Her hips stutter. Her breath fractures. Her gaze locks on mine like she’s hanging on to a cliff.
“Luigi,” she says, and it’s not a plea this time. It’s a command. It’s a claim.
I give her what she wants. I hold her down against me, deep, steady, relentless, and she shatters in my arms like she’s been holding herself together for years, and I hold her through it like that's my job now, like it's the one assignment I'll never refuse.
When I follow, it’s not soft. It’s not pretty. It’s the kind of finish that tastes like relief and rage and possession, the kind that makes a man want to burn every hallway that ever held a threat.
I bury my face in her throat and bite down gently like I’m sealing a promise with my teeth.
She trembles through it, then collapses forward, forehead to mine, breathing like she just ran for her life.
Because she did.
After, her palm rests on my chest.
Steady beat. Heat. Still alive.
I slide my hand up her spine and keep it there, a restraint, an anchor, a vow.
“Tell me we’re done,” she whispers.
I hear the smaller girl underneath it, the one who never got to believe happy endings were real.
I kiss the corner of her mouth. Slow. Mean. Like I’m teaching her what it feels like to be kept.
“We’re finished with the past,” I answer, because lying would be cruelty. “We’re not finished being sharp.”
Her mouth curves.
“Good,” she says. “No lullabies.”
“No lullabies,” I promise, and I mean it, because lullabies are how people fall asleep and forget to lock the door.
And then I roll us, pin her wrists above her head with one hand, not tape, just skin, just control, and I murmur against her ear, low enough it’s a threat only she gets to hear.
“Again,” I tell her. “Because the city can have the clause. Tonight I’m taking what’s mine.”
Epilogue
Isabella
The city tries to go back to normal like it was not just shown its own rot.
Men go to meetings. Women take calls. Coffee gets poured. Reporters rewrite what happened into something cleaner than it was. The river keeps moving, because the river doesn't care about narratives. But the rule is written now, not a rumor, not a handshake.
My father calls it stability when he speaks to other men. He calls it my decision when he speaks to himself. I let him, because credit is cheap compared to control, and I'm done wasting energy correcting men who only hear what flatters them.
I walk into the Valentine house with my head up and my hands steady and my name finally belonging to me. My cheek still remembers the sting of his slap, but I refuse to touch it, because attention is permission and I won't grant him any more.
I take the head chair again, because the chair is a tool, and tools are only dangerous when a person knows how to use them.
My father watches me like he's trying to decide if I'm still his daughter or something he has to negotiate with.
I am the second one now.
“Carraway,” he says quietly, like the name tastes wrong.
“He ordered Mother’s death,” I answer, and I don't soften it. “He ordered my brother’s death. He tried to remove me. He used your pride and Adrian’s stupidity as fuel.”
