Page 52

They said I was quieter, lately.

The staff started avoiding eye contact. Alex didn't speak unless spoken to.

Even the guards walked softer, like the halls had become a cathedral built on bodies.

Good.

I'd always hated unnecessary noise.

Especially when the only sound I wanted was the one that's gone.

I told myself she needed space.

I told myself I was keeping her safe.

But every hour since I left her at the sea house has crawled like broken glass under my skin. And it's getting harder to pretend that silence is mercy.

She haunts me.

In the piano room. In the scent of jasmine on my clothes. In the second pillow I don't use.

My house feels too clean now. Too quiet. Too sharp around the edges.

Like it's waiting for a storm I'm not sure I want to stop.

Today started like most do lately with rage.

I sat in the sunroom I never used before her. The one with the velvet settee and the white curtains she called "soft-light pretty."

My phone buzzed once.

Then again.

Alex.

"Trouble at the port. Warehouse 7. Someone touched the West shipment."

West shipment meant weapons. Which meant someone either had a death wish-or a message.

I didn't answer. I stood.

Suited in black. Shirt open at the collar. No tie. Gun holstered under my ribs.

Knife hidden at the ankle. My sleeves were rolled to the forearms like I had plans to make someone bleed.

I always do.

The warehouse was a familiar kind of chaos.

Crates overturned. Blood on the cement. Three of my men standing by the wall, injured but not dead.

Good. I'd kill them myself if they were.

Alex met me at the gate. Jaw tight. Eyes tired. "Two down. Four injured. Looks like Vitale's men."

Vitale.

I smiled.

That rat had been chewing at my borders for months. Testing. Always just enough to irritate, never enough to go to war.

Until now.

"One of the guards said they were looking for something," Alex added.

"Something or someone?"

Alex hesitated.

And I saw it.

He looked guilty.

I stepped closer.

"Who."

"One of them... he mentioned a girl."

The silence that followed made the air sharp.

"Her name?"

"No. Just... he said 'Isolde.'"

I closed my eyes.

I saw her-curled on that chaise by the beach window, fingers clutching a novel she wouldn't finish.

A shadow behind her eyes. The ache I left her with.

They'd found her.

Or tried.

And now I had permission.

The meeting with Vitale's men was not a negotiation.

They came late. Armed. I came alone.

They called it bravery. I called it math.

Three against me meant three fresh corpses.

The alley behind their nightclub was damp, dim, and reeking of piss.

I leaned against the brick wall and waited. When they rounded the corner, their leader swaggered like he had time left.

He didn't.

"Valencourt," he sneered. "Didn't think you'd show."

"You sent rats into my house. You shouldn't be surprised when I follow the scent."

He laughed. The sound grated.

"She yours, then? The girl by the ocean?"

I didn't answer.

I just stepped forward and drew my gun.

He didn't even get to scream.

The others tried.

Didn't matter.

The first dropped with a shot to the chest.

The second, I let crawl. He whimpered about not knowing. About orders. About family.

I shot his kneecap. Then his hand. Then his mouth.

"That's for speaking her name."

Back home, I poured myself a drink.

Didn't taste it.

My hand still twitched from the weight of the trigger. My jaw ached from clenching.

She wouldn't have liked seeing me like this.

But she isn't seeing me at all.

I walked into the room with the piano.

I stood at the keys.

Didn't touch them.

I stared.

And I imagined her there. Sitting. Smiling at nothing. Hair falling over her shoulder.

Eyes full of that soft sadness that makes me want to burn the world to give her peace.

I pressed a single key.

F sharp.

The note rang into the dark like a memory that wouldn't leave.

And then I walked away.

Back into the dark.

The next morning, I checked the camera.

Yes. Of course I had them installed.

Two inside. Three outside. Hidden.

She didn't know.

She couldn't.

She sat on the back porch. Wrapped in that white robe. The one I had packed just for her. She was sipping tea. Staring at the sea like it had the answer.

I watched her for thirteen minutes.

She didn't smile once.

And for the first time in years, I questioned whether keeping something safe was worth keeping her away.

But I didn't look away.

Because I can't.

Because love, in my hands, is just another form of violence.

And I don't know how to stop.