I wake to the smell of rust and mildew and something worse—stale urine, old fear, desperation. My head pounds like someone took a hammer to my skull, and when I try to move my arms, pain shoots through my shoulders.
Zip-tied. My wrists are bound behind me, plastic cutting into raw skin. I can feel blood—or maybe just sweat—trickling down my palms.
I'm in a chair, metal and cold, bolted to the concrete floor. The room around me is vast and dark, lit by a single bare bulb swinging slightly in a draft I can't feel.
Abandoned building. Some old factory or house, left to rot. The kind of place where screams don't carry, where bodies disappear.
I can hear voices from somewhere nearby. An adjoining room, maybe an office. Low murmurs, male, casual. Like they're discussing a football game instead of whatever they're planning to do to me.
The fear is physical. A block of ice in my stomach, spreading through my limbs, making my breath come short and fast. My heart hammers so hard I can feel it in my throat.
This isn't my father's world. His cruelty is polished, expensive, hidden behind silk and scotch and plausible deniability.
This is something else. Something raw and brutal and final.
The door creaks open. A man peers in, cigarette dangling from his lips, ash falling onto a stained shirt.
"Oh, she's awake." He grins, yellowed teeth. "Get in here."
Two more follow him. They circle me like sharks, and I recognize the type. Street soldiers. The kind my father uses for jobs that can't be traced back to him.
The kind that don't ask questions.
"Who are you?" My voice comes out hoarse, throat raw from whatever they used to knock me out. "What do you want?"
The leader—the one with the cigarette—laughs. Wet and ugly, like something's wrong with his lungs.
"We work for the same man you do, princess. Or, used to." He crouches in front of me, and his breath is hot and stale. "Vincent Castellano."
My stomach drops.
"You really shouldn't have run from your father." He tilts his head, studying me. "He wants what he wants. And right now, he wants every scrap of information you have on your husband."
"Go to hell."
I spit it at him, putting every ounce of venom I have into the words.
He wipes his face with the back of his hand, expression not even changing. "We know you're angry. We know he threw you out like garbage."
He stands, starts pacing. "Our agent did a fine job breaking you two, didn't she?"
He stops, looks at me directly. "Ivy sends her regards."
The room tilts. My blood turns to ice, then catches fire.
It was all a setup. Father and Ivy, working together from the start. How long? Since before my wedding? Since Kaia's miscarriage?
Every argument, every piece of "evidence" Rafael brought to Cassian, every perfectly timed leak of information—orchestrated. They broke us apart from the inside while planning to destroy Cassian from the outside.
And I was the weapon they'd use for both. The naive little princess who'd never see it coming.
"So just tell us," he says, his tone almost reasonable now. Like we're negotiating a business deal. "Safe houses. Bank codes. Security weaknesses. Where he keeps his records, his backup plans."
He shrugs, casual. "Your husband isn't coming for you. He doesn't even want you. Probably relieved you're gone, honestly. One less problem to worry about."
The words hit harder than they should. Because part of me wonders if he's right.
He leans closer, voice dropping to something almost sympathetic. "Help us, and your father will forgive you. Let you come home. Start fresh. Maybe even find you a better husband this time."
I don't answer. Can't answer.
I channel every ounce of coldness Cassian taught me, every lesson in controlling fear. I stare through him like he's not even there.
Like I'm not terrified.
The man sighs, straightens. "I was afraid you'd be difficult."
He nods to his men. "Your father gave us other options. If you won't talk, we'll just have to find another way to make you cooperative."
One of them—the big one with the neck tattoos—cracks his knuckles.
The leader smiles. "He said, 'Break her.' And a woman like you..."
He looks me up and down, and my skin crawls. "There's really only one way to break a woman, isn't there?"
Panic hits me. Pure, primal terror that wipes out every self-defense lesson, every ounce of training. All those hours in the gym with Cassian, learning to fight, to survive—useless when you're zip-tied to a chair with three men circling.
No. Not this. Anything but this.
The one with the neck tattoos grabs my hair, yanks my head back hard enough that my neck cracks. Pain shoots down my spine, and I can't help the whimper that escapes.
The third one—younger, eager, shaking with anticipation—starts unbuttoning my shirt with trembling hands.
"No." It comes out as a gasp, barely a word. "Please. Don't."
I hate how I sound. Weak. Begging. Everything Cassian taught me not to be.
"Please what?" The leader strokes my face with one hand, his thumb pressing into my throat hard enough to bruise. "Please stop?"
His smile is obscene. "Or please fuck you?"
I can't breathe. Can't move. The zip ties cut deeper as I struggle.
The third man grabs my legs, his rough hands tearing at my leggings. I feel the fabric rip, feel the cold air on my skin.
This can't be happening. Not this.
I try to go somewhere else. To the garden where I met Ian—Cassian. To the piano room where he played for me. To anywhere but here.
One man's hand covers my breast roughly, squeezing hard enough to hurt. The other's fingers slide beneath the waistband of my underwear.
My mind shatters.
I'm not here. This isn't happening. I'm somewhere safe, somewhere—
The man at my throat rips my shirt open, buttons scattering across the concrete floor.
There's a sound. A wet thwack that cuts through the haze of terror like a gunshot.
The man at my throat makes a gurgling noise. His eyes go wide, confused, like he can't understand what's happening. Blood bubbles from his lips.
He slumps to the floor, and I see it. A black knife is embedded in his neck, buried to the hilt. Right where the carotid artery runs, exactly where I was taught to strike for a kill.
The other two men freeze. Hands still on me, still violating, but their attention snaps to the doorway.
Their faces go white.
Cassian stands there, backlit by the fluorescent lights from the office beyond. For a second, he's just a silhouette, death incarnate.
Then he steps into the light, and I see his face.
Not the man I married. Not the man who held me while I cried or taught me to fight or played piano in the dark.
A shadow. Pure violence given human form, every carefully controlled instinct unleashed.
His face is a mask of rage so intense, so absolute, that it eclipses anything I've ever seen. More terrifying than my father's cold calculations, more deadly than any mobster I've ever met.
This is what he really is. What he becomes when someone threatens what's his.
The monster he's spent his whole life trying to contain.
And I've never been more terrified or more relieved in my entire life.