Chapter Twenty-Six

The estate smelled like blood and bourbon.

The kind of scent that lingered even after the bodies were gone.

Amara sat alone in her father's old study, the fireplace casting long, flickering shadows against the carved walls. She'd broken the glass of his framed photo. Now the shards lay scattered across the desk — just like every illusion she'd ever held about him.

“You worked with the devil,” she whispered, staring at the cracked image of Rafael Varela.

“And you let him kill you.”

Luca found her there.

He didn't say anything at first.

Just leaned against the doorway, watching her silently, knowing this wasn't a moment that needed comfort — it needed clarity.

After a long pause, he asked, “what now?”

Amara looked up, eyes sharper than ever. “Now we finish what my father couldn't.”

“And that is?”

“We dismantle every ghost he ever left behind.”

She called her top enforcers — Zeyna, Mateo, Silva — and laid it out clean.

“We're burning down the old alliances. Every name, every partner, every backdoor deal Rafael Varela ever made. I want his legacy buried.”

Silva raised a brow. “You want to cut with the half European underworld?”

“No,” Amara said. “I want to cut their throats.”

Zeyna smirked. “Finally.”

The first to fall was the Milan connection. 

Rafael’s old contact, Don Gianni, thought he could survive two decades of Varela rule without offering fealty to the queen who succeeded him.

Amara sent Nico with three men to his villa.

They returned with Gianni's ring, a severed finger still inside it.

Message received. 

Then came the Bavarian brokers. Traders. Men who had once smiled in her father's face and passed information to enemies behind his back. 

She didn't bother with diplomacy. 

Their warehouses were hit simultaneously in four cities. Explosions that lit the sky with flames and fear.

Each blast carried her signature: a playing card — the queen of spades — soaked in blood.

Inside the estate, changes followed. 

She had her father's portrait removed from the great hall.

Had the walls repainted. The furniture replaced. 

The old throne was dismantled, the velvet seat slashed open, revealing a hidden compartment beneath. 

Inside: a box of letters.

Correspondence with Dante Romano. 

Proof.

Details of shipment. Payments. A contract sealed in blood and silence — one that placed her father under Romano’s thumb in exchange for protection and power.

Amara read each one. 

And with every word, her rage deepened.

“You really didn't know?” Luca asked as they sat on the terrace later that night, the sea dark and endless before them.

She shook her head. “He told me Romano was poison. Said never to deal with him. And all this time — he was the one drinking it.”

Luca ran a hand through his hair. “That's how empires rot. From the inside.”

She turned to him, eyes burning. “Not this one.”

In the days that followed, silence fell over Europe's criminal circles. 

No one moved without permission. 

No one breathed without checking her temperature. 

And in Naples, Dante Romano watched it all unfold with cool detachment. 

“She's not just playing queen,” his consigliere muttered. “She's rewriting the rules.”

Romano smiled.

“Good. I'd hate for this to be boring.”

Then the news came.

One of their own had betrayed her.

A Capo. Young. Eager. Too ambitious. 

He'd sold intel to Dante's people — escape routes, weapons caches, even guard schedules. 

Amara didn't blink.

She summoned him to the garden.

Made him kneel.

Held his face in her hands.

“Why?” She asked softly. 

“I thought i could survive both sides,” he said. 

“You were wrong.”

She shot him pont blank.

The blood sprayed across the roses.

She didn't flinch. 

Later, Luca found her again in the garden. 

“You're shaking,” he said gently. 

“No. I'm not.”

“Yes. You are.”

She turned to him. “I trusted him.”

“He thought you were bluffing.”

“They all do until they bleed.”

Luca took her hand. 

“You don’t have to carry this alone.”

She looked at him.

“I already do.”

That night, they didn't make love. 

They clung to each other.

Silent. 

Fierce.

Desperate. 

Like the world might end before sunrise.

Like it already had.

When the sun rose, the decision was made.

“We hit Naples next,” Amara said, standing at the head of the table.

“Romano will expect it,” Silva said.

“Good. Let him.”

Zeyna leaned in. “He's fortified. Guarded like a Vatican vault.”

“I don't need to break into the vault,” Amara said. “I need to bury the man who built it.”

Luca's eyes met hers. 

“And if it costs everything?”

She didn't hesitate.

“Then I'll pay.”