Chspter 16
RAFAEL
The city below burned with lights. I stood at the edge of the floor-to-ceiling windows of my penthouse, shirt unbuttoned and sleeves rolled up, a half-empty glass of something strong and Russian in my hand.
New York always felt too loud. Even at night, when the noise dulled to a low hum, it never slept.
Neither did I.
Not lately. Not since Cartagena. Not since her .
I thought coming back to familiar ground—steel, glass, power with my name etched into the bones of every wall—would clear my head. But it didn’t. It just made me restless.
My jaw clenched as I threw back another sip, the burn sliding down my throat. Still not strong enough. Not to cauterize the thing festering in my chest.
Isabella.
She was here. In one of the buildings I owned. Close. Because I made sure of it. And I hadn’t seen her in four days.
Four days since I’d tasted her breathless curses in my mouth. Since I’d marked her wrists with leather. Since she fell asleep beside me like it meant something.
I hated that it did.
She wasn’t supposed to get that close. Wasn’t supposed to look at me like she saw straight through the monster I’d become. But she did. And worse—I let her.
I turned away from the window, my muscles tense under my shirt as I rolled my shoulders and set the glass down. The silence in the room felt thick, the dark marble floors and black leather furniture gleaming under soft light. Cold. Sleek. Controlled. Everything I was supposed to be.
And then— The door slammed open without warning.
Yuri and Nikolai. Both storming in like hell had opened behind them. I didn’t move. Didn’t flinch. Just turned my head slowly, already feeling the tension shift.
“Raf,” Yuri said, tone too casual. That always meant shit wasn’t.
I set the glass down. “What?”
Nikolai didn’t speak. Just tossed a manila folder onto the table and nodded for Yuri to continue.
Yuri pulled out his phone instead. “Forget the file. Look at this.”
I raised an eyebrow as he scrolled through and then read aloud. His voice lost all humor.
“Blood doesn’t lie. Even when names do.
She wears the past on her wrist and doesn’t even know it.
The daughter of the wolf walks among you.
Will you see her before she finds out?”
He looked up, eyes meeting mine. “Came from one of Viktor’s ghost emails.”
The air thickened. My jaw clenched, heart slowing, calculating. Daughter of the wolf. The bracelet.
I remembered the gold chain around her wrist. Said it was her mother’s. She never took it off.
My voice came low. “You think it’s about her?”
Nikolai answered. “He wouldn’t waste this cryptic bullshit on anyone else.”
“She could’ve been planted,” Yuri added. “Or worse—she doesn’t know.”
I stared at the fire flickering across the room, my fingers drumming against my thigh.
Isabella Silvani?
It didn’t sound real. But everything about her had always felt like a setup I hadn’t figured out yet.
I stood up, pacing slowly toward the window. Rain smeared the glass like smoke. “If she knows and she’s playing me…” I didn’t finish the thought. But they knew.
Nikolai crossed his arms. “What if she doesn’t? What if Viktor’s using this to make you paranoid?”
“He’s already succeeded.”
I turned back to them. “No one tells her. Not until I put her in the same room as Lorenzo and see their faces.”
Yuri nodded. “You think he’ll recognize her?”
“If she’s his daughter… he’ll know.”
The silence held for a beat before Nikolai muttered, “This is either your biggest mistake…”
“Or the only way to end it,” I finished.
The flames in the fireplace cracked louder than the silence between us.
I stared at the message again on Yuri’s phone.
Those few cryptic lines were enough to plant a poison seed in my head that I couldn’t rip out.
I didn’t even know if it had roots yet, but it felt real.
It felt dangerous. Like everything in me had already started preparing for it to be true.
Yuri dropped into the chair across from me, his legs stretched, casual like always. But his jaw was tighter than usual.
Nikolai stayed standing, arms folded, the flickering firelight dancing across his sharp profile. “What do you want to do?”
I didn’t hesitate. “Yuri, pull everything you have on Lorenzo Silvani. Now. I want history, movement, bloodlines—anything.”
Yuri gave me a look. “Already on it.” He pulled his laptop out of his bag, the screen lighting up in the low room. Fingers tapping keys, fast and familiar.
I started pacing again, dragging my hand down my face. Every time I tried to imagine Isabella knowingly hiding something this big, it didn’t fit. It almost did—but it slipped away just as quickly. Like she wasn’t a liar… but still holding too much.
Yuri muttered under his breath as he searched. “You better hope you wrapped it before you tapped it, Raf…”
I stopped in my tracks and turned my head toward him.
He didn’t even look up. “I mean, if she turns out to be Lorenzo’s daughter, and you’re already inside her—what, are we going to call him nonno ?”
