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55. Linger

Author: Erika Lana Bell
last update Last Updated: 2025-05-24 13:11:07

When the door slams behind him, it sounds like the end of something.

The impact reverberates through the frame, rattling down into the floor. My bones feel it. The stillness that follows presses in like a weight I can’t lift.

He’s gone.

But the room still holds him.

The wreckage he left behind surrounds me—splintered wood, shredded fabric, a toppled dresser with drawers hanging crooked, some spilled open, others cracked or split entirely. My bed is half in pieces, half scattered across the floor. The mattress lies twisted near the far wall, torn down the middle, coils protruding from where Hale’s hands had torn through it. Every corner of the room shows signs of his fury.

I stand in the center, unsure what to do—too scared to even move. My arms hang loosely at my sides, my skin still tingling from where he’d grabbed me, and shoved me. My body aches, but nothing hurts as much as the emptiness growing inside my chest.

I shuffle forward and kneel next to the frame, reaching for one of th
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  • Burn For Me : Bound By The Mafia King   155. Thorne

    Cali’s POV.The silence that settled after the video ended wasn’t peaceful—it was oppressive. Dense. Like the air had thickened with every unspoken truth trapped between my ribs. I didn’t cry. I didn’t even breathe for a moment. I just sat there, still and clenched, as the weight of my mother’s final words vibrated through my bones.Thorne.The name had meant nothing when she first said it, but now? Now it felt like a detonator wired straight into the foundation of Burke’s empire.A handler. One who predated Burke’s control. One who might know the origin of all this—the ledgers, the blackmail files, the deals inked in blood that turned a power-hungry man into an untouchable monster. If those files still existed, if Thorne had survived whatever purge Burke had unleashed… we might finally have something. Something beyond retaliation. Something bigger than Hale’s vendetta or my grief.We might have the power to rip Burke’s empire out by the roots and salt the ground behind us.I pushed b

  • Burn For Me : Bound By The Mafia King   154. Trade

    Cali’s POV.Sleep had been a laughable suggestion.Even after collapsing into bed sometime after midnight, after Killian had been secured, after Hale had finally stopped pacing the perimeter of the house like a storm in a glass cage, I couldn’t shut my mind off. Every time I closed my eyes, it was his voice I heard. Killian’s voice, smirking its way through my skull, whispering venom I thought I’d buried long ago.I’d thought seeing him chained up would bring some satisfaction. I thought maybe I’d feel powerful again. But instead, the weight in my chest only grew heavier.By the time the first pale smear of light pushed against the curtains, I was already dressed and moving. The halls were silent, everyone either still asleep or giving me space. Hale had reinforced the basement security last night. A new code. A new scan. Not even I could walk straight in anymore.But that didn’t mean I couldn’t watch.I stopped at the panel mounted outside the sublevel entrance. Hale might’ve changed

  • Burn For Me : Bound By The Mafia King   153. Death

    Cali’s POVKillian Vale wasn’t dead.But he was bleeding all over the floor, and I had every intention of making sure he stayed that way until we got what we needed. No threats, no negotiation, no begging for redemption.He would talk. Then he would die.He groaned, clutching his shoulder, the blood soaking into his pristine suit like oil spreading across silk. Hale stood over him in absolute silence. He didn’t say a word. Didn’t move. Just stared—cold, unreadable, the same way he had looked at me when I betrayed him with the fake drive. Only this time, the weight behind that stare wasn’t confusion or disappointment.It was rage. Ancient, quiet, and surgical.“Still think I’m a ghost?” Killian rasped, coughing through a broken laugh. “Still think you can outmaneuver me, Callie-girl?”I stepped forward before I could stop myself, my hand tightening around the grip of my gun.“Call me that again,” I said, voice low, “and I’ll make you regret being born with a mouth.”He grinned, though

  • Burn For Me : Bound By The Mafia King   152. Under Fire

    Cali’s POV.I didn’t take Hale’s car. That would’ve been too easy to trace.Instead, I hotwired one of the decoy sedans from the garage—the ones Hale uses when he doesn’t want anyone watching. It had cash in the glove compartment, two burner phones, and an unregistered Glock under the driver’s seat. Everything I needed, which only confirmed what I already knew.He kept that car ready for a reason.He knew one day I’d do this.I drove all night. Eyes dry. Heart louder than the engine. The road curled beneath me like something alive, something coiled, and all I could do was grip the wheel and keep moving forward. I didn’t cry. Didn’t scream. Didn’t fall apart.Not yet.There would be time for that later—after I tore Killian Vale’s heart out of his chest.The Valeska Syndicate had half a dozen fronts scattered along the southern coast. But only one was registered under a name I recognized. An old family contact. Someone Burke used to trade with before the merger fell apart. If Killian wa

  • Burn For Me : Bound By The Mafia King   151. The Syndicate

    Hale’s POV.I watched her leave the room without a word.She left with the dead silence of a woman who was deciding whether to kill someone… or burn the entire world down first.And I knew which one she was leaning toward.I waited until I heard her footsteps disappear down the hallway, then reached for the drawer behind me. The hidden one under the desk, beneath a false panel I built myself the week after I found that file.I pulled out the burner phone.Three numbers preprogrammed. All of them ghosts I never wanted to resurrect.But it was time.I dialed the first. The line picked up on the second ring.“You’re early,” the voice said.“I’m out of time,” I replied. “Killian Vale is alive.”A low whistle. “You sure?”“Got the contracts. Got the surveillance. He’s not just alive—he’s organizing.”“Which syndicate?”“Valeska. Looks like they’re trying to pick up the scraps Burke left behind. They already made a move once—tried to trade for Cali like she was a fucking crate of product. N

  • Burn For Me : Bound By The Mafia King   50. Another Truth

    Cali’s POV.The third floor of Hale’s estate was always shrouded in a kind of silence that didn’t belong to the rest of the house. Downstairs was movement—muffled voices, bootsteps, the occasional clink of glass from the kitchen or the steady hum of Rosalita checking on Belle. But up here, everything was still. Like time had paused. Like even the air didn’t want to breathe too loud.I stood at the base of the staircase for a full thirty seconds before I finally moved.The wood groaned beneath my bare feet, each step creaking like it was trying to warn me off. Maybe it was. I ignored it.Hale had never explicitly banned me from coming up here. He didn’t need to. This part of the house was old. Untouched. Untamed. The third floor wasn’t remodeled, wasn’t part of any guest tours or operational plans. It was like a locked attic in an old castle. Full of bones. Full of ghosts.The hallway was lined with shuttered windows and thick velvet drapes that hadn’t been drawn in months. Dust floate

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