“And you think I’ll just let you walk away?”
“I think you’re smart enough to know that trying to stop me would cost you more than it’s worth. I’m not taking anything that belongs to the family. I’m not moving into your territories. I’m building something separate. Something mine.”
My father studies me for a long moment. Calculating and weighing options. Deciding whether I’m worth the fight.
“Fine.” His tone is irritated but he knows better than to stop me. “But understand this. The moment you become a liability to this family, the moment your empire threatens ours, all bets are off.”
“Understood.”
“Then we’re done here.”
I leave his office with the weight of that conversation sitting heavy on my chest. I’ve just declared my independence from the family that raised me, trained me, made me into what I am.
And all I can think about is a girl with green eyes who disappeared into the night.
Weeks become months. The search for her continues in the background while I build my empire from the ground up. New territory. New soldiers. New operations that have nothing to do with my father’s business.
I’m ruthless in my expansion. Every lesson my father taught me, I use to carve out my own space in New York’s underworld. Within six months, I’ve established myself as a power separate from the family. Within a year, I’m someone the other families have to respect.
But through it all, she’s there. In the back of my mind. In every dark-haired woman I see in a crowd. In every set of green eyes that makes my pulse spike for half a second before I realize it’s not her.
Two years pass. Then three.
My empire grows. My reputation solidifies. I become the man everyone fears and no one crosses. The enforcer turned boss who built something from nothing. But I’m still looking for her.
Four years. Five.
Because I can’t let it go. Can’t stop searching. Can’t accept that she’s just gone.
I tell myself it’s because she’s unfinished business. Because she’s a witness who could expose everything with a single conversation to the right people. Because loose ends are dangerous in this life and she’s the loosest end I’ve ever left.
But that’s a big lie.
Because somewhere in those years of searching, the mission changed. It stopped being about eliminating a threat andbecame something else entirely. An obsession. A need that I can’t name and don’t want to own up to.
I need to find her. Need to see those green eyes again. Need to know if she’s real or if I imagined the whole thing in some fever dream of blood and violence.
Years of building an empire with her ghost haunting every step. Years of dead ends and false leads. Years of searching for a woman whose name I don’t even know.
My men think I’ve forgotten. Think the search is just routine surveillance at this point, something to keep junior soldiers busy.
They’re wrong. I still remember. Matter of fact, Dante Moretti never forgets.
Not a debt. Not an enemy. Not a face.
And especially not the one woman he wants more than his next breath.
She thinks she’s safe. Thinks each added year is long enough. Thinks I’ve moved on to bigger problems, more important targets. She’s wrong about all of that.
Because when I finally find her—and I will find her—she’s going to learn something that everyone in this world eventually learns.
You can run from Dante Moretti. You can hide. You can disappear for a lifetime. But eventually, I always collect what’s mine.
And that green-eyed girl? She’s been mine since the moment I decided not to pull the trigger.
She just doesn’t know it yet.
7
