10: The Scarred Vow

CHAPTER TEN

POV: Julian Vane

The silence of the Moretti estate was louder than the explosions at the airfield. It was a heavy, suffocating kind of quiet that pressed against my eardrums as Dante led me through the grand foyer.

My adrenaline was crashing, and in its wake, every inch of my body screamed. The gash on my forehead had stopped bleeding, but it throbbed with the rhythm of my heart. My ribs felt like they had been put through a meat grinder, and the scent of smoke was buried so deep in my skin I felt like I would never breathe clean air again.

Dante didn’t take me to my room. He didn't call for a doctor. He led me straight to his private wing, a place I had never been allowed to enter.

His master suite was a cathedral of dark wood, charcoal silks, and the faint, lingering scent of that sandalwood cologne I was beginning to associate with safety. It was a confusing thought that the man who had bought me was now the only thing keeping me from falling apart.

"Sit," Dante commanded, pointing to a leather chair near the fireplace.

I sat, my legs feeling like lead. I watched him move to a hidden cabinet and pull out a medical kit and a bottle of amber liquid. He poured two glasses, handed me one, and sat on the ottoman in front of me.

"Drink," he said. "It’s high-altitude rye. It’ll dull the edge."

I took a sip. It burned like liquid fire, cutting through the soot in my throat. I coughed, a wince crossing my face as my ribs flared in protest.

Dante set his glass down and opened the kit. He pulled out an antiseptic wipe and reached for my face. I flinched a reflex I couldn't control.

His hand paused in mid-air. His dark eyes softened, just for a fraction of a second, before returning to their usual iron stillness. "I’m not Enzo, Julian. I’m not going to hurt you."

"Everyone hurts me, Dante," I whispered, the exhaustion finally stripping away my filters. "My brothers sold me. My guards betrayed me. Why should you be any different?"

"Because you're my husband," he said, his voice dropping into that low, possessive register that made the hair on my arms stand up. "And in the Moretti family, we protect what is ours. Even from ourselves."

He leaned in, his fingers firm but surprisingly gentle as he tilted my chin up. He began to wipe the blood and soot from the cut on my temple. The sting was sharp, but I didn't pull away this time. I watched him the way his brow furrowed in concentration, the way the light caught the scars on his knuckles.

"Why did you come for me?" I asked. "You had the docks. You had the legitimacy. You could have let Marcus kill me and just taken the rest of the Vane assets as 'compensation'."

Dante stopped cleaning the wound. He looked me dead in the eye, his face inches from mine. "I didn't marry a name, Julian. I married a man. A man who had the balls to spit in my face while tied to a chair in a basement."

He moved the wipe to my neck, cleaning away a smear of grease. "And tonight, I watched you blow up a warehouse to keep a secret that would have protected you. You chose the Moretti honor over your own life. That makes you more than an asset. It makes you a queen."

"A queen?" I let out a dry, pained laugh. "I think the term you're looking for is 'survivor'."

"In this city, they are the same thing."

He reached for a bandage, his fingers brushing against my ear. The contact sent a jolt of electricity through me that had nothing to do with pain. For weeks, we had been circling each other like predators. We had traded threats, signed contracts, and shared a bed in silence. But this... this was different. This was intimacy.

He finished dressing the wound and then reached for the buttons of my tactical vest. "Take it off. I need to see your ribs."

I hesitated. "I can do it."

"Julian," he warned, his voice a low vibration of authority. "Don't fight me on this. Not tonight."

I let out a breath and dropped my hands. I watched as he unbuckled the heavy Kevlar and pulled it away. Beneath it, my white shirt was ruined—torn and soaked in sweat. He made quick work of the buttons, peeling the fabric back to reveal the dark, mottled bruising across my chest and side.

Dante’s jaw tightened. He reached out, his thumb feather-light as he traced the edge of a deep purple bruise over my heart.

"Enzo did this?" he asked, his voice sounding like a threat directed at the world.

"One of Marcus’s men. With a pipe."

Dante didn't say anything. He leaned forward and pressed a lingering, ghost-light kiss to the center of the bruise.

My breath hitched. My heart hammered against his lips. It wasn't an act of lust it was a vow. A silent promise that the person who did this would never breathe again.

He looked up at me, his eyes dark with a hunger that wasn't just physical. It was a hunger for possession, for soul-deep loyalty. He reached out and cupped my face with both hands, his thumbs stroking my cheekbones.

"I told you I would break you, Julian," he whispered. "But I think I was wrong. I think I just wanted to see what was underneath the gold."

"And what did you find?" I asked, my voice barely a thread.

"Fire," he said. "And a man I’m never going to let go of."

He leaned in, his lips finally meeting mine. It wasn't like the cold, hard kisses of our wedding day. This was a slow, deep burn. It tasted of rye, smoke, and a desperate, shared need. I reached up, my fingers tangling in his dark hair, pulling him closer as I let out a low moan of surrender.

In that moment, the basement, the docks, and the betrayal faded away. There was only the heat of his skin against mine and the heavy, silver weight of the ring on my finger.

I had been sold to the Butcher. But as Dante lifted me into his arms to carry me to the bed, I realized I wasn't his prisoner anymore.

I was his partner. And God help anyone who tried to stand in our way.