Mag-log inNicholas didn’t want to stop talking and that unsettled Althea the most.Not the drawings.Not the patterns.Not even the frightening precision hidden beneath the innocent way he explained movement and strategy.It was the excitement especially the way his eyes brightened when he connected things. He looked so proud when he discovered something that others missed.She had seen that look before.In mirrors.“Mama!” Nicholas said, still kneeling beside the scattered papers. “I think they wanted the loud sounds first because—”“That’s enough for now, sweetheart.” Althea interrupted gently.Nicholas blinked at her in surprise and his face suddenly became perplexed at her interruption.“But I’m not done.” He pointed out.Her chest tightened because she knew that his mind was still moving, processing and building.Marianna watched quietly from beside the table, her expression unreadable in the soft afternoon light.Althea forced herself to smile slightly.“You need to rest.”Nicholas frowne
The halls of Blackstone had quieted again by the time Althea left the war room.Since last night, peace was no longer present along the halls.Just quieter.The kind of silence that followed after too many decisions had been made and too many people were already moving behind them.Guards remained stationed at every major corridor now, more alert than before, their hands closer to their weapons, their eyes tracking every movement with sharpened instinct.The estate had changed overnight and so had everyone inside of it.Althea walked slowly this time.Not because she was tired though she was inside.But because her mind was still moving and connecting. She still keeps on replaying the maps, the networks, the intersecting structures Alessandro had left behind.And beneath all of that, Nicholas.Her chest tightened slightly at the thought.She hadn’t seen him since breakfast.After everything that happened last night, the gunfire, the fear, she needed to see him.She needed to make sure
The room didn’t disperse immediately because no one wanted to be the first person to step away from what they had realized in their discussion.The map between them wasn’t just strategy anymore.It was a living thing.A system that had already begun moving before they ever saw it.Dominic stood still, his hand still resting near Althea’s on the table, his gaze locked on the convergence point they had identified.No one spoke for several seconds.Even Enzo, who would sometimes crack a joke to lighten the atmosphere remained quiet in his chair.That alone said enough.Finally, Sebastian exhaled and straightened slightly.“So, we’re going to let him map us.” He said, not as a question but as a statement that needed to be heard out loud.Dominic nodded once.“Yes.”Sebastian’s jaw tightened.“And when he finishes?”Dominic’s eyes didn’t leave the map.“He won’t.” He answered calmly that drew the older men’s attention.Michael, who had stepped in silently fifteen minutes ago, now leaned ag
Dominic’s gaze hardened as he looked down at the intersecting lines on the table, the ink no longer just marks, but movement, intention, consequence.“Or it could be both.” He said in a low, controlled voice.The words settled and silence followed inside the room.Not empty.Not uncertain.Heavy.Deliberate.Seraphina stepped forward, her presence cutting cleanly through the tension. Years within the Valtieri world had carved something unshakable into her.She didn’t react to silence, she used it.Her voice dropped, quieter now, but sharper.“Has Luca sent feelers?”The question shifted the room.They all knew that feelers aren’t attacks.They weren’t confrontations.They were something worse.Quiet moves.Testing lines.Probing loyalty.Sebastian nodded slightly, his expression tightening.“Yes.” He answered calmly. “We’ve been getting updates since last night.”Dominic didn’t move nor shown any reaction. His focus simply sharpened.“Where?”Sebastian glanced briefly at Vincent, a si
The war room didn’t feel the same after the blood had already been spilled.The maps are still there as well as the markings. Names that were written by hand had now carried weight beyond the planning.What happened last night made the names become real.It never did after blood had already been spilled.Dominic stood at the center again.But this time, he felt no anticipation and only the aftermath.Sebastian leaned against the far edge of the table, arms crossed, his expression harder than usual.Enzo is sitting half-perched on a chair, restless, fingers tapping lightly against the wood. Roberto and Antonio stood nearby, both silent but alert.Vincent remained slightly apart, recovering from a knife injury on his arm.Watching.Always watching.Seraphina stood across from Dominic, composed as ever, though her eyes carried something deeper now, something sharpened by what had nearly happened.Her guards were positioned along the edges of the room.Led by Enrico Romano, her oldest and
The surgical lights dimmed behind her as Althea stepped out of the medical wing hallway.For a moment, she just stood there and breathing calmly.She let the sterile air settle against her skin, washing away the intensity of the procedure, the razor-sharp focus that had consumed her for hours.The patient was stable and alive.A miracle, some would say.But to her, it’s always control, precision and choice.She moved toward the wash area, and washed her hands again slowly, methodically, watching the faint traces of the operation disappear under running water.Tension from the operation being rinsed away.But not all of it because she that beyond the walls of the medical wing, the war still lingered.Althea dried her hands and walked down the hallway.She didn’t return to her room nor didn’t go to where Dominic is.She turned toward another wing.August.The door was half open when she arrived.She didn’t knock as she didn’t need to because the voices inside carried enough.“For the la
The yard had already dissolved into chaos.Gunfire ricocheted off steel beams and shattered crates. The air was thick with smoke, burning powder, and the metallic tang of blood. Men shouted over comms, boots pounded against concrete, and somewhere in the distance an engine revved and died.Dominic
A summon.Dominic looked at the knight chess piece on the warehouse floor across the screen inside Blacktsone’s war room. He understood that it wasn’t a threat, that his uncle is no longer hiding.Luca is calling Dominic out.A declaration of escalation.And Dominic answered.“Have you tracked the
The sun had barely settled into its late afternoon descent when Blackstone began to feel the shift.There was no gunfire or alarms this time.It came quietly but precise.Inside the operations room, Enzo was the first to notice.His fingers stilled over the keyboard as he studied the data feed. The
Smells of iron and gunpowder filled the storage facility when Luca Valtieri arrived.The converted warehouse stood in the middle of the barren industrial stretch is already silent.The exterior of the facility gave no hint of the violence that had taken place a few hours ago within its walls. The f







