MasukPOV: Nikolai VolkovI watched the girl run from the apartment building through my binoculars, a smile spreading across my face. Sienna DeLuca. Finally showing the fire I'd always known burned inside her. She looked so much like her mother it hurt."Boss, should we grab her now?" Viktor, my second-in-command, stood beside me on the rooftop across the street. His hand rested on his weapon, eager as always."No." I lowered the binoculars and lit a cigarette. "Let her run. Let her think she's free for a few more hours. The fear will make her more pliable when I finally collect what's mine."Viktor grunted but didn't argue. He knew better than to question my orders twice. The scar across his throat reminded him what happened to people who disappointed me.Twenty-three years. I'd waited twenty-three years for this moment. I pulled out my phone and dialed a familiar number. Sofia answered on the first ring."She shot Romano and ran," I said without preamble. "Just like you predicted."Sofia'
POV: SiennaI woke up to sunlight streaming through unfamiliar windows and Pedro's arm draped across my waist. For one blissful second, I forgot everything. Forgot Dante's dead eyes staring at nothing. Forgot Sofia's threats. Forgot the target on my back. Then reality crashed down like a wave, and I remembered where I was. Pedro's apartment. His bed.We hadn't done anything. I'd cried myself to sleep in his arms, fully clothed, while he whispered promises he probably couldn't keep. But waking up next to him felt intimate in a way that scared me more than Sofia's gun ever had. I tried to slip out of bed without waking him, but his arm tightened around me."Don't go." His voice was rough with sleep. "Just stay for a minute.""Pedro, I can't..""I know." He released me and sat up, running a hand through his messy hair. In the morning light, he looked younger. More vulnerable. "I know this is complicated. I know you probably hate me for everything I've done. But last night, holding you wh
POV: LucianThe numbers on my laptop screen blurred together at three in the morning, but I kept staring at them. Something was wrong. Very wrong. I'd been going through Romano family accounts for hours, cross-referencing payments and shipments, looking for any sign of a leak. After Sienna's kidnapping by the Torrinos, after the attack on my penthouse, I needed to know who was feeding information to our enemies.What I found was so much worse than a leak. Someone had been stealing from us. Not large amounts that would trigger alerts, but small transfers over months. Ten thousand here, fifteen thousand there. Individually, they looked like legitimate business expenses. Together, they added up to over two million dollars.I pulled up another screen, tracing the routing numbers. The money went through shell corporations, bounced between banks in three countries, and ended up in a single offshore account in the Cayman Islands. The account holder's name made my blood run cold.Marcelli Hol
POV: SiennaThe salt-stained air of Pier 12 burned my lungs as I stepped out of the taxi. My hand trembled against the door frame, not from fear exactly, but from something sharper. Anticipation, maybe. Or the cold certainty that I was walking into a trap.The warehouse loomed ahead like a graveyard monument, all rusted metal and broken windows. Moonlight sliced through the gaps in the roof, painting silver stripes across the concrete floor. My footsteps echoed too loud in the emptiness. Each sound felt like a countdown."Maya?" My voice cracked. "Sofia?"Laughter answered me. High and cruel, it bounced off the walls until I couldn't tell where it came from."Welcome, Princess DeLuca." Sofia emerged from behind a stack of rotting crates, her designer heels clicking against the concrete. She looked immaculate as always, red lips curved in a smile that promised violence. "So glad you could join our little party."Isabella appeared on my left, phone in hand, recording. Of course she was.
POV: SiennaThe safe house Maya brought me to wasn't what I expected. Hidden above an old bookstore in Queens, it looked more like someone's grandmother's apartment than a federal hideout. Antonio Rossi sat at the kitchen table, sipping espresso from a tiny cup."There's someone else you need to meet," he said after Maya left to coordinate with her team. "Your father's business partner. He's been waiting fifteen years to find you."My heart raced. "Another survivor?""The only other one who matters." Antonio picked up an old rotary phone. "Dante? She's here."Twenty minutes later, footsteps echoed on the stairs outside. The door opened, and a man walked in who looked so much like my father it took my breath away. Same dark eyes, same strong jaw, but where my father had been gentle, this man radiated danger."Sienna." His voice was rough with emotion. "You look exactly like your mother.""You're Dante DeLuca," I said. It wasn't a question."Your father's cousin. His right hand." Dante
POV: MayaI watched Sienna walk away from the library, her spine straight with newfound determination. Agent Harrison cursed under his breath, but I felt something else entirely, pride. The scared girl I'd first met months ago was gone. In her place stood someone dangerous."Rodriguez, what the hell just happened?" Harrison grabbed my arm as we left the library. "She played us.""She learned." I pulled free from his grip. "Which means she's more valuable than we thought."My phone buzzed with a text from my real handler, Agent Sarah Chen, the only person in the Bureau who knew the full scope of my operation. The message was simple: "Debrief. Now."Twenty minutes later, I sat across from Chen in a dingy coffee shop that stayed open all night. She looked tired, her usually perfect hair pulled back in a messy ponytail."Harrison says the Carter girl made you," Chen said without preamble."She figured it out on her own. Girl's have good instincts." I stirred sugar into my coffee, buying t







