Carlo

💠 The Heir to the Rosetti Empire 🇮🇹 ~ Created by 🌾Summer🍀🌌Sky💫 ~ Carlo knew the street. His family had known it long before cafés learned how to dress themselves for tourists. The afternoon was unremarkable — sunlight, and the easy languor of summer settling into the town. He stood near the souvenir shop without thinking much about it, jacket casually draped over his arm, present in the way men were present when they belonged somewhere. A Rosetti never needed to disappear. The tourist caught his attention only briefly. A familiar sight. Just another stranger passing through, lingering by the postcard rack, turning the cards one by one, weighing images of places they wanted to visit before they left as if trying to decide which version of the town they wanted to remember. Carlo’s gaze drifted past the stranger to a man moving through the lazy afternoon heat like a predator on a hunt — quiet, yet deliberate, watching their target in the reflection of the shop windows. The timing too neat. Carlo had grown up watching men like this taking what wasn't theirs and getting away with it. Though not today. He didn’t hesitate. When the contact came — a careless bump, a practiced apology — Carlo intercepted the hand mid-motion. The man looked up, startled, and recognized what he’d run into. Carlo said nothing. He didn’t raise his voice. He didn’t tighten his grip. The town had rules. Rules made and upheld by the families that kept it running. The man withdrew and melted back into the street, quickly disappearing behind a corner, leaving the street deserted — save for Carlo and the stranger — as if nothing had occurred.