Seraphina Vitiello POV

The apartment was small, a shoebox that barely contained a bed, but it overlooked Bondi Beach.

If I craned my neck, I could see the ocean.

It was blue. So incredibly, impossibly blue.

I signed the lease with a shaking hand, using the alias I had set up months ago. The landlord didn't ask questions; he just wanted the cash deposit.

I gave it to him, watching my physical liquidity vanish in seconds.

I was tired. My body ached from the flight and the old injuries, a dull throb deep in my bones. Even with the lingering pain in my leg, the sense of freedom was exhilarating.

But more than that, I was hungry.

Not the hollow hunger of being denied food as punishment, which I knew well.

This was a real, gnawing hunger.

I walked down the street. The air smelled of salt and sunscreen. People were laughing, walking dogs, holding hands.

No one was looking over their shoulder. No one expected a bullet in the back.

I found a steakhouse on the corner. It radiated an upscale warmth, the kind of place that smelled of rich jus and old money.

In Chicago, I was never allowed to order steak.

Isabella always got the filet mignon. I got the side salad.

*Spares don't need red meat,* my mother used to say, her voice dripping with disdain. *It makes them aggressive.*

I walked in and sat at a table by the window.

I ordered the ribeye. Rare.

When it arrived, I stared at it. It was beautiful, a seared slab of rebellion.

I cut a piece and put it in my mouth. It tasted like iron and freedom.

I ate until I was full, savoring every forbidden bite.

Finally, I signaled for the check.

The waiter brought the terminal.

I slid my black card into the slot. It was a risk—the card was linked to my personal trust, the one thing my grandmother had left me. But I had no cash left.

The machine beeped.

Declined.

I frowned. "Try it again," I said.

The waiter looked uncomfortable, shifting his weight.

He tried it again.

Declined.

My stomach dropped. My father.

He must have found out I didn't get on the plane to London. He had frozen the assets. He couldn't find me, not yet, but he could starve me.

I felt the heat rise in my cheeks, a distinct, burning brand of humiliation.

I checked my wallet, fingers trembling. I had used most of my cash for the apartment deposit. I didn't have enough for the steak.

"I'm sorry," I stammered. "I think there is a mistake with the bank."

The waiter's expression hardened.

"Do you have another card, miss?"

"No," I whispered.

People were starting to look. The shame was a hot, heavy blanket suffocating me.

I was the daughter of a Don. I was wearing a hoodie, and I couldn't pay for dinner.

"I'll call the manager," the waiter said.

"Wait."

The voice came from behind me, smooth and commanding.

I turned.

Luca was standing there.

The man from the plane. He was wearing a linen shirt with sunglasses tucked into his collar, looking effortlessly casual.

He held out a sleek black card.

"Put it on mine," he said.

The waiter's attitude changed instantly. "Of course, sir."

Luca looked at me, a glint of amusement in his dark eyes.

"Fancy meeting you here, Sarah."

I couldn't speak. I was mortified.

He sat down opposite me, uninvited but not unwelcome.

"Don't look so scared," he said. "I'm not a bounty hunter."

"How did you know?" I asked.

He pointed to my hands.

"You're gripping the table like you expect it to bite you. And your card just got declined. It's a classic runaway story."

I looked down at my white-knuckled grip.

"Why did you pay?" I asked.

He shrugged, leaning back.

"Because you looked like you needed a win. And the ribeye here is overpriced anyway."

He smiled. It was disarming.

He didn't know who I was. He didn't know about the bodies in the basement or the scars on my back. He just saw a girl who was broke and hungry.

"I'm a lawyer," he said. "I fix problems for a living. Consider this pro bono."

I looked at him.

He represented the civilian world. A world where problems were solved with credit cards and laws, not bullets and knives.

"Thank you," I said. "Again."

"Don't mention it," he said. "But next time, maybe order the salad until your assets unfreeze."

I laughed.

It was a rusty, foreign sound, scraping against my throat.

I hadn't laughed in years.

It felt good.

Seraphina Vitiello POV

We walked out of the restaurant together just as the sun was setting.

The sky was a bruise of purple and orange, bleeding into the horizon.

"You live around here?" Luca asked, his voice low and even.

"Just moved in," I said, gesturing vaguely down the block. "Down the street."

He walked me to the building, matching his pace to mine.

He didn't try to come up.

He didn't try to make a move.

He just stood at the door, hands relaxed in his pockets, watching the street before turning his gaze back to me.

"You're safe here, Sarah," he said. "Whatever you're running from, it's a long way away."

"I hope so," I said softly.

"Goodnight," he said.

"Goodnight, Luca."

I watched him walk away under the streetlights.

He moved with a loose, easy gait.

Dante had always walked like a tiger stalking prey—every muscle coiled, every step calculated.

But Luca walked like a man who had nothing to fear.

I went up to my empty apartment and locked the door behind me.

I sat on the floor, the silence of the room pressing in against my ears.

