Dante Cavallaro POV

Twenty-four hours had passed without sleep.

I sat in my study, a glass of whiskey resting untouched on the mahogany desk.

The house felt massive around me, hostile in its silence.

Every shifting shadow looked like her.

Every groan of the floorboards sounded like the phantom echo of her footsteps.

The door clicked open.

I looked up, expecting Vitale with news from the trackers.

It was Sofia.

She strolled in with an air of possession that made my stomach turn.

She was wearing a silk robe.

My wife's robe.

Red rage flooded my vision, tinting the world in violence.

"What are you doing here?" I asked, my voice a low, vibrating growl.

"I heard she left," Sofia said softly.

She rounded the desk, invading my personal space.

She placed a hand on my shoulder.

Her fingers felt like spiders crawling over my skin.

"I'm sorry, Dante. But maybe... maybe it's for the best."

"For the best?" I repeated, the words tasting like ash.

"She wasn't right for you," Sofia cooed, her voice dripping with false sympathy. "She was too hard. Too cold. You need someone who appreciates you. Someone who needs you."

She leaned down.

The scent of vanilla was suffocating, cloying and artificial.

It made me want to gag.

"I'm here, Dante," she whispered against my ear. "I've always been here."

She moved to settle onto my lap.

I stood up so abruptly that my chair flew backward, crashing against the wall with a deafening crack.

Sofia stumbled, barely catching herself on the edge of the desk.

"Dante?"

"Take that robe off," I commanded.

Sofia smiled tentatively, her fingers drifting to the belt. "Of course, I-"

"Take it off and put on your own clothes," I roared, the sound tearing from my chest. "And get out of my house."

Sofia froze.

Her face crumbled, the mask of seduction slipping.

"What? But... she's gone! We can finally-"

"There is no 'we'!" I shouted. "There never was!"

"But you chose me!" she screamed, her voice shrill. "You defended me! You bought me the penthouse!"

"I bought the penthouse for Elena!" I slammed my fist onto the desk, rattling the glass of whiskey. "I used your name to keep it off the books so my enemies wouldn't blow it up with her inside! You were a signature! A pen! Nothing more!"

Sofia recoiled as if I had struck her physically.

Her eyes narrowed, hurt morphing into venom.

"And the dress?" she hissed. "You let me wear it."

I narrowed my eyes, the non-sequitur catching me off guard.

"What?"

"The green dress," she said, malice leaking into her voice, desperate to claim a victory. "I tried it on. I rubbed my perfume on it. I told her I had worn it. That's why she slapped me."

The world stopped spinning.

She told me she wore the dress. She told me-

Elena's desperate words from that night echoed in my mind, haunting me.

I hadn't listened.

I had looked at the crocodile tears on Sofia's face and ignored the burning truth in Elena's eyes.

I walked around the desk.

I towered over Sofia, letting my shadow consume her.

She shrank back, real, primal fear finally entering her eyes.

"You provoked her," I said, the realization settling like lead in my gut. "You staged the accident in the kitchen. You poisoned my marriage."

"I did it for us!" Sofia cried.

"Get out," I said. My voice was deadly quiet, far scarier than the shouting.

"Dante, please-"

"If you are not out of this house in two minutes," I warned, "I will forget the debt I owe your dead husband. And I will treat you like the enemy you are."

Sofia scrambled back, tripping over her own feet.

She turned and ran out of the room.

Moments later, the front door slammed, shaking the house.

I was alone.

Truly alone.

I looked at the empty desk where Elena's resignation letter had lain.

I had chosen honor over love.

And now I had neither.

I pulled out my phone.

I dialed Rocco.

"Did you find them?"

"We got a hit on a credit card," Rocco answered immediately. "A burner account Aria set up years ago. They bought tickets."

"Where?"

"Las Vegas."

I hung up without another word.

I walked to the window and looked out at the dark, sprawling grounds.

Las Vegas.

The city of sin.

She thought she could run.

She thought she could hide in the neon lights.

She was wrong.

I wasn't a husband anymore.

I was a hunter.

And I was coming to claim my prize.

Dante Cavallaro POV

The private jet sat on the tarmac like a bird of prey coiled to strike.

The engines whined, a rising scream that harmonized with the chaos in my own skull.

Rocco and Luca were already on board.

Rocco was sharpening a knife.

The rhythmic rasp of stone against steel cut through the silence.

He was vibrating with a lethal, contained energy.

"She took the money," Rocco muttered, his eyes fixed on the blade. "My money. Her money. The family money. She took it all."

Luca was staring out the window.

He remained silent.

But his hands were clenched into fists so tight his knuckles had turned bone-white.

"She left the ring," Luca said softly. "She never takes it off. But she left it in the ashtray."

I sat down in the leather seat across from them.

I poured a drink.

My hand was steady.

Too steady.

"We land in five hours," I said.

"What's the plan, Boss?" Rocco asked. "We drag them back by their hair?"

"No," I said.

Rocco looked confused. "No?"

"If we drag them back, they will just run again," I said, swirling the amber liquid in my glass. "Elena... Elena is not a dog you can leash. She is a wolf."

I took a sip of the whiskey. It burned going down.

"We don't drag them," I said. "We corner them."

"And then?" Luca asked.

"And then we remind them who they belong to," I said.

"Vegas is open territory," Rocco warned. "The Commission won't like us operating there. The local gangs are feral."

"Let them try to stop us," I said.

I pulled a folded piece of paper from my pocket.

It was the note Elena had left behind.

I unfolded it.

Her handwriting was elegant, sharp as a blade.

I release you.

Three words.

She thought she could release me.

She didn't understand.

I was the darkness that stalked her.

I was the shadow stitched to her heels.

"She thinks I chose Sofia," I said to the empty air.

Rocco looked at me. "Did you?"

I looked at my Underboss.

"Sofia is a ghost," I said. "Elena is the blood in my veins. You don't choose your blood. It just is."

I crumpled the paper in my fist.

"I made a mistake, Rocco. I let her think she was secondary."

"So we go to apologize?" Rocco sneered.

I looked at him, my eyes cold.

"We are Cavallaros," I said. "We don't apologize."

I stood up and walked to the cockpit door.

"But for her," I whispered, the words meant only for the ghosts in the room. "I would burn the world to ash just to see her smile again."

I turned back to my men.

"Wheels up," I ordered.

The plane began to move.

The hunt was on.