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I keep my eyes on the road. “I’m paid to expect the worst.”

“Is that why you still have one hand on your gun?”

My grip tightens on the weapon, still half-drawn, resting against my thigh. I hadn’t even realized.

“Old habits,” I mutter, forcing myself to release it.

“From what?”

When I don’t answer, she continues, “You know everything about me, Alessio. My schedule, my security concerns, even how I sound when I—” She cuts herself off, color rising in her cheeks. “Yet I know nothing about you except that you work for my fiancé’s father, and you’re very good at violence.”

“That’s all anyone needs to know.”

“Not me.” Her voice softens. “I saw your face when the glass broke. That wasn’t just training. That was memory.”

The insight is too close, too accurate. I grip the steering wheel tighter, knuckles white. “Drop it, Isadora.”

“Why? Because you’re afraid I might see the real man behind theCapomask?”

“Because the real man isn’t someone you want to know.” The words come out harsher than intended.

She laughs, the sound brittle. “That’s where you’re wrong. The real man is the only one who interests me.”

I pull up to the De Angelis estate gates, relieved to end this dangerous conversation. The guard waves us through after recognizing the car.

“Your father will want a full report,” I say as we approach the house.

“Then give him one.” She unbuckles her seatbelt but makes no move to exit. “Tell him how his daughter was nearly crushed by falling crystal, but her watchdog saved her. Tell him whatever version makes you comfortable, Alessio.”

She reaches across the console, her fingers brushing my forearm where my sleeve is rolled up, tracing one of my scars. “Just remember that I know there’s more to this story. And sooner or later, I’ll figure it out.”

Her touch burns like a brand, sending heat radiating through my body. I catch her wrist, meaning to push her away, but instead I find myself holding her there, feeling her pulse race beneath my thumb.

“Be careful what you wish for,principessa,” I warn, voice dropping to a rough whisper. “Some truths destroy everything they touch.”

Her eyes darken, lips parting slightly. “Maybe some things need destroying.”

The air between us thickens, charged with something beyond desire—recognition, perhaps. Two people trapped in roles not of their choosing, seeing in each other the potential for something else. Something real.

I release her wrist abruptly. “Good night, Isadora.”

She studies me for a moment longer before exiting the car. I watch her walk toward the house, spine straight, head high—every inch the mafia princess she was born to be.

Only when she’s safely inside do I allow my mask to slip, running a hand over my face as the magnitude of my predicament crashes over me. Twenty years seeking vengeance against Gaincarlo and his happy family, and now I’m protecting his future daughter-in-law. Feeling things for her I have no right to feel.

My phone buzzes—a text from Maria: Visit soon. Important.

The woman who saved me, who raised me, who knows the truth. The only person who calls me by my birth name: Stefano. Not the ghost I’ve become, nor the weapon I’ve forged myself into.

I start the car, heading to her modest apartment in Queens, away from both the Calviño and De Angelis estates. Away from Isadora and the tempest she stirs in me.

But as the city lights blur past, I know with absolute certainty that I’m hurtling toward a choice—vengeance or something I never planned for. Something I’m not sure I deserve.

And nine days is not enough time to decide.

8

Isadora