Chapter 2

I jolted awake in bed and immediately rushed down the corridor.

The door to the archive room was thrown wide open, and the heavy smell of gunpowder lingered in the air.

Scarlett stood before the display case, pale-faced, a smoking gun still clutched in her hand.

My father's scale model ship, the one he had left behind for me, had been shot straight through. The bullet had struck the very center of the hull, causing the wooden keel to explode from the impact, scattering shards of glass all across the floor.

I froze at the threshold, my mind instantly going blank.

That ship was a replica of the very first freighter my father had navigated through the Mediterranean in his youth, back when he was still establishing himself in the family business.

Years later, when the real vessel was decommissioned, he spent a whole year meticulously crafting this model by hand. On the stern, my name was carved into the wood, placed there when I was seven.

Now, it lay broken in two.

"Why did you shoot?" I managed to ask.

Scarlett snapped out of her daze and quickly lowered her weapon. "I heard a noise inside. I thought someone was hiding behind the cabinet. Eliana, I'm so sorry."

I stared at her, so consumed by sudden rage that I almost lost my voice. "There's a solid wall behind that cabinet! How could anyone possibly be hiding there?"

Her face stiffened. "I didn't know."

"You literally had Dario pull up the estate's blueprint for you last night." I exposed her lie on the spot. "Are you telling me you didn't know whether this room had an exit or not?"

Scarlett's eyes instantly welled up with tears. "My apartment was just targeted last night. I haven't slept a wink. When I heard the noise, I went by instinct, that's all."

I stepped closer to the fractured remains of the ship. The bullet hole sat precisely at the center of the hull. The angle was steady, controlled—nothing like a panic-driven, blind shot fired in a frenzy.

"Did your 'instinct' make you steady your aim and shoot it straight through the hull?" I demanded, watching her expression turn pale.

"Are you saying I did this on purpose?"

"I don't know," I said, looking her dead in the eye. "But I do know that you shouldn't even be in this room in the first place. Get out."

She stood rooted to the spot.

"I said get out!" My temper flared, and I pointed toward the hallway.

Startled, she finally walked backward, only to step onto a jagged piece of glass.

Scarlett let out a sharp cry of pain and collapsed onto the floor. A shard had sliced through her calf, and blood quickly trickled down her ankle, staining her skin.

That was the exact moment Dario arrived.

The instant he saw the blood, his expression shifted entirely.

"Scarlett!" He crossed the room in two long strides, kicked the gun aside, and crouched down to inspect her leg. "Don't move. I'll call the doctor over."

Scarlett fought back her tears and shook her head weakly. "I'm fine. It was my own fault for destroying Eliana's father's things. Please go check on Eliana first."

Only then did Dario glance up, realizing there was blood on my hand as well. When I had reached down to pick up the broken pieces earlier, a sliver of glass had gouged open my palm.

Yet he only spared my hand an offhand glance.

"Have the butler tend to that."

An icy chill swept through my chest. "Dario, she just destroyed the ship my father left me."

He cast a quick look at the wreckage scattered across the floor. "I'll hire the best restorer."

"And what if it can't be repaired?"

"Then I'll commission a new one."

I stood paralyzed for two long seconds before letting out a disbelieving laugh. "Commission a new one? My father built that with his own hands! I don't want a replica that just happens to look like it!"

Scarlett suddenly gasped from the pain, and Dario immediately wrapped an arm around her shoulders to support her weight. "We're going to the hospital first."

I stared at him. "You're not even going to ask her why she fired a gun at my father's ship?"

"I heard her explanation. She thought an intruder was in the room."

"That is blatantly a pathetic excuse!" I yelled, pushed to the absolute edge of my sanity.

Dario's patience snapped as well. "Her place was hit last night, Eliana! She misjudged the situation, but that doesn't mean she intentionally wanted to break your things."

"So that's it? The matter is just settled?"

His voice dropped into a chilling register. "She needs stitches right now. The model is already broken, and my staying here isn't going to magically restore it."

That single sentence shattered whatever last thread of hope I had left. I closed my mouth and said nothing more.

Scarlett whispered, "You should stay here with her. I can manage going to the hospital by myself."

"Enough," Dario snapped, lifting her cleanly into his arms. As he brushed past me, he paused for a fraction of a second. "I'll handle this tomorrow."

The next morning, my father's old shipwright examined the shattered model and sighed, shaking his head. "The main keel is completely snapped. Even if I piece it back together, it will never be the original."

Later that afternoon, a massive wooden crate arrived at the estate on Dario's orders.

Inside was a nineteenth-century model cargo ship acquired from a private museum worth nearly a million euros.

Dario's assistant had it delivered. "Don Dario reached out to the collector personally to secure this. Miss Scarlett has also expressed her deepest apologies, and he hopes this matter can end here."

I cast a lifeless glance at it and spoke in a flat, indifferent voice. "Send it back."

That evening, an official notification from the San Luca Port Authority arrived in my inbox.

The legal shipping enterprise I had spent two long years negotiating had finally reached the final signing phase. Tomorrow, I needed to personally present the original contracts and authenticated credentials to the port commission.

This project was the last dream my father had desperately wanted to fulfill before he passed.

In three days, I would be leaving Sicily for good. Before I disappeared, I was going to finish what my father started.