MasukDeliaThe air in the warehouse was a thick soup of gunpowder and screams. I huddled behind the wooden pallets, my heart slamming against my ribs like a trapped bird. Every time a bullet hit the wood near my head, splinters rained down on me like sharp, wooden needles. I kept my eyes closed tight, praying to a God I hadn't spoken to in years."Sebastian! You’re done!"The voice boomed through the chaos. It wasn't Leandro’s—it was Lucas. He was raining lead from the SUV, pinning Sebastian’s men down. I saw my chance. I couldn't stay here in the middle of a war zone. I saw a small metal door at the back of the warehouse, a faint red 'Exit' sign flickering above it.I scrambled on my hands and knees, ignoring the pain as the concrete floor scraped my skin. I didn't look back. I just ran. I reached the door and threw it open, the cool night air hitting my face for a split second before the world went horribly wrong.Click.The sound of a gun cocking was louder than the battle inside. I
DeliaThe hum of the SUV’s engine felt like a funeral march. Matteo sat in the driver’s seat, his jaw locked so tight I thought his teeth might snap. He didn't look at me. He didn't even breathe in my direction. To him, I was already a ghost or worse, a piece of trash he was taking to the curb."Matteo," I whispered, my voice sounding like broken glass. "I really did love him. You have to believe that."Matteo’s grip on the steering wheel tightened until his knuckles turned a ghostly white. He let out a harsh, dry laugh that made my skin crawl."Love?" he spat, finally cutting a glance at me that was filled with pure poison. "You don't know the meaning of the word. You fed him to the wolves. You watched him bleed and you kept typing on that burner phone. Don't talk to me about love, Delia. Just sit there and pray the Don doesn't change his mind before we hit the tarmac."I fell silent. I deserved every bit of his hate. I deserved the coldness that was now my only companion.As we p
LeandroThe flight back to New York was a funeral procession in the sky. I didn't sleep. I didn't eat. I just sat in the leather chair of the private jet, staring at the dark clouds outside the window.My hand, still wrapped in a makeshift bandage from where I’d crushed the wine glass, throbbed with every heartbeat. It was a good pain. It kept me grounded. It kept me from thinking about the empty seat beside me where she should have been.By the time we touched down at Teterboro, the sun hadn't even started to peek over the skyline. Matteo and Marco were already on their phones, barking orders to the crews waiting on the ground."You heard the Don!" Marco yelled into his receiver as we stepped off the plane into the biting New York air. "Everything. Every warehouse, every shipping container, every front company that Sebastian Callista even breathes on. I want it leveled. Now!"I got into the back of the armored SUV, the silence inside the vehicle heavy."Boss," Matteo said, lookin
LeandroThe dust from the SUV’s tires settled slowly, a gray haze hanging over the driveway of the villa. I stood on the balcony, my hands gripping the stone railing until the skin over my knuckles turned white. My side ached a sharp, throbbing reminder of the bullet I’d taken weeks ago but that pain was nothing compared to the hollow, cavernous weight in my chest.I watched the black speck of the car disappear behind the rows of cypress trees. She was gone.I should have killed her. By every law of the Omertà, by every tradition my father and his father before him had bled to protect, Delia should be lying in a shallow grave in the olive grove. A mole is a cancer. You don't negotiate with it; you cut it out. But when I looked at her on her knees, her eyes drowning in tears as she confessed, I didn't see a spy. I saw the woman who had held my hand while I drifted in and out of a fever.I walked back into the study, the air thick with the smell of old leather and tobacco. Marco was
DeliaThe next morning, the light spilling through the window was skeletal and cold, a harsh departure from the usual golden glow of the Tuscan sun.I sat on the edge of the bed, the heavy silk sheets tangled around my legs like a shroud. Leandro was gone. The space beside me was cold, the indentation on his pillow the only evidence he had been there at all.I felt sick. It wasn’t the physical ache of a common illness; it was the visceral, soul-rotting nausea that comes with a dying conscience.For months, I had been the perfect little mole. I had infiltrated Leandro’s life under Sebastian’s iron thumb, terrified that if I didn't feed him secrets, Shawn and Carrie would end up in a shallow ditch. But the landscape had shifted. Leandro hadn't just given me "pocket money"; he had showered me with life-changing sums for "accompanying him" and playing his "Queen."Under the covers, I checked my bank balance on my phone. I was rich—"never-work-again" rich. That was the problem. The money
DeliaThe dining room was too quiet. The only sound was the clink of silver against china and the soft, rhythmic crackle of the fireplace. The vastness of the villa, which had once seemed like a dream of Italian luxury, now felt like a gilded cage.I looked at the empty chairs where Shawn and Carrie should have been sitting. Usually, the room would be filled with Shawn’s loud laughter as he struggled with his Italian pronunciation, or Carrie’s sharp-witted commentary on the wine. Their absence was like a cold, biting draft in the room, making the hair on my arms stand up."Leandro?" I asked, my voice trembling just a little, barely a whisper in the cavernous space. "Where are my friends? I thought we were all having dinner together."Leandro didn't even look up from his wine at first. He swirled the dark red liquid, watching it coat the glass like thick velvet, the candlelight catching the deep ruby hue."I sent them to the village with some of my men, Cara Mia," he said finally,







