Epilogue
-UNKNOWN-
Iwatched from the shadows as the adoption papers were signed.
No one noticed me.
That was the first rule of survival in this world: stay unnoticed. It wasn’t very hard. People only saw what they expected to see. A devoted husband. A happy wife. Powerful men smiling beneath cathedral light while pretending their hands weren’t stained with blood.
No one ever looked beyond that.
The ceremony unfolded beneath low amber chandeliers inside the old courthouse hall, all polished marble hundreds of years old with a touch of suffocating elegance.
Rain tapped softly against the stained-glass windows overhead, muting the city beyond into little more than blurred light and ghosts.
Violet Freud sat at the center of it all.
An elegant purple dress clung to her frame, her wedding ring catching gold beneath the light whenever she moved her hand.
She looked composed from a distance, but I noticed everything else—the tension in her shoulders, the way her thumb brushed absentmindedly over her ring.
The exhaustion hidden beneath her careful smile.
People always underestimated exhausted women.
Especially the ones who survived.
Beside her stood her husband. Lykos Costello, the Greek mobster himself.
He looked exactly as the rumors described: calm, unreadable, immaculately controlled. A predator pretending to be civilized. One hand rested lightly against Violet’s back while he spoke quietly with the officiant, but his eyes never stopped moving.
Watching exits. Watching windows. Watching people.
Good instincts.
Dimitros Costello, his son and officially new son to Violet Freud, stood nearby like a loyal hound pretending he had no teeth. Anyone with half a brain—and eyes—knew better. He carried violence the way priests carried scripture.
It was an interesting family Violet had made for herself.
And then there was the child.
I leaned farther into the darkness of the balcony overlooking the chamber, flicking my lighter open with a soft metallic snap.
Flame. Closed again. Flame. Closed again.
The lighter snapped open again and flame danced across my fingers.
Most people believed power came from money or brutality. Some believed it belonged to bloodlines. Others thought fear alone could build kingdoms.
Idiots.
Power belonged to whoever understood the truth first:
People would burn the world down themselves if you simply gave them the right match.
And the Obsidian Society had it and it’d been setting the world on fire for years.
In the back row of the room, the old enemy sat motionless among the invited guests who were oblivious to the leader of the Obsidian Society.
The face remained unreadable as Violet signed the final page.
The Freuds had always enjoyed games, but this game was no longer theirs.
I flicked the lighter shut and slipped it into my pocket.
The child laughed softly at something Dimitros muttered under his breath. Violet smiled. Lykos looked at them all like they were the only thing that mattered in this world.
A family.
But here was the thing. Families were fragile. All it took was one crack.
One secret. One body.
I stepped backward and deeper into shadow just as applause echoed quietly through the chamber as the adoption concluded and congratulations began.
Good.
Let them stay comfortable a little longer. Let them believe the war ended before it truly began.
I already knew what my next move would be.
A rumor here. A missing shipment there. A name whispered in the wrong ear.
Breadcrumbs.
That was all it would take.
And when the city finally realized something monstrous had been walking beside them the entire time, then we would see who deserved to inherit the society.
Inheritance was never about blood.
It was about who survived long enough to claim the throne once everyone else stopped breathing.
THE END