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Chapter 41

*Bianca's POV*The sea kept its own heartbeat under the floorboards. Somewhere below, a generator hummed, steady as breath; above, the house had gone still. For once, no one was listening.I should have been asleep. Tomorrow would be blood and paperwork. Instead I found myself standing by the open window, the air smelling of salt and iron, my pulse too loud.The door clicked once behind me. I didn’t turn.“You shouldn’t leave the window open,” Erico said. His voice was soft enough to disappear into the night. “Light makes you a target.”“Then close it,” I answered.He crossed the room. The curtains moved around him like water. When the glass shut, the wind fell away, leaving the thin, unbearable quiet of two people who had run out of reasons to pretend indifference.“You came to watch me sleep?” I asked.“I came to make sure you do.”“You don’t have that kind of authority anymore.”He studied me, the faintest ghost of a smile twisting his mouth. “I never did. You just let me think

Chapter 42

*Bianca’s POV*Morning bled in quietly, a pale seam under the door. I hadn’t slept. The whispers from the corridor had folded themselves into my mind, repeating until they became questions.Daniella.Her name still carried the weight of a lie. My mother’s friend. Violet’s mother. The woman whose letter said forgive me without ever saying for what.I sat at the desk, the photo between my fingers. Two young women laughing in sun—one with my mother’s eyes, one with Violet’s smile. It didn’t look like betrayal. It looked like promise.I traced the corner of the picture where time had bitten through the paper. If Violet knew her mother’s secret, she had buried it well. But somewhere in this house—among Vincenzo’s ledgers and Violet’s portraits—there had to be proof of what Daniella had done.The corridor outside was still, only the faint murmur of guards shifting at posts. I slipped out barefoot, the locket hidden under my shirt.The library smelled of ink and cedar. Shelves rose like towe

Chapter 43

*Erico’s POV*Giovanni’s smirk was still hanging in the air when Vincenzo’s summons came.I followed him out of the library, pulse hammering, trying not to think about the taste of Bianca still burning against my mouth.The corridor between us and Vincenzo’s office felt longer than usual, the kind of hallway that could measure guilt by footsteps. Giovanni said nothing; he didn’t need to. The look in his eyes told me he understood—maybe better than I did—how deep I’d already fallen.Vincenzo’s door was open. Paolo and Mario were already there, both standing. The lamplight painted their faces in gold and shadow. This was how we’d always been: five boys who’d outlived too much, still pretending the world hadn’t changed around us.“Close the door,” Vincenzo said. His voice wasn’t sharp; it never had to be. Command lived in the way he breathed.I shut it and turned back toward them.Paolo was first to speak. “You good, brother?”He meant Are you alive? Did she hurt you? Are you still you?

Chapter 44

*Bianca’s POV*The house never truly slept. Even when its lights dimmed and the guards’ footsteps faded, there was always a low hum beneath the walls—like the sea whispering against the stone, reminding everyone inside that silence could break at any moment.After Erico left, that hum became the only sound I could hear. The air he’d disturbed still felt warmer than the rest of the room. I stood there too long, staring at the door, trying to convince myself that the tremor in my hands was from the cold.When I finally sat down, the world seemed smaller. The candlelight pooled on the desk, turning the letter in my locket into a secret heartbeat. I hadn’t opened it yet; I wasn’t ready. Not while his voice still echoed in my head—Because I needed to see that you were still breathing.No one had ever said that to me before. Not even my own flesh and blood.I touched the edge of the desk where his hands had been. The wood was smooth, almost slick, but beneath the polish there were scratches

Chapter 45

*Bianca's POV*The air in Trapani tasted like salt and diesel fuel—sharp, metallic, alive. The docks stretched out in long, skeletal limbs, cranes silhouetted against the half-lit dawn. The world was quiet the way it always is before something breaks.I wasn’t supposed to be here.Vincenzo had made that very clear.Erico even clearer.But clarity had stopped mattering the moment I realized something in Daniella’s letter matched one of my father’s codes—47-Vel Mare-Delta. A signal used only at Trapani. A signal that meant someone here would know what happened to my mother.So I came.I drove one of the spare cars from the Mercanti garage, the one Mario always complained about because it “felt like a recycled coffin.” It didn’t matter. All that mattered was the pulsing need in my chest—the need for truth, for justice, for something that finally belonged to me.The brothers were already assembled when I stepped into the open dock corridor. Five shadows cut against the cold morning: Vince

