Prologue 1
Octavia
“Call your sniper off my sister, Adelaide, before I bring this entire world down with me.”
She simply stands there, her expression offering nothing, the gentle familiarity that once softened her features has vanished, leaving behind a version of her I scarcely recognise.
I take her in carefully, trying to recall the precise point at which her allegiance shifted, when the ease between us thinned, and her ambitions began to outweigh the loyalty that should have anchored our friendship.
Because in a world designed to favour men and silence women, the only real protection we ever had was each other.
“I look at you and I can’t believe what I’m seeing,” I say quietly. “Is this what you’ve become?”
Adelaide’s face stays impeccably calm. “Octavia, I’m cartel blood. Whatever illusion you held about us standing on equal ground ends here. I will always choose my legacy over anything else.”
She hesitates for a few seconds, just long enough for the slightest crack to show through her defences.
“You would have done the same.”
I let out a derisive breath. “Highly unlikely. I’d defend my legacy with everything I have, but I wouldn’t destroy the people I claim to love to protect it.”
“Sometimes we’re not given a choice,” she replies, her voice steady but threaded with something weary. “Sometimes survival requires sacrificing someone else.”
For a fleeting heartbeat, she almost appears vulnerable, but the moment closes just as quickly and her gaze turns impenetrable again.
“If you told me what’s happening, we might be able to help you,” I say.
She laughs. “This world will devour you alive, Bellanti. And to think your father still imagines you fit to become Capo…”
She scoffs. “How misguided. You’re suited to nothing more than being a dutiful Italian wife.”
Her words aren’t true, and she knows it, but knowing that doesn’t make them hurt any less.
“So let me get this straight,” I say, refusing to rise to the bait. “You need us at that party so badly you would tear us apart for it. You are willing to manipulate, threaten, even go as far as arranging for my sister to be killed—one of your supposedly closest friends—just to make sure we show up.”
I tilt my head slightly. “Did it ever occur to you, I don’t know… to fuckingask?”
“Too much effort. A rifle to your sister’s head ensures cooperation,” she says with a laugh. “Sometimes you work smarter, not harder.”
She smirks, and it takes everything in me not to reach for the blade at my side and drive it straight into her chest.
My jaw tightens. “I’m not setting foot on their territory, and you damn well know it. Not whilehe’sthere.”
Guilt flickers across her face, but she shuts it down almost immediately.
“You know exactly what will happen if I see him,” I go on. “I won’t hold back. The second my eyes land on him, I’ll move, and I won’t stop myself.”
I shake my head. “The killing isn’t even the real issue. It’s the witnesses. If I do it in plain sight, the Bratva will come down on me, and I’m not starting a war over something I can’t control.”
My jaw tightens. “Not when my father is already reckless enough as it is, piling up enemies by the minute, and every one of them will be waiting for me when he finally steps down.”
“Then control it,” Adelaide says. “Or let it eat you alive. Either way, you’re coming.”
Anger tightens in my chest. “You think you can force me?”
“I don’t think it,” she says quietly. “I’m certain of it.”
“Fine,” I snap. “I’ll go. But leave my sister and the girls out of it. Ophelia is not stepping foot there.”
