Page 87 of Queen

One of my guards steps in, carrying a small velvet box. Black, sharp-edged, heavy enough that my gut twists before it even touches the desk. “No return address, boss. Dropped at the gates.”

I wave him out.

The click of the door sounds like a coffin lid sealing.

Zina rises slowly, circling the desk in silence. She doesn’t touch the box, only paces around it like a predator sizing prey. My hand hovers longer than I want her to see before I snap the lid open.

Inside, cushioned against black satin, gleams Giovanni’s wedding band.

Not a replica. Not a forgery. The original. Cleaned. Polished. Gleaming as though time itself bowed to preserve it. I know every curve, every weight of that ring. I watched Giovanni crush men with that hand, seal alliances, choke enemies into silence. That ring carried the kingdom long before I did.

Zina exhales slow, sharp as a blade sliding free of its sheath. “Who the fuck would dare?”

There’s more. Folded beneath the band, a slip of parchment. Old. Stiff. Ink bleeding red across its surface. I unfold it once. Twice. A third time, because the words don’t shift, don’t soften, no matter how hard I glare.

"Rex cadere potest, sed umbra eius numquam dormit."

A king may fall, but his shadow never sleeps.

The weight of it drops into the room like a guillotine.

My jaw locks. My pulse hammers. I’m not a man who flinches, but this—this is Giovanni’s ghost slamming his fist on the table we thought we’d claimed.

Zina steps beside me, close enough that the scent of her crown oil and steel cuts through the smoke. She stares down at the ring, her expression unreadable—until her lips twist into something darker than fear. Something closer to recognition. “His shadow,” she whispers, eyes lifting to mine. “Or someone who wants us to believe it.”

Her hand brushes my arm. A small touch. Grounding. Necessary. She doesn’t say more. She doesn’t have to.

I snap the box shut, the sound final, violent. My reflection glares back in the black lid—hard, unyielding, but not untouched.

I lift my gaze to her. My voice comes out low, cold, certain. “It’s started.”

And in her silence, I hear the truth neither of us dares say aloud.

If Giovanni’s shadow is rising, then the blood pact we carved tonight wasn’t the end.

It was the fucking beginning.

19

zina

Threat Delivered: A Message in Blood

The scream isn’t human. It’s the kind of sound a man makes when he’s already seen Hell open its jaw. I bolt upright, heart slamming against my ribs, and sprint before my brain catches up.

The marble cuts into my bare feet, sharp and cold, but I don’t feel it. My only thought is Guido. My baby. My blood.

The south wing is chaos. Radios crackle, voices shouting over each other, boots pounding like gunfire across the stone. The stench of smoke clings thick in the air. I round the corner and slam into Romeo, his shirt plastered to him with sweat, eyes wide. His hand clamps down on my arm, grip bruising.

“Don’t—” His voice cracks. “Zina, don’t go in there.”

I wrench free, nails carving his skin. “Touch me again and I’ll gut you.”

I shove past him.

The world stops.

The air is poison—charred wiring, acrid smoke, the metallic tang of detonated charges that didn’t finish their job. My eyes snap to the bed. Guido’s bed. Sheets torn back, hanging in limp folds, and beneath the frame—wired with brutal precision—is a bomb. Clay bricks packed tight, shrapnel wedged like teeth. The timer ticks dead, casing scorched black. Someone disarmed it minutes ago. Maybe seconds.