Page 20 of Silent Schemes (Broken Blood)

Three Rosetti men by the service entrance, trying to look casual but standing with the rigid posture of men carrying concealed weapons.

Two more by the kitchen, one of them I recognize from surveillance photos—Dominic's brother, hungry for revenge.

Another near the emergency exit.

It's a kill box, and Varrick's about to walk right into it.

"Dance with me," Varrick says, appearing at my elbow.

"I don't dance."

"Tonight you do." He leads me onto the floor, one hand on my waist, the other holding mine.

To anyone watching, we're just another couple.

But I feel the gun under his jacket, the knife at his ankle.

He came prepared.

The orchestra plays something classical, waltz-tempo, and Varrick leads with surprising grace.

"They're here," I whisper as we turn. "Six that I've counted. Maybe more."

"I know." His hand tightens on my waist. "Spotted them when we walked in. The question is how you knew they'd be here."

"I told you, desperate people?—"

"Don't lie to me." His voice is soft but dangerous, the tone that precedes violence. "Not anymore. We're far past that, don’t you think?"

We turn again, and I catch sight of another Rosetti, this one armed with something heavier under his coat. "Kitchen entrance. Shotgun probably."

"You're remarkably well-informed for someone who just guessed they might try something."

"Varrick—"

"After. We'll deal with this after."

The music ends.

He releases me but keeps close as we move through the crowd.

His phone buzzes—a text from one of his men confirming more Rosetti soldiers outside.

It's worse than I thought.

This isn't just a test.

It's an execution.

"We need to leave," I say urgently.

"We can't. Not without making a scene. And a scene is exactly what they want." He's right. The Rosettis want public revenge, blood on the ballroom floor, headlines tomorrow about the Bastard King brought down.

"Then what?"

"We give them what they want. Just not how they want it."

Before I can ask what that means, he's moving.

Not toward the exit but toward the Rosetti men by the kitchen.

I follow, hand finding the knife strapped to my thigh.

What happens next is complete chaos.

Varrick approaches the first Rosetti like an old friend, all smiles and handshakes.

Then his smile turns sharp, and there's a knife in his hand, buried between ribs, before anyone realizes what's happening.

I take the second one, my blade finding his femoral artery, dropping him in seconds.

The room erupts.

Screams, running, tables overturning.

The other Rosetti men are moving, but Varrick's men are already in position.

It's not an ambush anymore—it's war.

I lose track of Varrick in the fight, focused on my own survival.

A Rosetti soldier comes at me with a broken bottle.

I sidestep, grab his wrist, drive my knee into his solar plexus.

He drops, gasping, and I finish him with his own weapon.

Blood on my dress.

Blood on my hands.

The baby doesn't care—if anything, the adrenaline makes me feel more alive, more dangerous.

This is what I am, what my father made me.

A killer in designer clothing, a weapon that happens to be carrying life.

When the dust settles, seven Rosetti men are dead.

Three more are running.

The ballroom is destroyed, and sirens are already approaching.

But Varrick is alive, standing among the wreckage like a king surveying his kingdom.

"We need to go," I say, tugging his arm.

He looks at me, really looks at me, and I see the moment he puts it together. "You knew. You knew exactly when and where and how many."

"Car. Now. We can fight about this later."

We make it to the penthouse just ahead of the police arriving.

The elevator ride is silent, tension thick enough to choke on.

The moment we're inside, he pours himself a drink, downs it, pours another.

The whiskey is Macallan 18, his favorite, and I wonder if this will be the last time I watch him drink it.

"Talk," he says, not looking at me.

"My father set it up. A test. To see if I'd warn you."

"And you did." He's still not looking at me. "Why?"

"You know why."

Now he turns, and his face is carved from stone. "Do I? Because from where I stand, you're still playing both sides. Still dancing to Daddy’s tune."

"I warned you!"

"You gave me enough to survive but not enough to avoid it entirely. That's not choosing me, Sienna. That's hedging your bets."

The glass flies past my head, shatters against the wall.

I don't flinch.

I can't.

My father and Vincent trained that out of me years ago.

"You knew they were coming." Not a question.

"Yes."

"Your father?"

"A test. To see if I'd let you die."

"You failed his test."

"I passed yours."

He crosses the room in three strides, backs me against his desk.

His hand comes to my throat, not squeezing, just resting there.

