Se connecterPartager
CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE
Date de publication:
2026-06-28 02:10:37
Dernier chapitre
Vows of Ruin: Til vengeance do us part CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE
GABRIELE'S POVI stepped into the hallway and took in the scene.Alexei's hand was around her wrist. The closeness. The low voices."Carmela." I kept my voice level. "Go inside."She looked at me for a moment and then she went, pulling the door halfway closed behind her.I finally turned to Alexei.He was already watching me with that cool and collected composure, his hands relaxed at his sides now and nothing in his posture suggesting he'd been doing anything worth explaining."What were you discussing?" I asked."Nothing that concerns the business," he said."Everything that happens in this house concerns me.""Of course." He inclined his head slightly. "I was saying goodbye. Your wife was passing through. The conversation was brief.""Brief conversations don't require that kind of proximity."Something moved in his expression. Not guilt. Not confession. It was something harder to name. "I meant no disrespect, Gabriele. You have my word on that.""Your word," I said, "is something I
Vows of Ruin: Til vengeance do us part CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE
CHAPTER FIFTY-THREECARMELA’S POVI'd been avoiding the east hallway for three days. Gabriele’s office in particular.Alexei Volkov had been coming to the estate for the past three days.It wasn't difficult to justify to myself. There were other staircases, other routes to the kitchen, other ways to move through this house that didn't take me anywhere near Gabriele's office while Alexei Volkov was supposedly inside discussing shipping routes or territory or whatever business had brought him back to Naples this time. I told myself I was being efficient. I told myself the note still sitting in my desk drawer had nothing to do with the path I chose to walk every morning.I didn't believe myself, but I kept saying it anyway, because the alternative was admitting that a single folded card had rearranged something fundamental in me, and I wasn't ready to admit that to anyone, least of all myself.Today I needed coffee, and the kitchen was closer through the east hallway than around the long
Vows of Ruin: Til vengeance do us part CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR
CARMELA'S POVI stared at the document for a long moment before I trusted myself to speak.The original record predated the payment by four months, which meant whatever my father had agreed to do hadn't started with a single transaction. It had started with a conversation. A negotiation. Something slow enough that there had been time, somewhere in those four months, for someone to change their mind.But he hadn't."Where did you get this?" I asked.Gabriele watched me carefully. "I've had it for a while. I didn't know what it meant until last night, when I remembered what Elena asked me." He paused. "I should have shown you sooner. I wasn't sure it was relevant.""It's relevant," I said."You're very calm about this."I looked up at him. "What would you like me to do instead?"He didn't answer that. He just watched me with that particular attention he had, the one that missed very little, and I wondered for the first time whether he already suspected something about my father that he
Vows of Ruin: Til vengeance do us part CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE
CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE CARMELA'S POVThe note was still in my jacket pocket when I sat down across from Gabriele the next morning.I was aware of it the entire time — a small, folded weight that shouldn't have meant anything and meant everything. I'd read it maybe thirty times since last night and each time Elena's handwriting did the same thing to me, pulled the floor out just slightly, enough to make everything else feel temporary and uncertain.I kept my face exactly where it needed to be.Gabriele was already deep into the accounts when I arrived, three folders open across the desk, his coffee going cold the way it always did when he was properly focused. He looked up when I sat down and pushed one of the folders toward me without preamble."These are shell companies," he said. "I need you to look at the registration dates against the shipment timeline and see if the pattern holds."I opened the folder and started reading.For the next hour we worked in the focused, efficient silenc
Vows of Ruin: Til vengeance do us part CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO
CARMELA'S POVI'd spent four days trying to put Alexei Volkov out of my head, and I was almost succeeding.Almost.She had your laugh.I'd turned those words over so many times they'd started to lose their shape, the way a word does when you repeat it too many times and suddenly it stops sounding like anything. I told myself he was testing me. Seeing how I'd respond to being unsettled. It was what men like him did in rooms like that — they found the soft spot and pressed it, just to see what happened. It didn't mean anything. It certainly didn't mean what the most irrational part of me kept insisting it meant.****There was another event later on during the week.It was smaller than the dinner. It was a gathering at one of the Famiglia's associates' homes, the kind of evening that existed so people could be seen together without it looking like a meeting. Gabriele brought me without discussion, which had become the pattern, and I dressed and came downstairs, took his arm and did w
Vows of Ruin: Til vengeance do us part CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE
CARMELA'S POVThe meeting had been Gabriele's idea, which surprised me, because everything I'd learned about him in the weeks since our alliance formed suggested he preferred to keep the Russians at a comfortable distance.He told me the night before, standing in the doorway of the study while I was going through papers, in the tone he used when he'd already made a decision and was informing rather than asking."The Russian Vor will be there tomorrow evening. Alexei Volkov. He's attending on behalf of the Pakhan." He paused. "I need you to be present.""As your wife," I said."As my wife," he confirmed, and the way he said it had shifted slightly from the earlier weeks. It sounded less like a role he was reminding me to perform and more like a fact he was stating. I nodded and looked back at my papers and listened to him leave.****The dinner was small and carefully curated, the kind of evening that looked social and was entirely business. I spotted Alexei Volkov the moment we walked
Vows of Ruin: Til vengeance do us part CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
CARMELA'S POVI woke up to the sound of voices outside my door.This was not the usual guard chatter. This was different. I sat up, listening."—Don't care what your orders are. I'm family. Open the fucking door."Marco.I glanced at the closet where Elena's evidence was hidden, then at the clock.
Dernière mise à jour : 2026-04-05Vows of Ruin: Til vengeance do us part CHAPTER TWENTY
CARMELA'S POV I woke up to the soreness between my legs. It was evidence of last night.The sheets were tangled around me and I could smell him on my skin—his cologne mixed with sweat, whiskey and sex.Gabriele's side of the bed was cold, which meant he'd been gone for a while.I couldn't look at
Dernière mise à jour : 2026-03-24Vows of Ruin: Til vengeance do us part CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
GABRIELE'S POVI pushed two fingers inside her, feeling her clench around me. She was tight—so fucking tight—and hot and perfect.Her hips bucked against my hand involuntarily."That's it," I murmured, pumping my fingers slowly. "Your body knows what it wants even if you don't want to admit it.""I
Dernière mise à jour : 2026-03-22Vows of Ruin: Til vengeance do us part CHAPTER TEN
CARMELA'S POV “Viktor Kozlov.” Gabriele extended his hand. “I didn't realize you were interested in modern art.”Kozlov. I'd already recognized him from the accent but now it was obvious. This man was Russian. Beside him were two men with two women beside each of them. They were all expensively d
Dernière mise à jour : 2026-03-18
Vous vous intéresseriez aussi à
Warning: My Mommy is A Savage!
Seeking A Peaceful Life2.1M VuesBegin Again
Val Sims1.0M VuesCold Showers
Symplyayisha837.6K VuesMaster Odell’s Secret Ex-wife
Eggsoup1.2M VuesFull Moon Sin: Werewolf Mating
Arthur130 VuesImmortal Cravings: Of Sin And Blood
LORA ASHLEY268 VuesFALLING FOR THE DANGEROUS BILLIONAIRE
Diana Lumiere 90 VuesDevour me, Logan: Ravaged By My Boyfriend's God-father
Pearl116 Vues
