POV: Carmen
The name Bernardis shouldn’t still exist.
That’s the first thing that strikes me as I scroll through the archive Vincent’s people dug up overnight. The Bernardis family was erased fifteen years ago—systematically, efficiently, with enough plausible deniability that most people chalked it up to a bad war and worse alliances. No survivors worth mentioning. No loose ends.
Except Arianna Ricci.
My fingers hover over the trackpad as I read the report again, slower this time, letting every line settle into place. Dates. Transfers. Internal leaks. Anonymous tips delivered at exactly the wrong moments. A family rotting from the inside before the first bullet was ever fired.
“This is impossible,” I murmur, though the evidence doesn’t waver.
Vincent stands near the window, arms crossed, his expression closed in that way it gets when old ghosts stir. He hasn’t spoken since he handed me the file. He doesn’t need to.
“She was barely twenty,” I say quietly. “No one paid attention to her then.”
“That’s why it worked,” Vincent replies. His voice is flat, but I hear the weight beneath it. “People underestimate quiet ambition.”
The report details it all with chilling precision. How Arianna siphoned funds through shell companies linked to Bernardis logistics. How she leaked schedules and safe house locations anonymously to rival crews. How she staged a cyber intrusion that looked like an external attack but required intimate internal knowledge.
How, when the family finally collapsed under pressure, she vanished with the money.
I feel cold.
Not the sharp kind that shocks you awake. The deep kind that settles into your bones and stays there.
“She didn’t just betray De Lucas,” I say. “She perfected it with Bernardis first.”
Vincent nods once. “She learned how to burn a house down without ever lighting the match herself.”
I close the laptop slowly, my hands trembling despite my effort to stay steady. This isn’t just confirmation of suspicion. This is a pattern. A blueprint.
Arianna doesn’t pick sides.
She builds collapses.
And Marco—God—Marco walked straight into it.
“I need air,” I say suddenly.
Vincent studies me for a moment, then nods. “You’ve been staring at screens for days.”
He grabs his coat, already moving. “Come. We’ll walk.”
The city outside the estate is quieter than I expect, the outskirts stretching wide and dim under a sky smeared with low clouds. Streetlights hum softly, casting pale halos over cracked pavement and shuttered storefronts. This isn’t Vincent’s usual territory. It’s too exposed. Too human.
That’s why he brought me here.
We walk side by side without speaking at first, our footsteps echoing in the empty street. I wrap my coat tighter around myself, the cool air cutting through me, grounding me in the present.
“You saved me once,” Vincent says eventually, his gaze fixed ahead.
I glance at him. “You didn’t bring me out here for nostalgia.”
“No,” he agrees. “I brought you because you’re spiraling.”
I let out a soft, humorless laugh. “Am I that obvious?”
“You always were,” he replies.
We turn a corner, the city opening up slightly, a distant glow marking the edge of a main road. Cars pass occasionally, their lights streaking past like reminders that the world keeps moving no matter how thoroughly your own life implodes.
“You don’t owe me anything,” I say quietly. “You know that.”
Vincent stops walking.
I do too.
He turns to face me, his expression serious. “That’s where you’re wrong.”
For a moment, I think he won’t say more. Then he exhales slowly, like he’s releasing something he’s held onto for too long.
“Years ago,” he says, “when Marco and I were at war, you were the only one who saw what was really happening.”
My chest tightens. I remember that time vividly—the tension, the constant threat, the way alliances shifted daily. The way Vincent’s name was spoken like a curse in our house.
“You warned me,” he continues. “You told me which men were going to sell me out before they did. You told me to leave a safe house that burned down two nights later.”
I swallow hard. “I didn’t do it for you.”
“I know,” he says. “You did it because you don’t let innocent people get crushed in power games.”
The word innocent feels heavy now.
“And Marco never knew,” Vincent adds.
“No,” I reply softly. “He didn’t.”
We resume walking, the silence between us different now. Not empty. Reflective.
“I’m not helping you because I hate Marco,” Vincent says. “I’m helping you because Arianna Ricci is a problem that doesn’t stop once she’s done destroying one family.”
“She’s already proven that,” I say.
“Yes,” he agrees. “And you’re the only one who sees it clearly.”
The compliment doesn’t comfort me. It terrifies me.
Because seeing it clearly means realizing how close Marco is to losing everything.
We walk another block before I stop again, my hand instinctively moving to my stomach. The motion is small, unconscious, but Vincent notices.
“Are you all right?” he asks.
“I’m pregnant,” I say simply.
The word hangs in the air between us.
Vincent’s expression changes—not shock, not judgment, but something closer to grim understanding. “Does he know?”
“No.”
“Will you tell him?”
I don’t answer immediately. I don’t know if I can.
“I wanted to protect my family,” I say instead. “And somehow I ended up outside of it.”
Vincent studies me for a long moment. “You’re still protecting them.”
“I don’t know how much longer I can,” I admit. “Arianna is faster than I expected. And Marco…” My voice falters. “Marco doesn’t want to see it.”
“Men like him don’t see the blade until it’s already inside,” Vincent says quietly.
We turn back toward the estate as the night deepens, the weight of everything pressing down on me. The evidence. The history. The future growing quietly inside me, unaware of the war it’s being born into.
When we reach the gates, Vincent pauses. “You need rest.”
“I need to stop her,” I reply.
“You will,” he says. “But not tonight.”
I nod, though my mind is still racing.
Back in my room, I sit on the edge of the bed, the Bernardis file open on my tablet one last time. Fifteen years. Two families destroyed. One woman always at the center, untouched by the fallout.
My phone rests beside me, silent.
Marco doesn’t know yet.
About the Bernardis.
About the trap at the dock.
About the child.
I press my hand to my stomach again, breathing slowly.
I don’t know how this ends.
But I know one thing with absolute certainty.
Arianna Ricci has been burning families down long before she ever returned to ours.
And if no one stops her this time, there won’t be anything left for anyone to save.