I wear his name like a scar.
Alessandro Rossi stole everything from me; my freedom, my future, the lie I told my father to keep him alive. He thinks I'm a tool to be used, a bride to be displayed, a Fraga to be broken. He thinks the ring on my finge...
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My mother's voice came back to me in pieces. Fragments of a memory I'd spent years trying to bury.
She'd been so frail by then, so pale she was almost see-through. The light in her eyes was already fading, but she'd pushed herself up against the pillows anyway, her cold fingers brushing my cheek. Her hand smelled like the lavender lotion she always used. I remember that. I remember everything.
"Promettimi, figliolo."
Promise me, son. That when you find a wife, you will love her. Care for her. Be gentle with her. Promise me you will always be her refuge, even when she can't love herself. Especially then. Promise me you will never hurt her the way your father hurt me. Promise me you will be her shelter. Her savior. Her heaven on earth. Promise me, Alessandro.
I was eight years old and didn't understand half of what she was saying. But I nodded anyway, my small hand wrapped around hers, and I swore it.
Two days later she was gone.
Yasenia's words sat on my chest like a stone I couldn't push off. I'd sworn I would never become him. Sworn it on my mother's grave, on every scar Diego ever carved into my back. And then one reckless moment, one stupid impulse, and I'd dragged myself right up to the edge of that same cliff.
She was barely standing. Her body wrecked, her mind fogged, her defenses stripped down to nothing. And I'd kissed her like the ring on her finger gave me permission. Like owning her name meant owning her.
She wasn't wrong. She wasn't even close to wrong.
My phone buzzed and yanked me out of the spiral. I grabbed it and swiped to answer. "Andrea. You better tell me you found that bastard."
"We couldn't track him. He's gone off the grid."
I ground my teeth so hard my jaw ached. "That's why I said find him. I don't care what it takes. Turn over every rock, every stone, every piece of shit hiding spot he's got until we drag him out."
"We will." Andrea's voice carried a faint edge of satisfaction. "That strike against his business two weeks ago sent him running. He's too scared to show his face right now."
Too scared wasn't good enough. If the bullet in my chest hadn't kept me down for days, Liam Bailey would already be rotting in the fucking ground. The night I walked out of the hospital, I'd gone straight to his warehouse on Long Island. Frankie waited close by, while I made sure his operation felt the first wave of what was coming. His men never saw it hit. The shipment went up in flames and I left him a message written in the ashes.
Andrea had been furious when he found out. Furious that I'd ditched him, more furious that Frankie had taken his place. He wanted to argue that she had no business being there, that she wasn't part of this, but I shut him down with one sentence: I trusted no one else with Yasenia's protection that night. He let it go, but I knew him. He'd circle back to it eventually.