A reminder of how easily he could end this—end me.

"I can't protect you if you keep silently scheming behind my back."

"I'm not playing anymore," I insist, my hands coming up to cover his. "I chose you. In that kitchen, after the Rosetti job, I chose you."

"Prove it."

The words tumble out before I can stop them.

"Bastian. When I met him, I gave him intel.

About Will. His safe houses, his patterns, everything.

My father was threatening Maya, and I—" My voice cracks.

"I betrayed Will to keep my cover, to protect my sister.

But it was killing me because I knew what it would do to you. "

His hand tightens slightly. "Will is like a father to me."

"I know. But it was him or you. And I chose you. I'll always choose you now."

The confession breaks something in both of us.

His hand drops from my throat, and suddenly I'm in his arms, his mouth on mine, desperate and angry and grieving all at once.

When we break apart, we're both breathing hard.

"We have to warn him," Varrick says.

"It might be too late."

"Then we make sure it isn't." He's already reaching for his phone, calling Will, voice urgent.

I watch him try to save his mentor, and my hand drifts to my stomach.

There's no movement yet—too early for that—but I swear I feel something.

A presence. A future that demands I be better than what my father made me.

Will answers.

He's alive.

Varrick's warning comes just in time—they were moving on him tonight, while we were distracted at the gala.

But Will's smart, paranoid.

He'll disappear, regroup, survive.

When Varrick hangs up, he looks at me with something I can't quite read. "You could have let him die. Kept your cover intact."

"I told you. I'm not playing anymore."

"Your father will know. He'll come for you."

"He was always going to come for me. The only question was whether I'd face him as his weapon or as myself."

"And which are you?"

"Yours," I say simply. "Whatever that makes me."

He studies me for a long moment, then pours another drink. "There's something else. Something you're not telling me."

My hand involuntarily goes to my stomach, and I force it back to my side.

But he catches the movement, files it away in that mind that misses nothing.

I can’t tell him, not now, not yet, not until I know what my final play is going to be.

If I have to take Maya and run, there won’t be a corner of the Earth Varrick won’t track me down to find his child.

"We all have secrets," I say.

"Not from each other. Not anymore." He moves closer, backs me against the desk again, but this time it's different. Not threatening, just intense. "What aren't you telling me?"

For a moment, I consider it.

Telling him everything.

About the baby, about the impossible situation we're in, about how I'm trying to save everyone and will probably end up destroying us all.

But the words won't come.

Not yet. Not until I have a plan that doesn't end in blood.

"I love you," I say instead, the first time I've said it out loud. "That's what I'm not telling you. I love you, and it's going to get us both killed."

He goes still, then his hands are in my hair, his mouth on mine, and we're falling apart and coming together all at once.

When he finally pulls back, his eyes are dark with something that might be hope or might be resignation.

"I love you too," he says. "God help us both."

That night, lying in his bed, I feel it again—that phantom pressure in my stomach.

Not movement, not yet, but promise.

In a few weeks, I'll start showing.

The secret will become visible, undeniable.

Another complication in an already impossible situation.

Varrick sleeps beside me, one arm possessively around my waist, hand splayed over my stomach like he knows. But he doesn't. Can't. Not yet.

Damn this, damn this fucked up world we live in.

Will Romano is alive but hunted.

The Rosetti family are decimated but not destroyed.

And I'm carrying the future Bane king while planning for an ending that gets darker every day.

I watch Varrick sleep, memorizing the peace on his face that only comes in these unconscious moments.

My fingers trace the scar on his chest, the one from someone who claimed to love him.

I understand that person now.

Sometimes love means leaving.

Sometimes it means betraying everything to keep someone safe.

"I'm sorry," I whisper to the darkness, to him, to the baby who doesn't know its mother is a killer and its father is marked for death. "I'm sorry for what I'll have to do."

Because I will have to do something.

My father won't accept failure.

He'll come for me, for Maya, for everyone I care about.

And when he does, I'll have to make a choice that saves the most lives, even if it damns my soul.

The baby doesn't move—can't yet—but I pretend I feel it anyway.

A flutter of hope in all this darkness.

A reason to find a solution that doesn't end in blood.

But I'm Sienna Cross and everything I touch ends in blood.

I just pray this time, it won't be Varrick's.

Or our child's.