Chapter 5 #2
The kitchen spills into a hallway so wide it could fit a damn sports car.
Floors polished to perfection, stone gleaming beneath my bare feet, every inch whispering wealth.
The walls are lined with art. It’s too quiet in here.
The kind of quiet that makes your skin crawl.
Stillness so tense, it feels like the whole house is bracing for impact.
I walk slowly. Unhurried. Drag my fingers along the grooves of the wall panels, every ridge humming with secrets. This place wears its silence like armor, and every step sinks deeper into its spine.
It’s neither warm nor soft. It lacks the smell of home-cooked meals or laughter echoing through the walls.
The sense of being watched lingers.
The kind of house where doors hide lies, and each hallway has teeth. It’s a perfect little kingdom for a man who never follows anyone’s rules but his own. Yeah, this is definitely Lorenzo’s house.
I pass a library big enough to host a damn opera. Velvet chairs, chandeliers, shelves groaning under the weight of knowledge no one here’s bothered to read.
I don’t stop.
Next is a sitting room with floor-to-ceiling windows, sunlight streaming through the glass.
Nope, still not what I’m looking for.
I’m searching for something authentic. Something secret. Something secured.
And when I find it—third door on the right, hidden down a corridor off the main wing that most people probably miss—I stop walking.
This one is different because everything else in this house—the wide halls, spotless rooms, and curated walls of art—are open and impressive. Built to intimidate. Which makes this one door feel more honest than anything else I’ve seen here.
This is where the secrets reside, and I’ve never been good at ignoring what’s forbidden. It’s a flaw. Or maybe it’s how I survive.
I glance back over my shoulder expecting to find Carlo or another of Lorenzo’s soldiers but instead I find no one.
My fingers slide into my hair. I pull out a pin and twist it in my palm.
I always carry one. Had to. Back when I was fifteen and stupid, trying to figure out what the hell was really going on behind closed doors at my father’s house.
When whispers turned into bloodstains and I learnt quickly that locked doors meant more than just privacy—they meant secrets. And sometimes, secrets meant survival.
So I learnt, picked locks, watched, and listened.
A bobby pin tucked in my hair to open what they didn’t want me to see.
Now, it’s instinct. To get ahead of the secrets before you don’t see it coming.
Before they slam into you with the force of a loaded gun and a smiling face.
I don’t wait for the truth to find me anymore.
I hunt it down. Pry it open. Drag it into the light, bleeding and raw, before it has a chance to gut me first.
I crouch low, breathe slow and steady, just like I’ve always done.
The pin slides into the lock, and I begin working on it carefully and patiently. This one’s tighter. Cleaner. Built to resist curious fingers and malicious intent. Figures. Lorenzo doesn’t do anything halfway.
I tilt my head, listening and feeling for the sweet spot.
Pressure.
Release.
A small turn.
I reset and try again. My fingers ache, but I don’t rush it. I’ve never been the kind of girl who gives up just because something fights back.
A flicker of unease stirs in my gut. Does he have cameras?
Of course he’d have them. Hidden ones. Discreet. Watching every corridor, every door. Probably watching me right now.
I pause and glance up at the corner of the ceiling, half-expecting a red light to blink at me. But there’s nothing. Either I’m clear or he’s better at hiding them than my father ever was.
Good. I enjoy a challenge.
I go back to the lock, twisting the pin just right, coaxing the mechanism instead of forcing it. I feel it then, the faint shift, the internal give. My pulse spikes.
Click.
The sound is gentle but conclusive.
I pause for a second, listening for footsteps, voices, or the weight of consequence. But the house remains silent.
I gently open the door an inch. Just enough. That’s all I need to slip inside.
The air inside is colder. Not in a comforting way.
But in a sharp, alert way. This is Lorenzo’s office.
Not the version of him that bent me over last night and fucked me until I forgot my name.
This isn’t the man with calloused hands and a mouth that ruins you.
This is the strategist. The king of damnation.
The version who plays chess with people’s lives and carves kingdoms out of ash.
I move in slowly, shutting the door behind me with a soft click.
Every step deeper into the space feels like crossing a line.
The desk is oversized, dark, heavy, built for command.
Not a scrap of clutter. Laptop open but asleep, daring anyone to try it.
Pens arranged in a straight line, none out of place.
