Chapter 24 Zara
The walls of the room are too smooth. Too clean.
Not a single crack to be found, not in the paint or the crown molding, not even in the polished brass drawer handles.
It’s all perfect in a way that doesn’t feel comforting.
Like a mask, pulled tight over the corruption beneath. Like the room itself is lying to me.
It’s been long enough now that I can’t tell what time it is without the sun.
The windows are tall and narrow, the curtains sheer enough to let in pale light, from the windows that don’t open.
Nothing here opens. Nothing here breathes.
The silence is a living thing, pressing at my ribs with every hour that ticks by.
I sleep only because I have to. Eat because it keeps me sharp.
I know better than to let myself get weak in a house full of men who are waiting for me to become a pawn again.
Grief has settled behind my eyes like smoke.
It doesn’t scream. It just lingers. The sight of Declan’s body is still in my head—ragged with pain and tired from holding on.
I should’ve been there when it happened.
I should’ve told him I loved him when I had the chance.
Instead, I was too late. Too lost in my own plan.
And now I have nothing but the weight of a funeral that will never happen and the memory of the only man who ever protected me.
I press the heel of my hand to my chest, where the pain is starting to sharpen again. That’s the thing about being locked in a quiet room. You don’t have any distractions that keep the ache manageable.
I’m still seated at the small desk in the corner when I hear a knock. No one barges in around here. They let me believe I have autonomy, let me answer the door like I still have agency. But we all know I don’t.
The same maid from yesterday slips inside, avoiding my eyes as she places a small cream-colored envelope on the polished wood of the nightstand. No name. No seal.
She doesn’t speak, leaving quickly. The door clicks softly shut behind her, and I stare at the envelope.
I’m cautious of it. My fingertips hover just over the edge before I finally lift it. The weight of it is obvious—thick paper, a note too heavy for its size. My name isn't on it, but the moment I slide it open and unfold the page inside, I know exactly who it’s from.
The handwriting is tight and meticulous, each letter curved with obsessive care. I read slowly at first, but by the end, my eyes are racing to keep up with the bile rising in my throat.
Zara,
The waiting ends now.
You were promised to me, and I intend to collect what’s mine.
No more delays, no more defiance. Your father may have failed in many things, but in this—he finally understood what’s required.
You don’t need freedom. You need structure.
Control. A man who knows how to mold you into something worthy of the name you’ll soon carry.
I remember Monaco. The fire in your eyes, the way you pulled away when I touched you. That will pass. They always fight at first—until they realize how good obedience feels.
Your dress is being prepared. You’ll walk down the aisle in white, but we both know there’s nothing innocent left to protect. You were made for a stage like this—ornamented, admired, owned.
We will be married before the month is over. That part isn’t negotiable. You’ll learn to live inside the life that’s been built for you. You’ll learn what loyalty means. And if it doesn’t come naturally, I’ll take my time teaching you.
Welcome to your future, princepessa.
—A.F.
The page trembles between my fingers, and for a second, I don’t realize that I’m holding my breath.
The week I spent in Monaco eight years ago rushes through my mind.
My father had arranged the trip for Anthony and me to meet, so he could reveal his plan together with Anthony’s father, Jerome.
That week was hell. Anthony never kept his hands off me.
I had to deadbolt my door at night in hopes he wouldn’t come in and take what wasn’t his.
By the end of the week, I knew I hated him, knew I couldn’t be attached to that man for the rest of my life. So that’s when I started planning.
I read it again. Not because I need to, but because I can’t believe the man who wrote this thinks he has the right to call himself human.
It’s not a love letter. It’s a threat dressed up in ink and paper.
Every line drips with possession, not affection.
There’s no illusion of respect. No attempt to charm me into compliance.
He already believes I’m his. He already thinks the fight is over.
I fold the letter carefully, every movement precise, methodical—because if I let myself move too quickly, I’ll tear it apart, and I need the evidence. Not for anyone else. For me. I need to remember what kind of man I’m being given to.
I’ve seen monsters. I was raised by one. But Anthony Falco is something worse. He’s not just violent. He’s entitled. And he’s deluded enough to believe that the day I’ll wear his ring will be a reward.
The silence around me deepens.
I set the envelope on the nightstand and stand, one hand braced on the edge as I try to quiet the panic flaring just beneath my skin. There’s no one to call. No one to scream to. The guards are loyal to my father. The staff are paid too well to interfere. And the only person I ever trusted is dead.
But I’m not helpless. Not yet.
My eyes fall on the desk drawer, and I pull it open. Pens. Pencils, sharp and gleaming. No weapons—but tools. Tools that can become weapons if I need them to.
I don’t know when the wedding is, not exactly. But if Anthony Falco thinks he’ll slide a ring on my finger without losing something first, he hasn’t been paying attention. I didn’t survive my father to be handed off like livestock. I didn’t risk my life for freedom just to fall back into a cage.
Falco’s name hangs over me like a death sentence. I can almost hear my father’s voice, already sealing the deal, already congratulating himself on securing another alliance with my body as the bargaining chip. The thought makes my skin crawl.
I’ve been held before. Not like this. Not with marriage vows being sharpened into shackles.
This isn’t confinement—it’s a countdown.
And I know better than to waste energy on panic.
Panic clouds your eyes, makes you miss the small openings, the cracks in their arrogance.
Survival isn’t about screaming. It’s about watching.
Waiting. Taking back what little control they think they’ve stripped away.
But waiting is wearing me down.
I’ve spent hours mapping out possibilities in my head.
Testing every version of an escape plan I can think of.
What I’d say if I got one of the staff alone.
How I might slip out during a shift change.
Where the cameras might be hidden. But every route ends the same way—shut down.
Patrolled. Covered. The security here is layered, and my father’s reach is worse than I remembered, and I know it’s because he’s prepared for me to test his control this time.
He’s not just trying to keep me here. He’s already sold me like a goddamn heirloom to the Falcos.
And I’m supposed to sit here quietly and wait to become the wife of a monster. My hands curl against my thighs. My nails leave crescent moons.
Every part of me wants to move. To act. To smash the glass vase on the dresser and see if the shard could make someone bleed. But that would be impulsive, not strategic. And impulse is how you die in a house like this.
So I breathe. I sit. And I think.
I imagine going to my father directly. Asking him, flat-out, what he expects from this marriage beyond control and politics.
But I already know the answer. He wants loyalty.
He wants legacy. He wants the Falco name tied to ours so tightly that I can’t cut it loose without tearing my own skin in the process.
There’s no mercy in this house.
I look down at my hands. They’re shaking again. Just slightly. The tremor of someone who’s trying to pretend she isn’t unraveling.
There has to be a way out.
I need a weapon. A signal. A name to call out to. Someone on the outside who still gives a damn. Someone willing to come looking.
But there’s no one I trust. Except maybe the man I shouldn’t.
Theo.
The memory of him feels reckless now. Dangerous. It presses at the edges of my control like heat behind my ribs. He doesn’t even know my real name. He said he searched for me once, and I pray he will do it again.
I close my eyes and tilt my head back, breathing through the ache rising in my throat. The grief. The isolation. The fury I can’t act on. I shove it all down, lower, into the part of me that knows how to wait. Knows how to endure. Knows how to make silence look like surrender.
Because they think I’m just the girl they locked up again.
They think I’ve been stripped of everything that made me a threat.
But what they don’t know—what no one in this house knows—is that I still remember. Every name. Every dirty transaction whispered in rooms. Every secret Declan ever told me in the dark when we were too scared to sleep.
And the flash drive still exists.