I clenched my jaw. “I didn’t.”
That got his attention. He slowly turned his head toward me, one brow raised. “ You didn’t? ”
I didn’t answer. I didn’t need to.
Yuri let out a low whistle. “You’re out of your goddamn mind.”
“I had her tied up and sprawled on my bed. You think I had time to dig through my wallet for a fucking condom?”
Yuri snorted. “I didn’t say when it happened.
Just that it happened. ” He leaned back, folding his hands behind his head.
“So let’s get this straight. She might be the heir to the throne of one of our greatest enemies, and you not only walked into her room dripping blood like a gift— you left one behind. ”
I didn’t respond. Mostly because I didn’t have an excuse.
“She didn’t know,” I muttered.
“You sure?” he shot back, eyes narrowing.
No. I wasn’t. Not completely.
But I knew the way she looked at me that night. I knew the tremble of her hands as she stitched me up, the hesitation in her voice when she asked questions. That wasn’t the face of someone playing a long con. That was someone who was standing on a tightrope, halfway between survival and collapse.
Yuri turned back to his screen. “Let’s see what we’ve got.”
Silence filled the room again as he searched. I sat on the armrest, elbows on my knees, staring at the fire like it could burn the questions out of my mind.
After a few minutes, Yuri’s fingers stopped moving. He exhaled, slow. “Nothing.”
I looked over.
“No daughter on record,” he said. “No wife either. Just a mistress and one son. Matteo.”
I frowned. “Matteo Silvani. I know the name.”
“You should,” Nikolai said. “He’s been quiet for a few years, but he was involved in some skirmishes in Spain a while back. The Don didn’t acknowledge him publicly for years, but now that Lorenzo’s nearing sixty and still has no heir? He’s all he’s got.”
“Personality?”
“Unstable,” Yuri said. “Smart. Dangerous. But nothing like his father. From what I’ve heard, he hates the man.”
I sat back, processing. “So if Isabella is his daughter…”
“She wouldn’t show up on any paper trail,” Nikolai said. “Which makes sense if the mother ran.”
“Viktor said, ‘she wears the past on her wrist.’ Could be the bracelet. Could be something more.”
“And ‘the daughter of the wolf’?” Yuri added. “Lorenzo’s been called Lupo behind his back for years.”
It fit too cleanly. Too many pieces locking into place. But the part that dug under my skin the most?
She didn’t ask about him. Not once. Even while chasing answers, even while digging into her past—Lorenzo Silvani was never a name she uttered.
Which meant either she was hiding it better than anyone I’ve ever seen— Or she truly didn’t know.
And if that was the case… Then what the fuck happens when I put her in front of the man who might’ve had her family killed?
I rubbed my hand down my face and looked at them both. “We’re going to Naples in three days,” I said. “And Lorenzo will be there.”
“You really want to take her?” Nikolai asked.
“I need to.”
Yuri leaned forward. “You going to tell her what we found?”
I stared at the fire again, the flickering embers dancing like secrets too hot to hold. “No,” I said quietly. “Not yet.”
The ice in my glass clinked once before I set it down untouched and turned my gaze to Yuri who stood up and walked to the bar, looking at the drinks. His laughter filled the space behind me, low and amused as he leaned his elbow on the bar. “You should see your face right now, Romanov.”
I glanced over my shoulder, slow and sharp. “You got something to say, say it.”
He lifted his drink in salute. “Just thinking. You might’ve knocked up the daughter of Lorenzo Silvani. That’s not just crossing the line, that’s pissing on it, brother.”
Nikolai muttered something under his breath and ran a hand through his hair. I didn’t even look at him. My eyes stayed locked on Yuri, whose grin hasn’t faded.
“She’s not pregnant,” I said flatly, jaw tight.
Yuri arched a brow. “You sure about that? ‘Cause unless she was already on something, I don’t think that’s how biology works.”
“She didn’t say anything,” I grind out. “And I didn’t ask.”
Nikolai sat back on the couch, exhaling. “So you went in raw, during an active war, with a woman who might be the daughter of the man who could put a bullet in your skull if he finds out?”
The silence hang heavy after that. I stared at the floor for a moment, trying to push back the crackle under my skin. I didn’t like the implication. That I didn’t think. That I lost control. But I did.
I lost control the second I pulled her into me like she belonged there.
“She didn’t know either,” I said, finally. “If she’s his daughter. She has no idea.”
Yuri tossed back the rest of his drink with a shrug. “Still might’ve made a baby with her. You’re real sentimental for a guy who slices throats for a living.”
I glared at him, but he didn’t flinch. He never does. “She was a move,” I said, almost to myself. “A play I made to control the board.”