The Rose and the Bullet

The night stretched endlessly before me, the shadows in the mansion growing darker with every passing hour. Sleep was a luxury I couldn’t reach. My body lay on the massive bed, still and stiff, but my mind spun mercilessly. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw that card again—the one left on my nightstand by men I never heard entering, never saw leaving. The memory clung to me like smoke: the cold black of the paper, the jagged silver letters.

You don’t belong here.

Those words were carved into my thoughts, repeating like a whisper in the corners of my mind. It wasn’t just a threat—it was a promise, one that made the walls of this mansion feel less like protection and more like a cage.

The silence was worse than noise. No distant footsteps. No muffled conversations from Alexander’s men. Just the hum of the night air-conditioning and the frantic beat of my own heart. Alexander wasn’t home. He had left hours ago, his jaw set, his words clipped when he told me he needed to “handle things.”

Handle what? I didn’t ask. A part of me was too afraid to know.

I turned on my side and stared at the vast window that looked over the grounds. The curtains swayed slightly, though no breeze entered. I imagined eyes out there, watching. My skin prickled. What if they were already inside again? What if another card was waiting for me, tucked under the pillow, slipped into the closet, written on the mirror in something far darker than ink?

I sat up abruptly, my breathing uneven. I pressed a palm against my chest, trying to calm the storm pounding beneath my ribs. This wasn’t just fear—it was suffocation.

The door creaked.

I froze. My eyes darted across the room, catching movement in the dim light.

“Miss Isabella?”

It was a man’s voice. Not Alexander. Deeper, rougher, but steady.

My body slackened, though my pulse didn’t slow. Stepping into the bedroom was a tall man dressed in a black suit, his expression sharp, his presence heavy. I recognized him vaguely. He was one of Alexander’s trusted men—Marcus, the head of security.

“You shouldn’t be awake,” he said simply, closing the door behind him.

My throat felt dry. “How—how did you get in here?”

“Master’s orders,” he replied, his tone clipped. “I’m here to check on you.”

“Check on me?” My laugh came out brittle. “That doesn’t sound like protection. That sounds like you expect something to happen.”

His eyes flicked over me, unreadable. “Something already did.”

The black card. The silent invasion of my sanctuary. I gripped the edge of the sheets tighter.

Marcus approached no further than the center of the room. His hands were clasped behind his back, soldier-like. “We’re sweeping the grounds every hour. No one gets past us tonight.”

The words should have comforted me. Instead, they chilled me further. If Alexander had ordered Marcus himself to guard me, then he knew the danger was real. More real than I wanted to admit.

I swallowed hard. “Do you know who did it?”

His gaze shifted slightly, the faintest hesitation before he answered. “Not my place to say.”

Which meant he did know. And if he wasn’t telling me, it was because the truth was worse than silence.

Marcus inclined his head toward the bed. “Try to rest. You’ll need your strength.”

Strength for what?

I wanted to ask, but his presence told me the answer would be useless. He wasn’t here to talk, only to guard. So I lay back down, though sleep was further from reach than ever.

When Marcus left, closing the door with a soft click, the room felt emptier than before. The shadows thickened. The silence returned. And in it, I heard my own doubt louder than anything else.

Maybe they were right. Maybe I didn’t belong here.

What was I doing, wrapped in the dangerous orbit of a man like Alexander? His world was built on blood and shadow, his rivals nothing like the polished, clean-cut businessmen he pretended to be in public. No. These were men who spoke in violence, who marked territory with fear, who left black cards on nightstands and disappeared like ghosts.

And now they had seen me.

I pressed my hands to my temples, trying to shut out the spiraling thoughts. But the house didn’t let me forget. Every creak of wood, every shift of the wind felt like a reminder: I was prey.

Hours dragged.

I don’t know when exactly I heard the engines—low, distant, rolling up the driveway. I sat up at once, my heart leaping.

Alexander.

I hurried to the window and peered down. Sure enough, his sleek black car cut through the night, headlights glowing briefly before vanishing into the garage. Relief hit me, sharp and heavy, almost painful.

I ran back to the bed and sat down, clutching the sheets in fists. But relief didn’t erase the anxiety—it only mingled with it, because when Alexander appeared in the doorway minutes later, he didn’t look like my Alexander.

His shirt was rumpled, his sleeves rolled up, his tie gone. Shadows clung to his face, jawline sharp enough to cut glass, eyes burning with something raw, something dangerous. His presence filled the room like a storm, and for a moment, I didn’t recognize him.

“Isabella,” he said, voice roughened, not with fatigue but with restrained fury.

I stood slowly. My mouth opened, but no words came out.

He crossed the room in three long strides and took my face in his hands. His palms were warm, but his touch was too hard, almost desperate. His eyes searched mine, like he needed proof that I was still here, still real.

“They didn’t touch you,” he said. Not a question—an assertion.

I shook my head, though my voice trembled. “No. Just… just the card.”

His grip tightened briefly before he released me, stepping back. His movements were sharp, clipped, every muscle in his body tight with control.

“I should never have left you alone,” he muttered, more to himself than me. Then, louder: “It won’t happen again.”

I wanted to believe him. But even as he said it, I sensed the weight behind the words—the same way Marcus’s silence carried truth. The danger wasn’t going away.

We didn’t speak much after that. Alexander paced the room like a caged animal, his phone pressed to his ear, his voice a low growl as he issued commands in a language I barely understood. Men’s names. Streets. Orders. Each clipped word made my chest tighter.

When dawn threatened at the edges of the sky, I finally sat on the bed again, exhaustion pulling at me. My eyes closed for what felt like seconds.

Then—

A knock at the door.

Alexander’s head snapped up instantly. He strode over and yanked the door open. One of his men stood there, a pale expression cutting through his hardened features.

“Sir,” the man said quietly. “Something was left at the gate.”

Something.

My stomach turned cold.

Alexander followed him out. Against my better judgment, so did I. The hallways were eerily quiet, the early morning light seeping through tall windows.

At the front of the mansion, just inside the massive iron gates, sat a small package. Wrapped in plain brown paper. No markings. No return.

Two guards hovered near it like it might explode.

Alexander strode forward, crouched, and tore the paper open with a violence that made my chest tighten.

The wrapping fell away.

Inside was a glass box.

And inside the box—

A single blood-red rose, its petals lush and perfect, glistening with dew that wasn’t dew at all but something darker. Along the stem, wrapped in black ribbon, lay a silver bullet.

The sight stole the breath from my lungs.

I clutched the railing, my knees weak. A rose. Beauty. Romance. Life. Paired with death, pressed against it like a lover.

The message was as clear as the card.

I wasn’t just being warned anymore.

I had been marked.

Alexander’s hand closed around the glass box, knuckles white, veins straining against his skin. His jaw worked once, twice, before he spoke, his voice a deadly whisper.

“It’s war.”

And though his fury shook the air itself, it was my own fear that hollowed me out. Because war meant casualties. War meant loss.

And I wasn’t sure if I would survive it.