Chapter 46

*Bianca's POV*Erico didn't let go of my arm when the others moved towards the van.He didn't even pretend to.His grip wasn't painful - it was something worse.It was scared."Come with me." He said, voice low, teeth clenched like he was holding the whole world back with his jaw alone.I opened my mouth to argue, but he tugged me toward the far end of the dock, behind a stack of rusted shipping containers, away from Vincenzo's eyes, away from the brothers, away from the noise. Only when we were fully hidden did he let go.For a second, he didn't say anything.He just pressed both hands against the metal wall above my head and breathed - slow, uneven, like every inhale hurt. "Erico..." I whispered."No."He cut me off so sharply it echoed.His eyes hung between his arms, curls falling forward, shoulders tight."You don't get to say my name like that. Not right now."A chill ran down my spine. Not fear, but something deeper.Something like recognition.He lifted his head then, slowly

Chapter 47

*Bianca's POV*The drive back to the compound was silent in a way that pressed against my skin.Not hostile — heavier than that.Like the whole van had absorbed the moment behind those shipping containers and didn’t know what to do with it.Paolo kept glancing at Erico in the rearview mirror.Giovanni pretended to nap but wasn’t sleeping at all.Mario hummed under his breath as if trying to cut the tension.And Vincenzo watched everything.He always did.I sat wedged between Erico and the cold metal wall of the van.He didn’t touch me.But the space between us felt electrified, humming with the words we hadn’t said, the breath we hadn’t taken, the line we’d stepped over.Every time the van hit a bump, my shoulder brushed his arm.Every time it did, something in him went rigid — like he was forcing himself not to react.When we finally reached the compound, the guards swung open the gates. Morning light spilled over stone walls and steel fences. The familiar weight of the Mercanti hous

Chapter 48

*Bianca's POV*The hallway to the lower wing felt colder than the rest of the house, the kind of cold that didn’t come from air conditioning or stone — it came from secrets.Old ones.Bloody ones.Mario walked ahead of me, a bounce in his step he clearly didn’t feel. Every five seconds he glanced back like he was checking I hadn’t vanished.“You don’t have to look at me like I’m going to faint,” I muttered.He shrugged. “You worry Erico. Which means you worry all of us.”My pulse kicked. “That’s not my intention.”“I know.” He gave a half-smile. “That’s what makes it real.”We reached the reinforced door.A guard opened it the second Mario nodded.The room inside was smaller than I expected — stone walls, a single table, a metal chair bolted to the floor. Two bare bulbs hummed overhead. The air smelled like old water and rust.The bookkeeper sat in the chair, wrists cuffed, shoulders trembling under a cheap brown jacket.A bruise darkened his temple.His lips were split.But his eyes—

Chapter 49

*Bianca's POV*The door to the interrogation wing shut behind us with a heavy metallic thud, sealing the bookkeeper's fear inside and releasing a different kind of tension into the hallway, the kind that sat under the skin like a bruise. The brothers moved ahead in a cluster of low voices, Paolo and Giovanni debating logistics, Mario muttering curses about the enemies, Vincenzo speaking in clipped, calm tones that controlled the room without effort. I followed at a slower pace, my pulse still hammering, the revelation lodged in my ribs like a shard of bones.My father is coming for the Mercantis. He wants a Mercanti head. And he wants to use my death to legitimize the war. Every breath felt colder, I didn't even notice Erico until his shadow fell across mine. He wasn't walking ahead with the others. He was beside me. Close enough that our arms brushed every few steps, but he didn't move away. Close enough that I felt the heat of him, the restrained anger simmering beneath his sk

Chapter 50

*Bianca's POV*The strategy room. Vincenzo led us into the war room, its long table covered in maps, satellite prints, and coded sheets. The air was thick with anticipation.Everyone took their places. Except Erico. He stood behind me instead of besides others. Close enough that I felt his presence, solid and warm, like a shield I hadn't asked for but desperately needed. Vincenzo glanced at him, then at me."Bianca." He said gesturing to a seat at the table. "You will sit here."I froze.Vincenzo had never offered me a seat here.Not once.Paolo blinked.Giovanni’s brow went up.Mario let out a low whistle.Erico didn’t move.He was still behind me-waiting for my reaction.I sat.Vincenzo didn’t smile, but something in his expression shifted.“You’re part of this,” he said.A chill slipped through me.“Why?” I asked.“Because your father made you the center of his war,” he replied. “So now you become the center of ours.”My hands tightened on the edge of the table.“And because,”

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