LOGIN
“DROP YOUR FUCKING WEAPONS OR I’LL BLOW HER FUCKING BRAINS OUT!”
The world froze.
“My sun…” Dante whispered.
There she was.
Amid smoke and rubble. Her wedding dress torn, stained with mud and blood. Her hair undone, disheveled. She was trembling, eyes wide open—filled with fear... with tears.And the gun.
Black. Cold. Pressed hard against her head.Nikolai’s hand shook—with rage.
“No…” Dante felt the ground vanish beneath him.
Behind Nikolai, several men had their weapons aimed at his people. His mother. His little brother...
“DROP YOUR GUNS!” Nikolai roared. “NOW!”
“Drop them!” Dante echoed, his voice breaking.
Everyone obeyed, and silence fell—more brutal than any bullet.
Nikolai smirked, lips curling.
“Look at me, Bellandi. Checkmate, Italian mutt.”
Dante couldn’t breathe.
Her. His sun. His everything. She had a gun to her head.He couldn’t move. Not while that bastard held her like that.
She looked at him—silent—but her eyes screamed for help. Tears carved paths of ash down her face.“Is this what you wanted, my love?” Nikolai murmured, brushing the barrel against her skin. “White flowers? A dream wedding? I would’ve given you that and more.”
She shut her eyes, and a thick tear slipped down her jaw.
“Let her go!” Dante roared. “Take me, you son of a bitch! Kill me instead!”
“Kill you?” Nikolai let out a dry, unhinged laugh. “No, Bellandi. I told you—that was never on the table.”
She gasped, cracking, her legs trembling.
Dante stepped forward.
The Russians raised their guns—one of them aiming straight at his little brother’s chest.“NO!” his terrified mother screamed, clutching the child. “Please, don’t shoot him!”
“One more fucking move,” Nikolai snarled, pressing the gun harder against her temple, “and I’ll kill every single one of you. One by one.”
Dante froze, fists clenched, fury choking him.
“She’ll never be yours,” he spat.
“She wasn’t yours either. And still, you kidnapped her,” Nikolai shot back. “We’re not so different, you and I.”
The air turned heavy, as if the world itself were holding its breath.
One wrong move—and everything would explode.
She looked at him. Only him.
And in that gaze, everything else vanished.
“Don’t let him take me,” she whispered. “I’d rather die here… with you.”
Something shattered inside Dante.
His heart. His soul. His whole goddamn life.He was shaking.
With rage. With love. With fear.“Let her go!” he roared, moving forward. “Take me! My life, my empire, whatever you want! Just let her go!”
Nikolai tilted his head, that crooked smile curdling blood.
“Your life? I already have it. Your empire? We reduced it to ashes today. The only thing left was to rip away what you loved most.”
Dante stepped closer, chest heaving, as if his heart were trying to leap out to shield her.
“Take me! Tear me apart if you want! But not her!”
Nikolai looked at him with delight. Not mockery. Not scorn.
Sick pleasure.
“You?” He let out a dry laugh.
“What joy would I get from doing to you what I want to do to her?” He licked her face.Dante’s fists cracked. Bone grinding against bone.
He took another step.Nikolai moved the gun—more pressure.
“Not another inch,” he growled.
“Damn you!” Dante bellowed—but stopped.
The helicopter roared overhead, shattering the smoke-choked sky, scattering dead petals, dust, and ash.
The flames at the pergola blazed like an omen. Dante walked through corpses and ruins, eyes locked on her. On his sun.Two men grabbed her roughly.
Nikolai opened the helicopter door, grinning like a fucking demon.Dante wasn’t thinking anymore.
He just roared.“Let my wife go, you bastard!”
His voice cracked—feral, broken, agonizing.
Then he saw it.
A pistol.
Tossed among the dead roses. Half-buried. Like a sign. A final chance.Dante dove. Rolled. Grabbed the gun.
And just as he pulled the trigger—BANG!
A shot hit him.
The pistol dropped from his hand.
Blood bloomed across his chest, soaking his shirt in red.
“NOOOOOOO!” she screamed, ripping the air apart.
She tried to run to him, but Nikolai shoved her into the helicopter like a sack of meat.
Dante collapsed to the ground, teeth clenched from the searing pain.
He was drenched in blood, life slipping away. But his eyes—his eyes stayed on her. Only her.He saw her banging on the door of the chopper, sobbing, screaming—
“Dante! DANTE!”
The helicopter lifted into the air, swallowed by screams, wind, and dust.
And on the ground, beneath a sky turning gray as if mourning with them,
Dante Bellandi bled.“My sun…” he whispered—before losing consciousness.
