Banished Sinner (The Dante Dynasty #1)

Chapter 1

LUCA

New York. Seven years away. It still feels like I left yesterday and yet a lifetime ago.

I navigate through the familiar streets noting how everything looks the same, yet different.

They say you can’t go home, and when I was forced out, I accepted that mantra. Made my own way in Chicago.

Something legitimate on paper, but brutal beneath the surface. My empire. Mine alone.

So why the fuck am I home?

It’s the letter. Two lines scrawled in a hand I couldn't place.

Don Dante is dead. The family needs you.

No signature.

No explanation beyond the newspaper clipping of Lorenzo Dante's assassination that fell from the envelope when I opened it.

My father. Dead. The words still don't feel real.

I pull up at a red light, watching people cross the street. They don’t give a shit that my father is dead. Why should I?

Traffic moves again. I follow the route to the family home, each turn bringing back flashes of memory.

My father's stern face across the dinner table, my brothers pissed off at me, my sister telling me I’m an asshole.

Katerina's face the last time I saw her.

Fuck.

I push that thought away. Can't afford to go there. Not now.

I roll my shoulders, not wanting to acknowledge the growing tension. Whoever sent that letter knew exactly what would bring me back.

The only thing that could.

Family.

But returning to New York with Lorenzo Dante in the ground means walking into a power vacuum. Into suspicion. Into danger.

My brother Alessandro will have taken control. He'll see me as a threat. The others will have chosen sides already. And somewhere in this city, someone arranged my father's murder.

I turn onto the private road leading to the estate in Long Island, the gates looming ahead.

Seven years of exile end with this drive.

I’m walking into the lion's den on nothing but a nameless summons and the pull of blood loyalty.

The guards spot my car. I see them reach for their weapons, faces hardening with recognition.

Welcome home, Luca Dante.

I’m let through the gates, but once I park among the line of sleek black vehicles and step out into the chilled air, two security men approach.

"Arms up," one barks, rough hands checking my ankles, my waist.

"Your hospitality is touching," I say, voice flat. "Does Alessandro know I'm here?"

The guard just grunts, confiscating my gun before nodding toward the house. Message received. I'm no longer trusted here—if I ever was.

The mansion looks exactly the same. White marble. Imposing columns. The Dante legacy carved in stone.

Walking through those double doors feels like stepping back in time, but the reception inside reminds me that this is no homecoming.

The main hall falls silent as I enter. Cousins, capos, and consiglieri gathered in black suits, conversations dying mid-sentence.

Some faces register shock, others contempt. Nobody moves to greet me.

My younger brother, Adriano, leans against the far wall, whiskey in hand. His eyes meet mine, hardening instantly. "Who the fuck invited you?"

Well, I can eliminate him as the sender of the letter.

I don't answer, don't have one that wouldn't complicate things further.

Valentina, my youngest sister, appears at the top of the stairs.

For a moment, her face brightens, but a glance toward someone I can't see makes her features smooth into careful neutrality.

"Welcome home," she says cooly as she descends the stairs.

"Luca fucking Dante." The voice cuts through the tension, and suddenly, there's Victorio, my oldest friend from childhood, now working for my family.

He pushes through the crowd.

His face cracks into a genuine smile, arms opening wide.

"You have balls of steel, my friend." He embraces me. Maybe he sent the letter.

"Vic. Not even I can avoid paying respect to my father.”

"Lorenzo would be glad you're here," he says, clapping my shoulder. But there's something in his eyes that feels like a warning. "Despite what others might think."

I nod in understanding. Victorio's warmth is genuine, but he knows my presence disrupts the status quo of power in the Dante family.

The room feels like a powder keg. I’m the match.

Alessandro steps forward as the head of the family like he was born there.

In a way, he was.

The eldest Dante, groomed since childhood to wear the crown.

His gray eyes, identical to mine, to all of our siblings’, assess me coldly across the room.

He hasn't aged these seven years, just hardened. More steel in his jaw, more ice in his gaze.

"So, the prodigal son returns." His voice fills the room without his raising it. A talent he learned from our father. "Convenient timing."

I shrug, deliberately casual. "Nothing convenient about a murdered father."

The family council surrounds us, uncles, cousins, capos from each territory.

Their faces shift between curiosity and suspicion.

My brother Adriano moves to stand on Alessandro's right, watching me like he's trying to solve a puzzle.

"Chicago treating you well?" Alessandro’s question is innocent enough, but we both know what he's really asking. How powerful have you become? Are you here to challenge me?

"I built something good there," I say simply.

"Something good," Alessandro repeats, his head tilting, his eyes narrowing like he’s trying to read my mind. "After abandoning your responsibilities here."

What a fucker. My exile wasn't voluntary. He knows that.

