"Yes, you do." His eyes held mine, unflinching. "You heard me on the phone. You heard the word. Don."
The word settled between us like a death sentence.
"You're—" I couldn't make myself say it.
"Head of the Barone crime family," he finished for me. "The oil empire is the public face. What people see, what the media reports. But underneath?" He gestured vaguely. "Territory. Operations. Business that can't be conducted in boardrooms or shareholders' meetings."
My legs gave out. I sank onto the nearest chair, my mind racing through every interaction we'd had, recontextualizing everything through this new lens.
The business dinner with Vincent Calabrese. The "shipping concerns." The way people deferred to him with something that looked like fear. The security that seemed excessive for a CEO.
It all made horrible sense now.
"You're a criminal," I whispered.
"I'm a businessman who operates outside conventional boundaries when necessary."
"That's just a pretty way of saying criminal." I looked up at him, this stranger who was my son's father. "Do you kill people?"
The question hung in the air. I wanted him to laugh, to tell me I was being dramatic, to explain it all away.
Instead, he held my gaze and said, "Only when there's no alternative."
The honesty was worse than any lie could have been. At least a lie would have given me something to cling to, some way to pretend this wasn't real.
"Oh my God." I pressed my hands to my face. "Oh my God, Cassian. And you brought Leo into this? Into your world?"
"I brought you here to protect you." He stepped closer, his presence overwhelming even in the vast space. "There are people who would use you to get to me. Matteo—my cousin—wants what I have. The territory, the business, the power."
"What does that have to do with us?" My voice shook.
Cassian pulled out his phone, turning the screen toward me. A grainy image filled the display—a photo taken from across the street.
Of me. And Leo.
My blood turned to ice.
It was us leaving our old apartment building. Leo's hand in mine, his dinosaur backpack on his shoulders. The photo was slightly blurred, clearly taken from a distance with a zoom lens.
"When was this taken?" My voice came out strangled.
"Before I brought you here. Before you were under my protection." He zoomed in on the date stamp. Three days before we'd moved. "Matteo's been watching you. Watching him."
I grabbed the phone from his hand, staring at the image. My son. Someone had been photographing my son.
"How long?" I could barely force the words out.
"At least a week. Maybe longer." Cassian took the phone back, his movements controlled. "That's why you're here. That's why you can't leave. Because the moment I let you walk out that door, you become a target."
He didn't finish the sentence. He didn't need to. The implication hung in the air—we already were targets.
"You made us targets by claiming us!" My anger flared, hot and desperate. "If you'd just left us alone—"
"I made you protected." His voice was level, maddeningly calm. "Matteo was circling before I even knew Leo existed. The moment you walked into my office, you put yourself in his crosshairs. He researches everyone close to me, looking for leverage."
"So, this is my fault?" The accusation burned.
"This is reality." He stepped closer, and I forced myself not to back away. "Matteo knows about Leo now. Not because I told him—because he watched. Investigated. And now he's deciding whether a two-and-a-half-year-old boy is useful leverage against me."
