Semua Bab VELVET GUN: Bab 41 - Bab 50

“They said time heals everything. But what do you do when time only makes the silence louder?”The wind howled through the vineyard like it knew something they didn’t, cold, fast, unforgiving. Ellie stood alone on the edge of the cliffs behind the estate the place Amy always came to think, to smoke, to scheme, to bleed in peace. Her coat billowed behind her like a ghost, black gloves, black boots, black eyes. They’d brought back a body, burnt, bent, broken, a body that looked too much like Amy, too much to deny and yet… Ellie didn’t cry, not here.She just stood there, the taste of iron on her tongue, her heart a fist she couldn’t unclench. The fog rolled over the hills in thick, heavy drapes, swallowing the horizon — as if the world itself was trying to erase Amy’s silhouette from memory but Ellie refused, she wouldn’t forget, couldn’t. Not after everything, not after nights spent whispering promises into bruised skin, not after kisses that tasted like honey and gunpowder, not after

“If I don’t come back… I want you to live. I want you to wear color, I want you to be the soft girl I fell in love with.”The morning sun hit Ellie’s cheek like a gentle warning not warm, not cold just… real. Like time was still moving, even when everything else felt paused inside her. The comb tugged through her golden blonde hair, strands falling in soft waves down her shoulders. She sat at the vanity in Amy’s room—her room now, though she hadn’t let herself call it that, not even once. The mirror reflected a girl who looked nothing like the one from six months ago, the one who had stormed into the underworld, rage-tinted and blood-soaked, holding Amy’s gun like it was scripture. This version of Ellie was quiet, colorful. A pastel pink blouse clung to her like a whisper, a yellow skirt brushed against her knees. Her lips were glossed with a soft cherry hue, not red like war, but like life. Outside, Lena hummed as she poured coffee into Ellie’s cup. The window was open, birds chirped

“Sometimes it isn’t love that saves you sometimes, it’s just someone sitting beside you and not asking you to speak.” The kitchen still smelled faintly of rosemary and lemon a calm, clean scent that didn’t quite match the tension flickering under Alba’s skin. She stood alone near the doorway, hands tucked behind her back, eyes fixed on the checkered floor tiles like they could explain the knots in her chest. The murmurs of the house distant footfalls, the clinking of dishes, the creak of old wood — all moved around her but inside, she was still. It had been days since the test, days since she’d thrown herself between Ellie and that poisoned plate with a trembling certainty she hadn’t known she possessed. She still didn’t understand what had moved her so quickly — instinct, maybe or something deeper. The sharp fear in Ellie’s eyes had undone her. She hadn’t thought, she’d just acted and the laughter. God, the laughter afterward, the way everyone had burst into it, the way she’d smi

“To play the game, sometimes you must become the lie”The night swallowed her whole. The club’s air was a heady mix of perfume, bourbon and secrets. It pulsed with jazz and the low murmur of menwho thought the dark made them invisible. Women draped in diamonds moved like smoke between velvet booths. Cigarettes burned to ash. Deals were whispered into whiskey glasses and among them was Alba but she wasn’t Alba here. Her name at least the one they gave her was MarcellaDeRossi.Marcella DeRossi, she was the kind of woman people invented legends about an heiress wrapped in old money and mystery, with a lineage that stretched from crumbling villas in Naples to scandal-drenched summers on the French Riviera. Her presence was cinematic: distant, deliberate,devastating. She didn’t speak much, but when she did, it felt like a closing statement. Everyone noticed her but no one approached. Not because she was unfriendly, but because some fires don’t burn… they freeze you where you stand. It w

“He mistook her softness for something breakable. Until she slipped the poison into his drink, and he bled secrets at her feet.”The club’s lounge was emptying out, the jazz band packing up, leaving behind only whispers of what had been. Marcella DeRossi rose from her booth, hips swaying in a wine‑red satin dress that reflected the last pools of light like a promise. The night was thick with smoke, a slow pulse in the marble-floor sanctuary of sculptured shadows. He remained at the back booth—waiting, waiting for her, his silhouette carved in dim lamplight. She met his gaze once, cocked her head and let the silence speak. Then she walked to him, heels clicking like gunshots, her perfume trailing dangerous, exotic, nearly silent. He didn’t stand,just watched, lips curling into an amused half-smile. “Miss DeRossi… elegant.” His words were smooth, practiced. She sat opposite him. “You always come to the back, don’t you?” “I like a quiet table.” He ordered another drink. “Tonight, a scot