Chapter 8
Chapter eight
ANTONIO
DAY TWO
The key.
I've been staring at these two words for three hours, and they're starting to burn into my retinas. Isabella as "the key" to what? I've cross-referenced bloodlines, medical records, family trees going back four generations. Nothing makes sense.
Unless someone's been watching her longer than any of us realized.
I pull up her medical files again. Cancer at seventeen. Experimental immunotherapy trial. Full remission against the odds. What if she wasn't randomly selected for that treatment?
No—that's paranoid thinking. The immunotherapy trial was legitimate. I've had Luca verify it three times. The doctors who saved her life had no connection to our world.
If there's a conspiracy here, it's not about her blood. It's about her bloodline.
Isabella's grandmother built networks that survived the Cold War, accumulated leverage on half the families in Europe. When she died, she left it all to her granddaughter—locked behind conditions that have kept powerful men circling for years.
One year of legal marriage to access the inheritance.
We've been married four months. Eight more to go.
That's what Luciano was really selling at the auction. Not just a daughter. A key to half the power in Europe. Is everything revolving around her inheritance?
And someone's been waiting years to get their hands on that key. I don't know who. Because everyone has. But I will find out.
Connor's twelve-hour deadline passed six hours ago.
He's got his people in Piraeus asking questions, but so far nothing actionable.
Dimitri, former military, now working undercover inside the Greek operation went dark yesterday.
Either he's been made, or he's gone to ground. Neither option sits well.
And I still can't reach Isabella.
The security feeds from the island show nothing but static. Franco and Manuel were supposed to install cameras, send confirmation. Instead, I'm staring at dead air where my wife should be. The Greeks are fucking with me, and I can't prove how.
I rewind the footage again, searching for anything I might have missed, until a knock at the door interrupts me.
"Boss." Nikolai's voice drops when he enters. "Paola's been asking questions. About the Greek situation. About Isabella."
My jaw tightens. Paola. Days ago she was trying to crawl back into my bed, spitting venom about my wife. Now she's suddenly interested in gardening and in playing nice. The change is too fast, too complete.
"Keep watching her," I say. "She sneezes wrong, I want to know about it."
Once he leaves again, I resume pacing. The mahogany desk looms in the center of the room like a war table, covered in maps and reports. Greece spreads across one wall—red pins marking escape routes, blue ones showing safe houses Connor's people have identified. My jaw aches from clenching.
Cerberus watches me from his spot by the fireplace, tracking each turn with those knowing eyes. He can smell my fear. Dogs always can.
My phone buzzes. Luca.
"Talk to me," I growl into the receiver.
"The comms situation is worse than we thought." His voice is tight, frustrated—Luca doesn't like admitting failure. "They're not just blocking signals. They're spoofing them. Making it look like Franco and Manuel have control of the network when they don't."
"English, Luca."
"Every message you've received from the island in the last hours might be fake. They're intercepting outgoing signals, replacing them with their own. Franco could be screaming for help and we'd never know."
"Can you break through?"
"I'm trying to insert a flag—something that would alert Franco if he sends a real message. But it's delicate. If they notice me poking around, they might..." He doesn't finish. They might what? Hurt her? Kill her? Move her somewhere I'll never find?
"Do it now," I say. "Whatever it takes."
I hang up and stare at the map.
Connor's latest reports are scattered across my desk.
His Irish connections have been busy—Moretti shipments blocked in Baltimore, accounts frozen, Henrik's supply lines choked in three countries while he's rotting in jail.
Maybe Luciano actually put him there. We're hitting back, but it's not enough.
These bastards are still moving closer to that island. Too close.
And I can't fucking reach her.
The knock at my door grates against my already shredded patience. "What?"
"I need to talk to you." Paola's voice, stripped of its usual calculated warmth.
I consider ignoring her. I've got enough problems without adding whatever game she's playing. But Nikolai's warning echoes in my head. She's been asking questions.
"Come in."
