Page 25 of Intrigue (Dark Syndicate #4)

Selene

My head throbs as consciousness returns. The kitchen tile presses cold against my cheek, and copper fills my mouth where I bit my tongue. Cassian’s footsteps echo somewhere in the house, punctuated by breaking glass.

The broken phone lies inches from my fingers, Sandro’s voicemail still burning in my mind. I manage to press play again, needing to hear it one more time.

“I should have told you years ago.” His voice breaks. “Everything you believe about that night is wrong. I took the fall because... because there are things you don’t know about who you really are. About what your father did...”

The phone screen goes off.

What does he mean?

Rage propels me up. My legs shake as I stumble toward the living room, following the sound of destruction. The apartment is eerily silent, but the moment I step through the doorway, I find him.

Cassian stands amid the wreckage of his paintings, canvas shreds scattered like confetti. An empty whiskey bottle dangles from his fingers, his knuckles smeared with blood.

When he spots me, his lips twist.

“There she is. The princess who ruined everything.” He hurls the bottle. It shatters against the wall beside my head. “The perfect setup, wasn’t it? The struggling artist who just happened to catch the princess’s eye.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Ask your father.” He hurls another bottle past my head. “He paid well for this performance.”

Before I can process his words, his hand connects with my face again, harder this time. Stars explode behind my eyes. “Cassian please stop this...”

“Don’t you fucking tell me what to do, you whore!” he screams.

I cough and struggle up. “Ok...I’m sorry...” I just need to get him to calm down so I can get out of here.

“I just want to know one thing. Was any of it real? Or was I just another puppet in your game?”

“You hit me, you drunk asshole. You don’t get to play victim.”

He lurches, staggering closer. “Victim? You picked him! Sandro! After all I did for you!” He laughs. “Hit you? You destroyed my life. Everything I worked for, gone because I was stupid enough to fall for you.”

“What are you talking about?”

I don’t see the next slap coming.

He lunges forward again, hand raised. Pain explodes across my face before I can block him. I stumble back, vision blurring.

Slowly, I lift my head. Cassian’s breathing hard, his face twisted with something worse than anger. Betrayal. Hatred. Despair.

“Do you know what I gave up for you?” His voice is unhinged, teetering between a sob and a scream. “Do you have any idea what I had to do?”

“You had to do?” My voice shakes. “What the hell are you talking about?”

Before he can answer, the front door bursts open.

Everything happens at once.

Three men in black suits rush and then Cassian is being ripped away from me. He thrashes, screaming obscenities as they drag him across the room. He thrashes, but they’re stronger, forcing him to his knees. A sharp cry rips from his throat when one of them drives a fist into his gut.

I barely register the movement behind them before he steps forward.

My father.

The world stops. The blood drains from my face.

He looks at me with something that isn’t quite disappointment, but isn’t surprise, either. Like he’s known all along I’d end up here. Like he planned it.

“That’s enough theater for one night.” My father’s voice cuts through the chaos. He steps inside, immaculate in his tailored suit. “Hello, daughter.”

“What is this?” I demand, tasting copper.

He smiles, all predator. “The final act, cara mia. Where all the pieces come together. Starting with your precious Cassian, my gift to keep you distracted while I continued to work the Morettis over to my side. Did you enjoy falling in love with him? He played his part well. Amazing what a struggling artist will do for funding, isn’t it? ”

The floor seems to tilt beneath me. “What?”

“Oh yes. Every ‘chance’ meeting, every shared moment... all orchestrated.”

“You’re lying.”

“Am I? Shall we discuss more lies? Like the story of your birth?” He pulls out a photo—old, creased—and tosses it at my feet. I pick it up, hands trembling. It’s Mom, young and smiling, with a man I don’t know. He’s got my nose, my jaw.

“That is Adriano Moretti, your real father.”

My stomach lurches. I shake my head, willing him to stop, to take it back, but he doesn’t. He steps closer, his presence suffocating, and tells me the truth.

The real truth.

I was never a Marconi.

“You see, cara mia,” my father continues, circling me like a shark, “you were never meant to exist. Your mother, Bianca, was already in love with another man long before her arranged marriage to me. That man? Adriano Moretti. A Moretti heir. They were together before and after her forced marriage, and you… you were the result of that affair. I mean I suspected. But he didn’t care, at first. After all, I married her for power, not love.

