“Neither was our mother.”
“And look how that ended.”
The air cooled around us.I sat the glass down too hard; whiskey sloshed over my fingers.For a moment, the flashback was too sharp to ignore—my mother standing in this same room years ago, pleading for mercy for a man who’d betrayed my father.She hadn’t been wrong.
My father’s answer had been efficient.Public.A lesson.
“Mercy,” he told me that night, blood still drying on his cuffs, “is an infection.It weakens judgment, poisons power.You give it once, and the whole body rots.”
I was young.I believed him because he was God in those days—until I learned gods could die screaming like anyone else.
Marco spoke again, softer.“You can’t protect her from this.”
“I can try.”
“You'll be putting her in a cage.She doesn’t want that.”
“She’s already in one.”
Marco swore under his breath and pushed away from the desk.“I’ll send word to the men.No retaliation until you give it.But Enrico?—”
“What?”
“Don’t wait too long.Patience can look a lot like weakness to people who don’t know better.And we both know what happens to Kings when they appear weak.”
He left before I could answer.The door shut, sealing in the quiet again.My brother and I hadn’t always seen eye to eye, especially when it came to the family business, but… since I took over, he’d had my back on every occasion.
I stared at the maps on the desk.Red pins marked ports, warehouses, routes.Lines crisscrossed like veins.Every inch of this city carried a cost I’d paid in loyalty or blood.
My phone buzzed again.New message.Unlisted number.Just an image this time — a raven perched on broken glass.No text.A symbol, then.A calling card.
Who the fuck was coming after me?And why choose now?Why not before I married Mia?Or… does this all have to do with her?
I forwarded it to Marco, typed:Find origin.
Then I rose.My reflection stared back from the window — same dark suit, same guarded eyes.Upstairs, a soft sound—footsteps, maybe.The faintest creak in the boards above me.It reached me like a pulse.For a heartbeat I let myself imagine a different life: no guns, no empire built on fear.Just her laugh in the kitchen, morning light across her face.The thought was dangerous precisely because it was possible.
The phone buzzed again, breaking it.Another message.
Marco: A body found near the river.Our man.A note pinned to his chest.
I opened the image file.
Black ink on paper, letters deliberate and neat:
Your throne bleeds.
No signature.
The anger started low, like a hum under the ribs, rising in increments.I set the phone down carefully.
I called Marco.“Pull everyone from the docks.We lock the city down.No shipments.No collections.We freeze movement until I know who’s playing this game.”
He hesitated.“That’ll cost us.”
“I don’t give a flying fuck.”
He started to say something else, then thought better of it.“Understood.”