The hours dragged on, and by midday, Fabio appeared carrying a paper bag and a neatly folded change of clothes draped over his arm. His expression left no room for refusal.“Sir, you need to eat something and change.”Dante barely turned his head.“I’m not hungry.”“This isn’t just about hunger, sir. Do you really think she’ll want to see you like this when she wakes up?”Dante narrowed his eyes, exhaling with impatience.“I’m not leaving her alone.”“You won’t. I’ll stay here.”Fabio set the bag on the table and crossed his arms. He wasn’t afraid to challenge Dante when it came to his well-being.“Go, shower, get some rest, and change your clothes. You’re a mess.”Dante clenched his jaw. He didn’t want to leave her—couldn’t—but Fabio was right. He couldn’t afford to be weak. Not when Svetlana needed him strong.With a resigned grunt, he stood from the chair, stretching muscles that had stiffened from too many hours in the same position.“I’m not leaving the clinic.”“You don’t have t
The clinic door closed behind her with a hollow thud, and the cold night air slapped her face. Fiorella stopped for a moment, inhaling deeply, as if trying to contain the whirlwind of emotions storming inside her. But it was useless. A low, guttural growl escaped her clenched lips."Hope that bitch dies," she muttered through her teeth, feeling the rage burn her from the inside out.She hated her. With every fiber of her being.Dante was supposed to be hers. Not that intruder’s. Not that cheap woman who had appeared out of nowhere to steal what rightfully belonged to her. She’d watched him grow—from a scrawny boy into a powerful, commanding man. She had loved him in silence for years, dreaming of the day he would finally see her as something more than just the little girl who had always been by his side.She clenched her fists so tightly her nails dug into her palms. No. She wasn’t going to let that Russian whore ruin what she had waited her whole life for.Her mind drifted, involunta
Time had stopped for Dante.Since the doors had closed behind the stretcher carrying Svetlana, he hadn’t looked away. He stood there, unmoving, like a predator lying in wait—but his chest was tight with a kind of anguish he didn’t know how to contain. His mind clung to a single thought:Is she still alive?The hallway of the private hospital was cold and impersonal, lit by harsh fluorescent lights that clashed with the dried blood on his hands. Her blood. Svetlana’s blood.Fabio stayed close, watching him with a mix of concern and resignation. He knew this wouldn’t end well either way. If Svetlana died, Dante would burn everything to the ground.And if she lived... he would too.Inside the operating room, the atmosphere was frenetic.“I need more saline! Her pulse is still unstable!” barked the surgeon, his voice steady but urgent.Bright surgical lights cast sharp shadows over faces hidden behind masks. Svetlana lay on the table, her skin pale—almost translucent—beneath the bloodstai
The silence in the room was thick, like the haze of an impending storm. Dante’s men stood firm, some with arms crossed over their chests, others with a hand resting near the weapon on their belt. The polygraph still blinked on the monitor, recording the final echoes of the interrogation, while the conspirators at the end of the line shifted with growing unease.One of them—the tallest and most heavily built—clenched his jaw and slowly pulled his hand from inside his jacket. His gaze darkened, and before anyone could react, he drew his gun and aimed it straight at Dante.“Nobody move!” he barked, his voice rough, taut with adrenaline.Time froze. The metal of the gun caught the light from the lamp on the table, and in the blink of an eye, three more followed suit, drawing their pistols in swift, precise motions.The traitors exchanged looks—fury mixed with grim resolve. But then, the tide turned in an instant.“Drop your weapons.”Fabrizzio’s voice cut through the air with chilling cal
Minutes earlier…Svetlana paced the room like a caged lioness. Her body tense and alert, she moved in circles, her steps carving an invisible pattern into the carpet. If she kept walking like that, she was bound to wear a groove into the floor.Every fiber of her being vibrated with a restlessness she couldn’t control. Her chest felt tight, as if an invisible hand were squeezing her heart, crushing it. Everything that was happening kept her on edge.For the first time since she’d been ripped from her old life, she wasn’t thinking about her family. Not about Russia, the ballet, or the stages she missed so much. Her mind was occupied with something else. Or rather, someone.Dante.His name was a whisper in her head, a constant echo that was driving her mad. He was in danger—she could feel it. And even though she’d tried more than once to convince herself that everything she felt was pure madness, that he was manipulating her, that she needed to focus and pull herself together… it was imp
The night wrapped the Bellandi estate in a deceptive silence, broken only by the occasional creak of wood and the distant whisper of wind slipping through the trees. The old cellar, hidden behind a row of cypress trees, was the perfect refuge for those who wanted to speak without being overheard. The air inside was thick with smoke and distrust, making the atmosphere heavy like a storm about to break.While Dante still struggled to regain his composure, to stop thinking about her, in another corner of his domain, betrayals were simmering slowly.“This whole thing is bullshit,” a man said in a rough, sharp voice, pounding his fist on the table.His gaze locked onto another present, a veteran with scarred hands, who frowned and straightened in his chair.“In my fifteen years working for the Bellandi, no one had ever doubted my loyalty,” he growled, clenching his jaw.“They’re not just doubting yours,” a second man interjected, his tone dry and cutting like a knife.“He doubts everyone,”







