Chapter 41
Damiano
The world doesn’t come back screaming. No, it returns in a lull, like it’s holding its breath, waiting to see what I’ll do next.
When I look at my hands, my knuckles are torn open, skin hanging like ribbons, blood painting the lines of my palms.
This isn’t new. I’ve stood over dead men before, felt that cold, clean satisfaction of a job done right.
It’s supposed to be clean. Methodical. Professional.
Tonight is none of those things.
This is something else entirely—something I can’t name, not even if I tried. I stare at what’s left of Julian on the floor, and for the first time, the violence doesn’t taste like power. It tastes like an unraveling.
Like the ugliest, most honest thing I have ever shown.
Katarina is in front of me.
She wedged herself between me and the body. She stopped my manic rage.
She is dattered, barely standing, yet she threw herself in front of me like I was the one who needed saving.
I look at her bloodied face, her eyes that are almost swollen shut, and her bleeding lips.
She’s looking up at me with devastating worry and undeniable love.
I did this. Not Julian. Me. My obsession, my secrets, my drunken rage; all of it led her here.
I am still shaking, my chest heaving in shallow, ragged pulls. I can sense the adrenaline leaving my body like a tide going out, and what it leaves behind is worse than the violence.
The sober, ugly weight of what I am settles in.
A vicious killer. Careless. Unforgivable.
“I’m sorry,” I choke out, my voice a scorched rasp. “Perdoname… I’m so sorry I lost you.” My blood-stained hands frame her face.
I try to be gentle, but my hands are wrecked, and she flinches slightly as I touch her injured face.
Still, she doesn’t pull away. She leans into my palms instead, and that single act breaks something open in my chest that I don’t know how to close.
“Don’t ever run from me like that again,” I whisper. The words come out pained, a plea. “If I lose you, there is nothing left to stop what I’ll become. You saw what I’m capable of.”
She holds my gaze. She doesn’t look away from the blood on my hands or the dead man behind her. She sees all of it, but she stays. Her arms come up slowly, carefully, and she pulls my forehead down to rest against hers.
“I know who you are,” she whispers. “Now that you know who I am, are you sure you love me still?” she asks, her voice pained.
“It doesn’t matter who your father is. You’re mine. You’ll always be mine, Dolcezza.” I say before pulling her into a kiss.
I kiss her deep, tasting the blood and tears on her face, and it’s only then that my heartbeat slows.
Only then do I find reprieve. Her hands cling to me as if she’s holding on for her life, and I pull her as close as I can and hold her tight.
Grateful to all the Gods who let me save her just in time.
“Ti amo. I’ll always love you, sempre.”
“Ti amo,” she whispers before burying her face in the crook of my neck, her words providing a relief I didn’t know I needed.
We sit there, wrapped in each other’s arms for a long minute, seeking comfort in each other’s heat.
When I hear heavy boots walking toward us, I look up. Lucian stops dead in the threshold, his footsteps halting inches from the dark, spreading halo of blood around us. Beside him, Andreas crosses his arms above his chest. Both stared at us, bewildered.
“è bellissimo, vero?” Andreas murmurs. It’s beautiful, isn’t it?
Lucian shifts his weight, his eyes wide as he takes in the scene around him.
“Really, guys?” Lucian asks, his voice dry and flat as he makes a disgusted face. “In a pool of blood? This is where we’re doing this?”
I don’t pull away. I only grip her tighter, smoothing her back to help her stop crying.
“Fuori, Lucian,” I say. I tell him to go away.
“Gladly,” Lucian mutters, “But I came to say we’ve got—”
A synchronized roar of engines interrupts the rest of his sentence, the sound vibrating through the floor. High-beam headlights cut through the windows, sweeping across the room.
“Company…” Lucian finishes.
Three black SUVs crest the ridge, boxing in the cottage like a wall of steel—a megaphone crackles to life, loud and jarring.
“Cotrini. Soleri. Moretti.”
The voice booms, dripping with that special blend of boredom and contempt that only comes from someone who’s run out of patience.
“I know you’re in there… Come out with your hands where I can see them. Now. Don’t make me come in there and drag you out like children. You’ve caused enough of a mess for one day,” the voice says.
“Castigliones,” Lucian says as he removes the safety of his submachine gun.
Katarina goes rigid in my arms before Andreas’s hand pats heavily on my shoulder.
“The grown-ups are here,” He says, letting out a breathy, dry chuckle.
I pull back, my eyes searching Katarina’s. I wipe a stray smudge of blood from her temples.
“Stay behind me,” I whisper.
Lucian leads the way out, my body a solid shield between her and the world. I can feel her small hands clutching the back of my jacket, her knuckles pressing into my spine.
We walk out into the blinding headlights of the SUVs.
The ridge is crawling with Castiglione guards. Flavio is leaning against the hood of the lead SUV, his arms crossed over his chest. He looks collected and utterly unimpressed. He stares at the three of us before focusing on me—blood-stained, disheveled—and his eyes narrow with a judgmental gaze.
“Look at you three,” Flavio says, his voice carrying an authoritative weight. “Do you ever stop to think, or is it just adrenaline and idiocy all the way down?”
“Non hai niente a che fare qui,” I warn. You have no business here.
He strides forward, all polish and arrogant, like he owns the ground under his feet.
Andreas and Lucian step in front of me in unison.
“No one wants trouble. We were here to make sure the heir was safe.” Andreas attempts a dialogue, and Flavio’s stride breaks.
He stops three feet away from me. His arms slowly uncurl from his chest as his gaze shifts from my face to the woman hiding in my shadow, and the earth tilts, just a little, like it’s waiting to see who falls first.
Flavio freezes, his mask cracking for the first time since I met him.
He sees her bloodied face, the way she shakes against my back, and his composure slips.
In an instant, the bored demeanor is gone, replaced by seething anger.
He doesn’t speak, nor does he move to grab her. Instead, he comes up to my face, his eyes wide and burning.
“Let. Her. Go.”