But his version paints me as the deserter. The disloyal son. Fine. I don’t give a shit.

Uncle Matty clears his throat. "What matters is that Luca's home now. When the family's under attack—"

"Is it, though?" Alessandro interrupts. "Or did Luca come running back because he smelled opportunity?"

I flex my hands and do my best to play it cool. He can’t rattle me. "I received a letter."

This catches his attention. Something flickers across his face. I can’t decide if it’s surprise or concern. Maybe both.

"From whom?" he demands.

"Anonymous. Telling me to come home."

Murmurs ripple through the room. Alessandro's gaze sweeps the faces around us, searching for a confession no one offers.

"Interesting," he says. "Someone wanted you here badly enough to go behind my back."

The implication settles heavily in the air. Someone in this room doesn't trust Alessandro's leadership.

Someone wanted the second son to return.

I have no intention of taking my brother’s place, but I can’t deny that I enjoy watching him squirm about it.

I meet my brother's stare. "I'm not here to take what's yours."

"Everything here is mine now," he responds, and there's no mistaking the warning. "Including the consequences of what father built. The enemies he made."

I understand the game now. I've been summoned as either an ally or a sacrifice. Alessandro hasn't decided which yet.

And in the calculating depths of his eyes, I see he's wondering if I've already chosen my own role in whatever comes next.

“Well, as wonderful as this welcome home has been, I’m going to my room to clean up.” I don’t bother waiting for my brother to dismiss me. He’s not the boss of me.

I’m my own boss.

Have been one for seven years.

Seven years longer than my brother, and he knows it. So does someone else who seems to want me to usurp my brother. This trip home has gotten a lot more interesting.

I find my room looking the same as it did when I left, which is surprising.

I figured my family would have washed away all traces of me when they forced me out.

I wash up and change and then grab a drink before heading out into the garden for some fresh air.

“Vic is right. You have Everest-size balls to come home.” Valentina joins me in the spot where we used to smoke cigarettes when she was too young and I was supposed to know better.

She's not a child anymore, though.

The little sister I left behind has become a woman with our father's shrewd eyes and our mother's grace.

"Some things never change." I lean against the stone balustrade.

“I don’t know.” She studies me. “You’re even scarier looking than I remember.”

I snort. “You were never scared of me.”

She shrugs. “No. Deep down, you’re a cream puff.”

“You tell anyone that and I’ll have to kill you.”

We both laugh at that.

“Seriously, though. Except for more gray and wrinkles, nothing has changed,” I say, easing into the question I shouldn’t ask but won’t be able to stop myself from voicing.

“Why should anything change?”

“Does that mean Katerina Petrov is still around?” I ask, trying to sound casual.

Valentina's smirk widens into something knowing. "Yes, big brother. Your Russian beauty still graces our halls regularly."

My chest tightens at the confirmation. Katerina. Here. The name alone sends a current through my body that I've spent seven years and countless women trying to forget.

"She's not my anything," I mutter.

Valentina laughs. "Please. All this time, and you still can't say her name without that look."

"What look?"

"Like someone punched you in the gut and you're thanking them for it."

I scowl but can't deny it. Katerina Petrov. Auburn hair that shone like fire in the sunlight. Eyes like arctic ice that somehow burned when they looked at me. The only woman who ever saw past the Dante name to the man beneath.

"It's just… strange," I say carefully. "The Bratva connection. With everything happening—"

"You mean with Father murdered and everyone pointing fingers at the Russians?" Valentina's voice drops lower. "Yes, it's complicated her position. Alessandro keeps her close."

My jaw clenches as images of my brother fucking what’s mine flash in my mind. "How close?"

Valentina gives me a sidelong glance. "Not like that. He values her diplomatic skills. She navigates between our world and theirs better than anyone."

"Does she know I'm back?" The question slips out before I can stop it.

Valentina's eyes soften, just slightly. But I think I see pity. It makes me wonder if Katerina is married. How will I not kill him if she is?

"She'll be at the funeral tomorrow,” Valentina says. “But don’t get your hopes up. When you left… things changed. She changed.”

My heart, which for a moment picked up that pace at the idea of seeing her again, screeches to a halt.

"She hates me." It's not a question.

Valentina shrugs, turning back to the roses, leaning in to sniff one. "Hate requires passion. I'm not sure she allows herself that luxury anymore." She pauses, as if she’s considering her next words. "But she flinched when your name came up at breakfast. Just for a second."

That tiny admission ignites something dangerous in my chest. Hope. The most vicious of emotions.

"Be careful, Luca," Valentina warns, suddenly sounding older than her twenty years. "Everyone's choosing sides. Even people we thought we knew."

I nod, understanding the layers in her warning. Trust no one. Not even the woman I once would have died for.

Especially not her.