She enters without her usual swagger, hands clasped in front of her. There's dirt under her nails—from the garden, probably. Her eyes are red-rimmed, raw in a way I've never seen from her.
"What do you want?" I don't bother softening my tone.
"Information." She swallows hard. "And to give some in return."
I lean against the desk, arms crossed. "I'm listening."
"Dr. Rafe's family has been receiving threats. For weeks." Her voice wavers but she pushes through. "Someone's been pressuring him for information about the families he treats. Financial situations. Vulnerabilities. Who's weak, who owes what to whom."
Now she has my attention. Dr. Rafe has patched up half the made men in Europe. His loyalty was bought with protection, not fear—if someone's threatening that balance, they're threatening the entire infrastructure of trust that keeps our world functioning.
"Who?"
"I don't know. But they asked specifically about marriage alliances. Called it 'consolidation.'" She meets my eyes. "Said the old families were too scattered. That it was time for unification."
Consolidation. Unification. The words slot into place alongside everything else I've learned.
The auction where I bought Isabella. The Greeks' sudden interest in her bloodline.
Her mother's thirteen years of scheming.
Someone's been playing a long game—decades long—and we're only now seeing the edges of it.
"Why are you telling me this now?" I demand. "Why not a week ago? A month ago?"
Paola's composure cracks. "Because today is the anniversary." Her voice drops to something barely audible. "Alba's shop. Five years."
The name hits like a sucker punch. Alba. Paola's sister. Yellow roses in the window, bullet holes in the glass. Collateral damage in a war between families that had nothing to do with her. I remember the funeral—Paola's face carved from stone, refusing to cry in front of anyone.
"The flowers in the garden," she continues, her throat working. "With Elena. They're chrysanthemums. Alba used to grow them. She said they were stronger than people thought. That they'd survive anything if you gave them half a chance."
I say nothing. Every instinct screams that this is manipulation—grief weaponized, deployed at the perfect moment. But there's something in her voice that even the best actress couldn't fake. The exhaustion of carrying pain for years, the way it leaks out when your defenses finally crack.
"I came to trade information for freedom," she admits. "But those flowers with Elena... I couldn't..." She stops, shakes her head. "Alba would have loved her. She always wanted kids."
The silence stretches between us. Cerberus lifts his head, watching Paola with the same wariness I feel.
"Tell me everything about these threats," I finally say. "Every word, every detail. Who approached Rafe, how they knew what they knew, when it started."
Because I'm suddenly certain of two things. First, whoever's threatening Rafe's family is connected to whoever has Isabella. The same long game, the same patient accumulation of leverage and information.
And second, they've been planning this much longer than any of us realized. Years. Maybe decades. Collecting secrets, positioning pieces, waiting for the right moment to strike.
My phone buzzes. A message from the island, supposedly from Franco:
All secure. Isabella resting comfortably. No concerns.
The words are wrong. Too formal, too clean. Franco doesn't write like that—he's all fragments and profanity, gets his point across in as few words as possible. "Resting comfortably" sounds like a hospital report, not a soldier's update.
And the timestamp is three hours old, but I'm only receiving it now.
They're not even trying to hide their game anymore. They want me to know I'm cut off. Want me to feel the helplessness, the fear.
They don't know who they're fucking with.
I pull up the map again, trace the routes between the mainland and that island. Measure distances. Calculate timelines.
Connor's people are in position. Dimitri might still be operational—or might be leverage I can use. I've got men loyal enough to follow me into hell, and I've been building favors across Europe for exactly this kind of situation.
The Beast in me wants to storm that island now, tear through anyone who stands between me and Isabella. But that's what they're expecting. That's what they're planning for.
This time, I need to be smarter than the rage.
I need to think like they do—in patterns, in long games, in moves planned years in advance.
And then I need to burn their carefully constructed house of cards to the fucking ground.
Come back to me, ballerina.
I made her a promise. I don't break my promises.
Not anymore.