There’s a crystal decanter off to the right, filled with something golden and expensive.
Two glasses sit beside it. Only one’s been used.
My eyes wander to the wall opposite the desk.
Maps are pinned to the wall. Black sharpie smeared across it. Some towns are circled, while others are crossed out with angry Xs, as if someone wanted to erase them from existence.
And then I see him.
One photograph stops me cold.
Matteo De Luca. Mid-turn. Jaw clenched. Eyes dark and unreadable.
There’s a cruel kind of beauty about him—the kind that messes with your head.
It makes you pause before your brain catches up to your body and realizes you’re staring.
Sharp cheekbones. A mess of tousled dark hair that looks accidental but never is.
Stubble smudged along a razor-sharp jaw.
And those lips—full, plush, made to wreck you.
Not built for soft smiles. Not shaped for forgiveness.
Even pinned to a fucking corkboard, he looks untouchable. Lethal. Magnetic.
Matteo De Luca.
Every girl noticed him. How could they not?
He didn’t just walk into a room—he fucking dominated it. Took the oxygen, the attention, and the rules like it was nothing. The air shifted when he moved. It sank into your bones, like gravity decided he was the new god it worshipped.
My breath sticks because I noticed him too. I remember the way my stomach dropped the first time I saw him. The way my eyes didn’t want to look away.
Power looks good on some people.
On him?
It looked fucking perfect.
The second photo next to him is of Alessandro—his father.
Older. Colder. Meaner.
That man doesn’t just look dangerous; he is. His presence seeps through the photo like poison. The slow, steady kind that drips into your veins until you don’t even realize you’re dying.
His eyes are hollow, like dark pits where empathy should reside. The lines on his face seem shaped by authority, not age. His suit is sharp and there’s a tilt to his mouth that tries to look like a smile but never truly succeeds.
That man has sat at my father’s table more times than I can count.
Always the same ritual. Low voices. Tight expressions. Smiles that never touch their eyes. Like two wolves circling the same carcass, deciding who’ll make the first move.
And below the two men, there’s a third photo. A woman.
She’s not facing the camera directly. Her head is tilted slightly, with a strand of dark hair caught on the curve of her jaw, highlighting her sharp and striking profile.
She’s beautiful in that natural, effortless way that doesn’t need to try.
Full lips parted mid-laugh. Cheekbones touched by sunlight.
A small laminated tag is located under the photo. EMERY.
Everyone knows who Emery is. She’s the reason Matteo De Luca burned his own kingdom to the fucking ground. The girl who made the strongest man in our world choose love over legacy, and disappeared with her into the smoke.
My eyes lift back up the wall to the notes in the margins.
Lorenzo isn’t just looking for them. He’s hunting. Tracing their movements. Mapping out towns. Collecting dates. He’s chasing shadows and memories. And judging by how this wall looks, with obsession bleeding through every mark, he won’t stop until he finds them.
I turn away but stop, my gaze settling on the photo on a nearby shelf.
Inside the frame are four people.
A woman, with raven hair and breathtaking beauty. She appears happy. Complete.
Beside her stands a man made of steel and silence. His eyes are sharp and cold, with an ugly scar running down his temple. He has the stance of someone who would tear the world apart to protect his family. But the world didn’t listen anyway.
There are two children between them. The girl is younger, probably five or six, full of light and brightness. Her grin is wide and fearless. But it’s the boy who captures my attention.
He stands up straight for his age. He has his arm around a girl, maybe his sister, and there’s a soft smile on his face. His face is rounder than the man I know now, cheeks still holding onto boyhood, but I recognize those eyes.
It’s him.
Lorenzo
Before the crown and the blood.
Before the world decided it would rather fear him than love him.
I run my fingers along the glass. There’s something about it that makes my chest hurt because he looks almost gentle, still untouched by the things that would come later.
I’ve heard the rumors. Everyone has. That his family were slaughtered. A family wiped out in a single night, and he was the only survivor.
I set the frame back where it belongs, my fingers lingering a second longer than they should. A quiet apology weighs heavy in my chest for looking too long, for seeing something that was never mine to find.
And yet, I breathed it in and touched the pieces he buried.
This is his past. His private world. Something I was never supposed to see.
I move toward the door, then slip out before Lorenzo finds out I’ve been breathing in all the things he’s spent a lifetime burying.