Isn’t a lost soul playing with fire.
Someone calculates this.
Measured.
A message without a signature.
My mind moves fast—too fast.
Giovanni’s enemies.
He broke the deal.
He bled the families dry.
Rumors involve the church's purpose and secrets hidden beneath stone.
Ledger pages that never saw the light of day.
We were the only ones meant to have access to the secrets.
And this woman…
walks into my booth at midnight during a storm
and asks me if I know what it’s like to crave the forbidden?
No one does unless they want something.
Danger rolls through me in an icy wave.
“Who sent you?” I ask.
She doesn’t flinch.
“I told you,” she murmurs, leaning so close her breath slips through the lattice and grazes my skin.
“I came to take something back.”
Every instinct in me—priest, son, heir, weapon—blazes red.
This woman isn’t here for salvation.
She isn’t here for forgiveness.
She isn’t afraid of me at all.
And the truth slams into place like a lock clicking shut:
She’s here for something my father hid.
There is something lying underneath.
It's something worth killing for.
It's worth walking through a storm to claim it.
And she came prepared.
