For years, my world has been a machine of control and violence. Every step calculated, every risk measured, every emotion filed away and used only as leverage. There was never room for want, never space for distraction. Even the women who came before her were nothing—nameless, faceless, gone before morning.
My father taught me that power is cold and precise, a weapon to be sharpened and never sheathed. He would call what happened last night a weakness. A crack in the armor.
I tell myself it’s only lust. A predator’s hunger after the kill, a reaction to conquest. The body knows how to want, even whenthe mind doesn’t. Except when I try to focus—on the ledgers, the dossiers, the maps spread before me on the desk—her image hovers at the edge of every thought. Her voice, hoarse and angry. Her scent, sweat and fear and something sweeter beneath. The look she gave me when I pressed her down: not submission, not surrender, but some wild, furious need that mirrored my own.
She wants to hate me, but she can’t. I saw it in her eyes.
I force myself back to the paperwork. Shipments from Antwerp, coded messages from Zurich, an intercepted note from one of Vittorio’s lieutenants. None of it holds my attention.
My mind drifts—the memory of her shaking beneath me, the way she dug her nails into my skin, refusing to let me have the last word even as she came apart in my hands. I wonder if she’s awake yet. If she’s thinking of me. If she’s cursing my name or longing for my touch.
A knock at the door breaks the spell. Dimitri enters, silent as always, a folder tucked under his arm. He closes the door, his face set in that calm, unreadable mask he’s worn since we were boys. I nod for him to speak.
“Vittorio’s furious,” he says, dropping the folder on my desk. “He’s gathering allies. The Calabrians. Maybe the Slovaks. Word is he’s offering a bounty of ten million for anyone who brings you to him alive. Fifteen for your head.” He shrugs. “He’s desperate.”
I leaf through the folder: photos, transcripts, a map with too many red circles. “Desperate men make mistakes,” I say, my voice flat, automatic.
“He’s lashing out. He’ll burn his own house down before he admits he’s lost.”
Dimitri hesitates, watching me with that careful, sidelong glance. “The girl?” he asks. “She’s leverage, Emil, but she’s also a weakness. The men are talking.”
I bristle at the implication. “Let them talk. She’s mine.” The words come out harder than I intend, a line drawn in blood. I don’t explain myself. I never have.
Dimitri nods, unfazed. “As you say. Security’s doubled. No one gets near her without my say-so. If Vittorio wants her back, he’ll have to crawl.” He pauses, searching my face. “You want me to move her? Somewhere less… exposed?”
I shake my head. “No. She stays here. Where I can see her.”
He gives a short, sharp smile. It’s approving, maybe, or just relieved not to argue. He collects his folder, gives a last glance, and slips from the room as silently as he came.
When the door closes, the quiet comes rushing back. I should be thinking of war, of strategies, of which alliances will break first and who will betray me when the bullets start flying. But all I can think about is her. Not as a pawn, not as a shield, but as something I want to keep safe for reasons I can’t admit.
I justify it as strategy. Keeping her alive means holding leverage. She’s proof of my victory—a trophy, a warning, a living threat to every man who ever doubted me. That’s what I tell myself.
The lie tastes thin. In truth, it’s more personal. I am addicted to her. To the resistance she shows me, to the spark I see every time I push her, to the fire that burns in her no matter how hard I try to snuff it out.
I picture her in my bed with the sheets tangled around her thighs, hair wild on the pillow, lips parted in anger andsomething dangerously close to pleasure. I wonder how long she’ll fight me.
If there will ever come a day when she yields, or if I even want that. Maybe it’s her defiance I crave most. The way she refuses to be conquered, even when her body betrays her.
I lean back in my chair, hands steepled, letting the city hum beyond the glass. The taste of her is still on my tongue. The memory of her voice—low, shaking, determined—haunts the quiet. For a man like me, everything has always been about control. With her, something’s changed. Something’s cracked. And for the first time in years, I’m not sure I know how to fix it, or if I even want to.
War is coming. That’s certain, but it’s not the blood I fear. It’s the possibility that, for once, I have something to lose.
***
Later that night, the house is heavy with silence. The last of the staff have vanished into their quarters, the guards make their slow rounds in the garden, and every room seems hollowed out by shadows and memory. I wander through the halls, pretending to check the locks and alarms, pretending to care about routine.
My steps bring me again and again to the same door. The door to the bedroom where Isabella sleeps.
I pause outside, hand hovering over the handle. I tell myself this is for security, that I need to be sure everything is safe. I tell myself I’m only doing what any cautious man would do when he’s made enemies of half the city. Lies come easily to men like me. I breathe in, push the door open, and slip inside.
The room is warm, the light from a single lamp painting long gold shadows across the walls. She’s asleep, sprawled onher stomach in the tangled mess of sheets. Her hair spills over the pillow, a dark wave soft against white linen.
For the first time since the wedding, her face is calm. There’s no anger, no fear, just a hush, the lines of worry smoothed away. Her hand is tucked beneath her cheek, lips parted in a small, unguarded sigh. The sight stops me cold.
For a moment, I don’t see the woman who spat curses and threats at me, who clawed and raged and tried to keep something of herself even as I took everything else. I don’t see the adversary, the pawn, the victory. I see only the impossible softness of her skin, the curve of her mouth, the innocence I’ve crushed beneath my heel. It’s enough to make something in my chest tighten, a sharp, unwanted ache that tastes like regret.
I step closer, every instinct in me warring against the urge to touch. I kneel by the side of the bed, watching her breathe. Her lashes flicker, a crease forming between her brows, as if she senses me even in sleep.