And when she finally left me, taking you with her to be with Adriano, I saw it as treason and took you back. ”

I feel sick. My hands shake at my sides. “You killed them.”

He tilts his head, unimpressed. “I did what was necessary. Your mother’s indiscretion with Adriano should have died with them. But you... you grew to look so much like them both.”

Rage burns through me. “That’s why you wanted me dead.” My voice is barely above a whisper. “Because I look like him. Because if the Morettis ever found out you were the one who killed Adriano—”

“They’d burn me to the ground,” he finishes easily.

“Yes. And that’s exactly why I couldn’t allow you to live.

I orchestrated another rival to take the fall for Adriano and your mother’s death.

Then made it seem that your mother’s affair was with him and not Adriano.

I actually made it seem like she was two timing, but that part wasn’t so hard since she was a whore anyways. ”

He laughs before continuing.

“Then it all leads back to you being the product of that affair. I played the part of the heartbroken widower whose wife left him but couldn’t abandon an innocent child and took you in. Making it look like I didn’t really care that you weren’t mine but loved you anyways.

“Sadly, Adriano’s brother couldn’t do much when he died shortly after from drunk driving.

Putting a dent in my plans. But the seed had already been sown.

So, I had to wait for his stupid, reckless son to grow up.

Do you know how hard it was living with you all those years?

Hearing you call mey ‘dad’...it fucking irritated me.

But I was determined to see it through. And thankfully, when you were both of age, he was stupid enough to fall for my vices.

Little whispers here and there and he came to me of his own accord. ”

The room spins. “The Morettis...”

“Don’t they know they’re trying to kill their own blood?

” He laughs, a low, twisted sound. “It was the perfect plan all along. I could have ended you any time. All those years, watching you sleep, waiting. I could’ve slipped something into your food and just watched you choke on your own blood.

I was so damn close. But I needed to let it simmer.

I wanted to send one final ‘fuck you’ to your whore of a mother and her lover, both rotting in their graves.

I wanted them to roll in their graves all this while watching they way I neglected you as a child, yes, but I also wanted them to suffer.

To know that their betrayal would echo even in death.

Killing you myself would’ve been too easy.

No, I wanted them to see you grow up, to see you have a life.

To see you fall in love. And then, I wanted your life to end at the hands of your own flesh and blood, the very ones who should protect you.

It would have been the sweetest revenge, a beautiful tragedy.

You’d have been the final brunt of their betrayal to me, and they’d have known every agonizing moment of it. ”

“You’re a sick, sick man.”

“Ironic, isn’t it? Edoardo was originally supposed to plot your death, not realizing you’re his cousin. Though I suppose family killing family is a time-honored tradition. But the bastard got greedy and wanted to wet his dick first.”

And like a flash I remember everything.

The Morettis had always been a threat, but this was different. This wasn’t about power plays or territory disputes. This was personal.

Edoardo Moretti was a pompous ass who wanted to control me.

He had always been too bold, too sure of himself. The way he looked at me at gatherings, the way he spoke about me when he thought I wasn’t listening. Like I was already his.

Now I understand why father played along, indulging the Morettis in their “discussions” about an arranged marriage. And I was commanded, never asked. Just expected to accept my brand new life.

I never thought much of it because after the day was done, I had Alessandro to see at night. He was all that mattered. He alone would be my true love.

But I didn’t know how far it had gone—until the night of the party.

That’s when I learned the truth.

The Morettis weren’t just proposing an alliance. They had already sealed it.

A deal had been struck behind my back. I was to be handed over, married off, bound to Edoardo before the year was over. No say. No escape.

I had confronted him—angry, reckless, and twenty-one—and he had laughed.

“You should be grateful, Selene. I’m doing you a favor. Your father? He’s tired of you. I’m the only reason you’re not dead yet.”

I didn’t understand that statement then. Now I do.

But back then, that’s when it clicked.

It wasn’t just about marriage. My father hadn’t sold me off because I was valuable, but he had done it because he needed me gone.

Now I understand why Edoardo grabbed my wrist so hard and cornered me, trying to force his disgusting self on me, but I snapped.