the same mournful processional twice. The guests had begun to whisper.

Across the aisle, Alessandro Rossetti sat rigid in his seat, his smile fixed but his hands gripping his knees. His gaze kept darting toward the doors, then toward the floor, then toward the doors again.

Then the music shifted. A low, rolling chord. The guests straightened. The enormous ballroom doors swung open, and the entire room turned to look.

A figure in white appeared at the far end of the aisle, face hidden beneath a delicate veil, the gown trailing like spilled moonlight. She didn't move at first. Then, with an escort at her side, she began the long walk toward the altar.

The bride approached. The train of the gown whispered across the marble. Candles guttered as she passed. Enzo stepped forward, meeting her at the base of the steps, and reached for the veil with the confidence of a man who had done this a hundred times in his own head.

He lifted the veil.

The fabric slipped back, and the face beneath it was not Bianca Rossetti. The face beneath it belonged to a stranger.

For one eternal second, Enzo simply stared.

A ripple of confusion moved through the front row. Serafina's hand closed around Massimo's wrist. Alessandro's face went pale and shiny with sweat.

Behind them, three hundred guests waited for a wedding that was no longer what any of them believed it to be.