Slowly, I pulled my old phone out of my bag.

It was the only thing I had left from Chicago. The only tether to a life that no longer existed.

I had kept it turned off since the hospital.

But I needed to know.

I needed to see if the bomb had finally detonated.

I powered it on.

It vibrated instantly, a violent buzz against my palm.

Dozens of missed calls flooded the screen.

My father. My mother. Marco.

And one text from Isabella.

It was sent three hours ago.

I opened it, my breath hitching in my throat.

It was a photo of a wedding dress.

Layers of intricate lace. Cascading silk. Diamonds catching the light.

It was the dress she was wearing to marry Dante.

The caption was short, brutal, and precise.

*He is finally mine. You were never even a player in the game.*

I stared at the screen, the blue light stinging my eyes.

She was right.

I wasn't a player.

I was just the ball they kicked around.

But the game was over.

I felt a dull ache spread through my chest. It wasn't heartbreak.

It was the phantom pain of a limb that had been severed a long time ago.

I stood up, my movements mechanical.

I walked to the kitchen counter and set the phone down on the granite.

My eyes landed on a heavy metal pestle the previous tenant had left behind.

I picked it up, weighing the cold steel in my hand.

I raised it.

And brought it down on the screen.

*Crack.*

Glass shattered, spiderwebbing outward.

I hit it again.

And again.

And again.

I didn't stop until the phone was nothing but twisted metal and plastic shards, unrecognizable.

Breathing hard, I swept the pieces into the trash.

Seraphina Vitiello was dead.

She died in the wreckage of that SUV.

I walked to the window and looked out at the dark expanse of the ocean.

I was Sarah now.

And Sarah was going to survive.

Dante Moretti POV

The reception hall was a gilded cage, suffocating and overly bright.

Five hundred guests pressed in on all sides, and the air grew heavy with the cloying scent of expensive perfume and desperation.

Isabella was hanging off my arm, her fingers digging into my bicep with a possessive vice grip. She had been anchored to me for four hours.

Her smile was bright, brittle, and entirely fake.

She waved her ring at everyone who walked by, flashing the diamond under the chandelier's glare like a trophy.

"Look at the size of it," she cooed to the Don's wife from New York. "Dante has such exquisite taste."

I didn't choose the ring.

My mother did.

I just footed the bill.

I took a long sip of whiskey. It burned going down, but not enough to numb the irritation crawling under my skin.

"Where is your sister?" a Capo from the Rossi family asked, swirling his wine.

Isabella stiffened against my side.

"She's ill," Isabella lied without missing a beat. "She went to London for treatment. Poor thing. She's always been... fragile."

*Fragile.*

I thought of Seraphina in the basement.

Fifty lashes.

She hadn't screamed. Not once.

She had stared at the wall with eyes that were ancient with pain, far older than her years.

Fragile wasn't the word I would use.

Broken, perhaps. But never fragile.

A waiter weaved through the crowd with a tray of juice.

A small child—the son of one of my soldiers—darted past.

Impact.

He bumped the waiter, and apple juice splashed onto the pristine white hem of Isabella's dress.

She gasped, the sound sharp and ugly.

"You little brat!" she shrieked.

The music seemed to die instantly.

Isabella raised her hand.

She was going to strike the boy.

I caught her wrist mid-air.

My grip was unforgiving.

"Enough," I growled.

She looked at me, eyes wide with shock.

"But he ruined my dress, Dante! It's custom Vera Wang!"

"It's a dress, Isabella. He's five."

She yanked her arm away, rubbing her wrist dramatically.

"You're hurting me," she hissed.

I looked at her.

Truly looked at her.

I saw the cruelty etched in the set of her mouth. The vacuous vanity in her eyes.

She wasn't the girl who had sat by my bed in the safe house.

That girl had been patient. Gentle.

That girl had read to me for hours when darkness was my only companion.

That girl had smelled like vanilla and rain.

Isabella smelled like Chanel No. 5 and cold ambition.

I felt a cold knot tighten in my stomach.

Something was fundamentally wrong.

I turned to Marco.

He was loitering by a pillar, looking bored.

"Where is the box?" I asked.

"What box?"

"The one Seraphina left at the gate."

Marco hesitated, shifting his weight.

"Isabella told me to burn it. She said it was just trash."

"Did you burn it?"

"No, Boss. I put it in your office. Just in case."

"Get it," I said.

"Now? But the speeches are starting."

"Now, Marco."

He saw the darkness in my eyes.

He nodded and disappeared into the crowd.

I looked back at Isabella.

She was viciously berating the boy's mother now.

A sudden, overwhelming urge to be anywhere but here clawed at my throat.

"I need a drink," I told her, though I had no intention of stopping at the bar.

I walked away before she could answer.

I walked straight out of the ballroom and into the blessed silence of the hallway.

I was going to open that box.

And I had a sickening feeling that whatever was inside was going to ruin me.