No Mercy, Ex-husband

Chapter 5

Shay's POV

The scent hit me before I was even fully conscious.

It was thick, cloying, and aggressively sweet, a fragrance that belonged in a botanical garden or a funeral parlor, not the sterile, high-ceilinged luxury of my suite at the Valois estate. For a heartbeat, my mind betrayed me.

My mind took me back to memory lane.

I began to recall when I was back in that cramped, drafty studio apartment on 4th Street. It was our first anniversary. Massimo had come home with a single, wilted Himalayan lily he’d bought from a street vendor with his last ten dollars.

“One day, Shay,” he had whispered, tucking the white petal behind my ear, “I’ll buy you a forest of these. I’ll make sure the whole world smells like your favorite flower.”

I bolted upright, my breath coming in shallow, jagged gasps. The memory didn't bring warmth; it brought a surge of bile to the back of my throat.

My hand instinctively flew to my abdomen, tracing the faint, jagged scar beneath my silk nightgown. The baby was gone. The man who gave me that flower had tried to bury me.

I threw back the duvet and marched to the balcony that overlooked the grand foyer of the mansion.

I stopped dead.

The foyer was gone. In its place was a white nightmare. Thousands of rare Himalayan lilies, the kind that only grow at high altitudes, the kind that cost a fortune to transport were packed into every square inch of the marble entrance.

They were in crystal vases, draped over the banisters, and piled in sprawling, extravagant heaps. It was a sea of white, so bright it was blinding under the morning sun.

"He has a very loud way of saying 'I'm sorry,'" a voice drawled from the shadows of the gallery.

I didn't turn. I knew the vibration of that voice. Lucien Valois stepped out of the darkness, dressed in a charcoal silk robe, a cup of black coffee in his hand. He looked down at the floral invasion with a look of clinical boredom.

"Five thousand," Lucien said, his voice a cool baritone. "Massimo had them flown in by private jet from a conservatory in Bhutan. He must have spent the better part of a million dollars to arrange a delivery this fast."

"It smells like a corpse," I whispered, my voice trembling with a rage I couldn't quite suppress.

"It smells like guilt, Alessia," Lucien corrected, stepping closer. He didn't touch me, but his presence was a wall of cold, grounding reality.

"This is the 'Offering' phase. He realizes he threw away a diamond, and he’s trying to buy back the right to speak to you. He thinks that because you once loved these, they are a bridge to your heart."

I gripped the marble railing until my knuckles turned white. "He thinks he can buy a memory. He thinks if he fills the air with the smell of the past, I’ll forget the smell of the blood on the floor."

I turned to Lucien, my eyes burning with a fire that had been tempered in the fires of Zurich. "I want them gone. Not moved. Not donated. I want them destroyed."

Lucien’s lips curled into a predatory smile. "I was hoping you’d say that. I’ve already taken the liberty of preparing the 'disposal' unit in the courtyard. But we aren't just going to throw them away, Alessia. We are going to send a message."

An hour later, I stood in the center of the estate’s cobblestone courtyard. The morning air was crisp, but the humidity of the lilies still seemed to cling to my skin like a shroud.

Lucien’s staff had moved the five thousand flowers into massive, industrial-sized crates. Next to them stood a heavy-duty wood chipper, its metal maw gaping open like a hungry beast.

A tripod had been set up, and a professional-grade camera was pointed directly at me.

"Are you ready?" Lucien asked. He stood behind the camera, his expression unreadable.

I took a deep breath. I had traded my nightgown for a sharp, tailored suit of blood-red wool. My hair was pulled back into a sleek, lethal ponytail. I looked like a woman who could buy and sell Massimo Falcone’s soul.

"Record," I commanded.

I stepped toward the crates. I picked up a single, perfect lily. It was beautiful, terrifyingly so. I looked into the lens, imagining Massimo’s eyes on the other side.

"Himalayan lilies," I said, my voice smooth and chillingly calm. "A flower that symbolizes purity. A flower that requires a delicate touch and a loyal heart to thrive."

I held the lily over the mouth of the chipper.

"But when a flower is touched by a hand stained with betrayal, it rots."

I dropped the flower. *Grind. Whir. Shred.* The machine roared to life, a mechanical monster devouring the white petals and turning them into a spray of brown, wet mulch.

I didn't stop there. I grabbed a whole bouquet, tearing the silk ribbons with my teeth, and hurled them into the blades. One by one, then by the armful, I fed Massimo’s apology into the machine.

"Massimo," I said, looking directly into the camera as the sound of grinding stems filled the air. "You spent a million dollars to remind me of who I used to be. I’m spending five minutes to show you who I am now. If you want to send me 'trash,' expect it to be treated as such."

I turned to the staff. "Take the mulch. Every bit of it. Pack it into a box and send it to the Falcone Penthouse. Mark it 'Care of Elena Van Doren.' And include a note."

