"Isla."
I paused at the doorway but didn't turn around.
"I know you're afraid," he said quietly. "But everything I've told you tonight—the business, the risks, all of it—I'm trusting you with that information. That means something."
"What does it mean?" I asked without looking back.
"That I'm not trying to own you. I'm trying to protect you." His voice dropped lower. "And maybe, eventually, you'll understand the difference."
I didn't respond. Couldn't. I just walked away, my footsteps silent on the carpet, leaving him standing alone in that vast living room.
I slipped into Leo's room and sank into the chair beside his bed. He slept peacefully, unaware that his father was a criminal. That we weretrapped in a penthouse with a man who killed people. That our lives had just become infinitely more complicated and dangerous.
I reached out and touched Leo's curls, soft beneath my fingers.
"I'm sorry," I whispered. "I'm so sorry I brought you into this."
But even as I said it, I knew the truth. I hadn't brought Leo into Cassian's world.
Cassian had always been part of Leo's world. From the moment of his conception, my son had carried Barone blood.
And now we'd both have to live with what that meant.
CHAPTER 15
Cassian
Isla’s door had been closed for three days now.
Not locked—I'd checked, standing outside it every night like some fool, my hand on the handle. A barrier that said more than words ever could.
It was barely 7 a.m. now, and I'd already been awake for hours. Sleep had become impossible since she'd overheard that phone call with Marco. Since she'd learned what I really was.
She had come out each morning for Leo’s breakfast, her face a careful mask of composure. She’d helped him with his cereal, smiled at his chatter about dinosaurs, then retreated the moment he was occupied with his trains. She wouldn't look at me. Wouldn’t speak beyond the bare minimum required for Leo's sake.
And now that door closed again.
I stood at my office window, watching the city wake beneath a gray October sky. My reflection stared back—a man who'd built an empire on violence and control, now undone by a woman's silence.
My phone buzzed. Marco.
"Morning briefing?" he asked.
"My office. Ten minutes."
I poured coffee, black and bitter, and tried to focus on what mattered. The business. The family. The threats circling closer every day.
Not the way Isla had looked at me three nights ago, when she'd learned what I really was. Like I was a monster she'd accidentally let into her home.
Marco arrived precisely on time, closing the door behind him. He carried a tablet and the grim expression I'd come to associate with bad news.
"Matteo?" I asked, not bothering with pleasantries.
"Getting bolder." He pulled up surveillance photos. "He met with three of our Brooklyn dock supervisors yesterday. Two switched allegiance. The third refused and…" Marco hesitated.
"Spit it out."
"Turned up in the East River this morning. Beaten badly. Still alive, but the message was clear."
