"We're not discussing this."
"We absolutely are." She stood, crossing her arms. "You promised autonomy. You promised no cages."
"And I meant it. As long as you're alive to exercise that autonomy." I moved closer, my tone dropping to something sharper. "The Castellanos are making a move. They want to hit you at the charity event. Public location, maximum visibility, maximum impact."
She went still. I watched her process the information, watched the fear flicker across her face before she buried it.
"Then we change the plan," she said. "We don't hide. We show up stronger."
"No."
"You don't get to unilaterally—"
"I do. Because you're my wife, and there's a cartel trying to murder you in front of television cameras, and I will not lose you because you're trying to prove something about independence." My voice was ice. "The event is cancelled. You stay here. This conversation ends."
She stared at me, and I could see her calculating angles, looking for leverage. This was the woman I'd married—brilliant enough to weaponize every word I'd ever spoken about trust and choice.
"If you cancel publicly, it looks weak," she said carefully. "It looks like you can't protect your wife. Let me go. But we flood the location with security. Plainclothes, rooftops, embedded in the crowd. We make it impossible for them to move."
"Absolutely not."
"Then you're caging me. You're telling me I can't go anywhere unless it's safe, and in your world, nothing is ever safe. So you're keeping me locked in this compound forever."
She was right. The realization hit me like a physicalblow.
I couldn't keep her locked away—not without destroying the very thing that made her mine. She chose to be here. She chose to stand beside me. And the moment I took that choice away, I became just another man controlling her life.
I wanted to put a fist through the wall.
Instead, I pulled out my phone and called Marcos.
"Security detail. Full team. I want snipers on every adjacent building, plainclothes operatives mixed into the crowd, and an exit route with backup vehicles. Julietta goes, but not one person from the Castellano crew leaves that building alive if they so much as breathe in her direction."
"Sir," Marcos's voice came through measured, controlled, "that level of deployment will expose our numbers. If this is bait to assess our—"
"I don't care if it's bait. Execute it."
A pause. Then: "Understood. I'll coordinate with Vince on placement."
Julietta's eyes widened.
I ended the call and looked at my wife.
"You go. And you do exactly what my people tell you. No improvisation. No heroics. You smile for cameras, you shake hands, you play the grateful bride. And the moment Marcos gives the signal, you move. Understood?"
"Understood," she whispered.
The hit came at 2:34 p.m.
I was in the security room, watching six different camera feeds simultaneously. Julietta looked radiant in an ivory dress, her handresting on a society woman's arm, laughing at something that wasn't funny. My men were positioned perfectly—two at the exits, four embedded in the crowd, another six on adjacent rooftops.
She was safer than any asset in my entire operation.
It still wasn't safe enough.
The first shot came through the building's east window. The bullet missed Julietta by inches and shattered the champagne flute in her hand. For a moment—one terrible moment—she froze.
Then my men moved.