I pulled a card from my pocket and wrote with a steady hand:

Your husband’s taste in 'trash' hasn't improved. I thought you’d like the remains of his latest obsession.

By noon, the foyer was clean, but the phantom scent of the lilies still lingered. I was in the library, staring at the stock market tickers, when Lucien entered. He wasn't carrying coffee this time; he was carrying a set of keys and a legal document.

"We need to discuss your security, Alessia," he said, his tone shifting back to the professional coldness that defined our relationship. "Massimo’s little stunt proves he knows where you are. My perimeter is solid, but the mansion is too large to guard every wing with the same intensity."

I looked up, a frown marring my brow. "I have guards at my door, Lucien."

"It’s not enough," he said, walking to the window. "Massimo is desperate. Desperate men don't play by the rules. They hire kidnappers. They firebomb the gates. If you are going to be my partner in his destruction, I cannot afford for you to be a liability."

He turned back to me. "I’m moving you. To the East Wing. My wing."

My heart gave a strange, fluttery kick. "Your wing?"

"There is a suite directly connected to mine through a secure vestibule," Lucien explained, his eyes fixed on mine. "It has its own reinforced entrance and biometric locks. But more importantly, there is a literal door between our sitting rooms. If there is a breach, I am ten seconds away from you at all times."

"Lucien, I don't think…".

"It wasn't a suggestion," he interrupted, his voice dropping an octave. "You wanted to be a Valois. A Valois stays close to the pack. This is about survival, not sentiment."

He stepped closer, his presence suddenly overwhelming. "Massimo wants to hunt you. I am simply making sure he has to go through me to do it."

The transition was swift. By evening, my belongings had been moved. The new suite was even more opulent than the last, decorated in deep blues and silvers, but the atmosphere was different. It felt intimate.

I stood in the center of the room, looking at the heavy, dark wood door that led to Lucien’s private quarters. It was closed, but the knowledge that he was right there, just a few feet away, changed the air in the room.

I sat at my new desk, opening my laptop. The video of the lily destruction had already been sent. My internal monitors showed it had been viewed ten times from a private IP address in the Falcone Plaza.

Massimo was watching.

I could almost see him, pacing his office, his face red with rage and confusion, clutching a glass of scotch as he watched the woman he thought he knew turn his romantic gesture into compost.

A soft knock sounded on the connecting door.

I froze. "Come in."

The door swung open. Lucien stood there, his tie discarded, the top buttons of his shirt undone. It was the most unbuttoned I had ever seen him.

"Elena received the package," he said, leaning against the doorframe. "My sources say she had a screaming fit that lasted two hours. She broke a vase that cost more than your old apartment."

A small, dark spark of satisfaction lit up in my chest. "Good. Let her feel the weight of her husband's wandering eyes."

"And Massimo?" Lucien asked.

"He’s watching the video," I said. "He’s trying to find Shay in my face. He hasn't realized yet that Shay is dead."

Lucien walked into my room, his footsteps silent on the thick carpet. He stopped at the edge of my desk, looking down at me. For a long moment, neither of us spoke. The tension was a living thing, a cord stretched tight between revenge and something much more dangerous.

"Don't let the scent of those flowers fool you, Alessia," Lucien said, his voice a low warning. "He doesn't love you. He loves the power he thinks you represent. He loves the challenge of a woman who said no."

"I know that," I whispered.

"Do you?" Lucien reached out, his thumb catching my chin and tilting my face up toward his. His skin was warm, a sharp contrast to his icy eyes. "Because when he starts crying and he will start crying, you need to remember the sound of the fountain. You need to remember the way his mother looked at you while you bled."

"I remember," I said, my voice hardening. "I remember every second."

"Good," Lucien said, his hand lingering for a second too long on my jaw before he pulled away. "Get some sleep. Tomorrow, we will take his first subsidiary. I want him to wake up to a world that is slightly smaller than the one he went to sleep in."

He turned and walked back into his room, closing the door behind him with a soft, final *click*.

I stayed there in the silence, the smell of woodsmoke and Lucien’s expensive cologne replacing the lingering scent of the lilies. I was safe. I was powerful. I was a Valois.

But as I looked at the connecting door, I realized that the war wasn't just happening in the boardrooms or at the galas. It was happening here, in the quiet spaces between a woman who wanted revenge and a man who was far too good at providing it.

I pulled out my old phone, the one I had kept from my life as Shay. I went to the deleted folder and looked at the one photo I hadn't been able to destroy. It was a picture of a tiny, hand-knitted baby bootie I had bought the day I found out I was pregnant.

"You're next, Massimo," I whispered into the dark. "I'm going to take everything. Your money. Your name. And then, I'm going to take your heart and shred it just like those flowers."

I closed the phone and turned off the lights, the white silence of the room swallowing me whole.