LOGINEverything is different now. Lucien now knows the ghost that has been haunting Emilia’s life since childhood. Emilia now stands between the man she loves and the man who created her scars. There is no going back to who they were. From here onward, every choice will draw blood. Thank you for journeying with them.
The estate gates groaned open, the sound echoing through the driveway like a warning. The convoy rolled in, dark SUVs, blood still drying on metal, engines ticking with heat. The courtyard was silent. The air felt thick, as if the house and land themselves were holding breath.Emilia stepped out before her door fully opened.Her boots hit the ground with a cold, steady purpose. No hesitation. No tremor. But inside her chest, something ached, sharp, aching, longing. She had held herself together for hours, for battles, for commands, for the coldness of war.But now, She lifted her head.And there he was.Lucien Moretti stood on the balcony above, one hand gripping the stone railing, the other resting carefully against his ribs. The bandages beneath his open shirt were stark white against his skin. His face was drawn, paler than she had ever seen him, exhaustion carved into hard lines.Rosa stood beside him, supporting him gently, her shoulder just barely against his arm.A silent guardi
Lucien woke like a man dragged back from death by force.He surfaced from the darkness like someone hauled out of deep water, lungs burning, ribs screaming, chest aching with each breath. Every muscle throbbed with the memory of fire, metal, and loss. The world swam in a haze of pain and heavy silence.He blinked.The ceiling.The carved cornices.The scent of antiseptic and blood.The room was painfully still, too still, except for the soft, exhausted breathing of someone asleep beside him.Rosa.Her head rested on the edge of his bed, her hand still loosely wrapped around his. Her fingers were cold. Her face streaked from old tears. Her hair undone, her eyes bruised with sleepless grief.She hadn’t left him. Not once.Lucien tried to speak, but the first sound caught in his throat like broken glass.Rosa stirred, lashes fluttering. The moment her gaze found his awake, A breath escaped her, trembling and relieved.“Lucien,” she whispered, voice cracking.He blinked again, slow, disori
The house still smoked when they brought him in.They carried Matteo like you carry a bad debt, limp, sheepish, bound with rough rope and the coward’s new look, a man who had been caught thinking he could outlive his choices. One of Enzo’s boys shoved him through the doorway, laughing like a kid who’d found something forbidden in a locked attic.“Look who we dragged out from under the chandeliers,” the kid joked, voice high with triumph. “Tried to hide in the wine cellar like a rat.”Everyone in the room laughed.Matteo’s leash scraped across the marble, a wet, humiliating sound. He was pallid, hair plastered to his forehead with smoke and sweat. His eyes darted to the window where the courtyard still burned, then to the corridor where the men of the house stood in small groups, guns tucked at their sides, faces unreadable.For a second he tried to gather posture, tried to look like a man, not a snared animal.“Long time no see, Matteo,” I said. My voice was light; the words were a sca
The estate was already trembling under the weight of gunfire when Emilia took a step forward. The air cracked with chaos, shouts, bullets, glass shattering like rain. The marble floors of Dario Vescari’s mansion gleamed beneath the strobe of muzzle flashes.Dario’s guards scrambled for cover, shouting orders that dissolved into screams. It all happened too fast for them to understand; they didn’t realize the men outside weren’t reinforcements in case anything went wrong. They were executioners. Emilia had briefed them for war.She didn’t blink.Her hand lowered from the small detonator she had pressed. Her voice came steady, even as the walls shook.“One thing I’ve learned from Lucien,” she said softly, “is that you never give an enemy a second chance to hurt you.”Her father turned sharply, fury flaring through his shock. “What have you done?”“What Lucien would have done,” Emilia replied. “Ended the problem. Permanently.”Dario’s eyes widened as realization dawned—too late.“You…”“Y
The gates of Dario Vescari’s estate opened with the slow hum of betrayal. Emilia didn’t wait for an escort. She walked through alone, her boots echoing against marble like a clock counting down.Her men were already in position beyond the fences, engines off, radios quiet, the night heavy with waiting.Inside, the air smelled like smoke and secrets. Classical music drifted from somewhere deeper in the house, soft and deceitful. Two guards by the door exchanged uncertain glances when she passed. None dared to stop her.Every step she took through Dario’s corridors was measured, no hesitation, no fear. Only the quiet certainty of a woman who had already decided how the night would end.When she reached the glass doors of the main room, she paused. Through the reflection, she saw him.Her father.The Vulture.He was seated at the far end of the room, a tumbler in hand, voice sharp as he barked orders into his phone.“Santiago needs to let us strike by dawn! Moretti’s men are scattered, i
Dawn bled slow and gray over the Moretti estate. The smoke from burned curtains and scorched beams hung low, a ragged halo that made the house look less like a palace and more like a battlefield shrine. I stood on the balcony overlooking the courtyard, cloak pulled tight around my shoulders though the air had the raw bite of early autumn. Below, men moved with the focused, clean violence of those who had done this before: loading crates, checking magazines, fastening straps, stacking cases of ammunition into the back of battered trucks.The sight should have sickened me. It did not. It steadied me.They were my makeshift army now. They had followed a man they called boss for years; they would follow me today because I gave them a reason to. Because this was no longer only about vengeance. This was about cutting out the rot before it ate the whole house. About ending the war started with my name.Raul stood at the top of the stairs, his sling a dark reminder of the night we had lost Jul







