The ceiling dips so low that stone grazes the top of my ponytail. The walls narrow; the air tightens; the temperature drops until it stings. My lungs pull in cold that feels like it’s scraping me from the inside out.
And the walls…
God.The walls are carved with ghosts.
My lantern catches symbols etched so deep the grooves look like wounds—spirals, slashes, a lion crest so ancient Giovanni must’ve stolen it from the bones of someone far older. Tally marks gouged into stone by someone who counted their days until they bled out.
A chill crawls up my spine.
Every shadow looks like a hand.Every drop of water sounds like a footstep chasing me.Every breath tastes like secrets I shouldn’t fucking know.
But I keep moving.
I didn’t come here to tremble.I didn’t come here to remember Santino’s mouth on mine, or the way he pinned me against a wall like he couldn’t decide whether to save me or ruin me. The memory drags heat across my skin anyway, low and dangerous.
Not now.Not here.Not underground where want turns into weakness fast.
I force it back and focus on the map my father left me—inked warnings, scrawled symbols, the knowledge that got him killed.
The tunnels fork twice. I take the left each time. My lantern skims over alcoves filled with rotting crates. Old weapons. Dead-drop symbols. Smuggling routes Giovanni used when he pretended to play god.
My fingers brush a carved X-over-circle — a sign meaning:Open this and start a war.
I swallow hard and push deeper.
The tunnel straightens, the walls smoothing to polished granite in places, cracked like old scars in others. The air thickens. The floor levels. Something here feels different—charged, waiting.
Then I see it.
A stone door.
Not a panel.Not a barrier.A fucking tomb built to bury truth itself.
Carved with Giovanni’s sigil.
The lion.The crown.The ring of thorns wrapping both like a noose.
My breath catches, sharp and painful.
It’s the same crest that hangs from Santino’s neck—warm against his skin when he pinned me closer, colder now that I’m standing in front of the version Giovanni hammered into stone.
The lantern flame flutters as if bowing to it.
This is the vault Santino and Romeo nearly ripped each other apart over.The vault Giovanni used to bury evidence powerful enough to shatter every Rivas still living.
Evidence I came here to steal.To expose.To use.To avenge.
My father’s death slams through me — the gunshot,the scream,Giovanni’s men dragging his body away before the blood dried.
A hot pulse climbs behind my eyes, fierce and lethal.
If Giovanni hadn’t killed my father, he would’ve chained him down here and let the dark finish the job.
I move closer.
The stone door radiates cold that bites through my skin. My fingers tremble when I lift my hand—not from fear, but from theweight of how close I am to ending the lie my life became the night they murdered him.
I press my palm to the carving.
