Semua Bab The Monster's Protégé: Bab 61 - Bab 69

MARCO There were a million things I once believed about myself—untouchable, unbreakable, and goddamn bulletproof. And then I saw her. One look, and that was all it took. One fucking look at her with him, and my entire delusion of self-image cracked like a delicate glass. Jealousy? Hell yes, I’ll admit it. I’d never allowed my mind to go there, to picture Aurora with someone else. Aurora belonged in leather and shadows, her lipstick blood-red, her heels merciless, and a gun always somewhere close enough to kiss her skin. That was the version of her I’d written into my story. The version that stayed. A goddess with venom on her tongue and chaos in her smile. Men wanted her, fantasized about her, but none ever dared to step into her orbit.

AURORA I couldn’t decide if Marco’s silence was a blessing or a warning shot. Since the last meeting, he’d kept a professional distance; he was being cold, efficient, and annoyingly invisible at every Romano family event. He was present when it mattered, gone when it didn’t. Not a glance, not a word more than necessary. I’d assumed he’d chase that mystery girl, that something in him would crack, but Simon’s updates came up empty. Whoever she was, she’d vanished like a ghost, and Marco? He’d buried himself in work like it could silence whatever haunted him.And me? I was sitting in the open, pretending the crosshairs weren’t aimed directly at my back.Dominic had changed, too. The usual arrogance in his st

AURORAWhen you touch a Roman in this city, you pay. And for the next twenty-four hours, Chicago bled for it. Every soldier, every snitch, every lowlife who'd ever whispered our name in reverence or fear was dragged into the chaos. The order had been simple—Find Samantha Romano or die trying. And God help anyone who got in our way.By nightfall, the cells beneath our warehouse were overflowing. The stench of sweat, blood, and bile clung to the walls like mold, and screams echoed like sirens. We broke bones, ripped out lies, and drowned rats in their own cowardice. If they lived, they talked. If they didn’t—well, that was one less mouth to waste time on.My fists were shredded, the skin split wide open, each knuck

AURORA I’ve known the Romanos since I was eighteen—barely old enough to drink, barely old enough to understand what real power looked like. And yet, even then, I saw it in them. I felt it. Their name didn’t just command fear—it commanded reverence. Years passed, but time with the Romanos wasn’t measured in calendars. It was measured in blood, in loyalty, in the weight of silence between unspoken truths.The Romano—Viktor, Dominic, Sammy, or even Alessandro Romano, were not the kind of people who wore their hearts on their sleeves. They were tough nuts. But when the matter came to their hearts, they were weak. None of them wore their hearts where you could see them. No, they buried their emotions under layers of steel and t

AURORA Confessing to Marco wasn’t easy. In fact, it was one of the hardest things I’d ever done. To bare the parts of myself I’d fought so desperately to keep hidden—the ache, the fear, the quiet unraveling that crept through me day after day—felt like stepping off a ledge with no promise of landing. He was the one person I couldn’t afford to look weak in front of, the last witness I wanted to be my undoing. Maybe it was pride, maybe it was ego. But if I’m being honest, it was something far more primal than that—self-preservation.But today felt like an exception. It felt like I wanted to be held, cared for, and listened to. And Marco knew it. And he wanted it. And if he had smelled my desperation, ther