I don’t know why I’m surprised, but I am. I never thought they would stoop this low. All my life, I’ve known they only cared about themselves, but if I harbored any belief that maybe they could change, be less selfish, now I know the answer . . .
No.
“It was better than ruin,” the man who raised me mutters under his breath. This man is no father. He’s a weak, disgusting person who only cares about his status.
Lorenzo smiles with teeth. “Your family is saved, Victoria. And you should be grateful. Very few people get to be the solution to a centuries-old empire collapsing.”
“And why would I ever do this?”
“You have to, Victoria,” my mother pleads.
“Why? What more can he do? He’s already taken everything. What more can he threaten us with?”
“Violence. Death,” my father hisses.
“What?”
“Do you not know who your little boyfriend became?” My father scoffs.
“What the hell are you talking about?”
“Well, apparently, he wasn’t at all what you thought he was. Your old friend is part of the Amante crime family . . .”
“What the—”
“Which is exactly why you will go along with this plan, Little Bird.”
The moniker sends chills down my spine. His words are clear. I’m a bird in a cage, and there is no way out because he holds the key.
My pulse pounds in my ears. “You’re insane.”
He shrugs casually. “Probably.”
He then turns toward the door, and something in me snaps. “Lorenzo,” I rasp. “Don’t walk away from me.”
He pauses.
I storm around the table, closing the distance between us until I’m right in front of him.
His cologne hits me—dark, smoky, expensive, sinful—and it’s so unfair how familiar it feels.
I glare up at him, trembling. “Tell me the truth. Why are you doing this?”
His eyes soften for a fraction of a second, like a dying star flickering before the explosion. Then the softness is gone. He leans down, lips brushing the shell of my ear.
“You left me,” he whispers. “So now I’m going to show you what that feels like.”
He pulls back.
“And, Little Bird?” His smile slices into me like a blade. “I’m just getting started.”
He walks out of the dining room without another word. The door shuts behind him, and the world that I thought couldn’t possibly fall apart any further . . . collapses completely.
29
Lorenzo
Three. . .
