Page 10 of The Silent War

Syndicate.

I watched his eyes flicker like he’d just realized, two seconds, too late which wolf he’d fed his throat to.

“Parity?” I repeated. “That’s the word you brought into my city?”

He opened his mouth again. Didn’t get to finish.

Bastion was up and moving before he registered, pinning his head to the table.

“You think this is a syndicate?” Bastion twisted the heir’s tie until he choked on the silence. “We’re some backroom crew you can buy off with a crest stamped in wax?”

He struggled once.

“We are dynasty,” I said, watching Bastion grip tighten, “Our crest goes back farther than yours. Registered in the Sovereign before yours. Our Codex runs deeper. And unlike your families, we don’t just inherit the name. We bleed it.”

Dynasties cared about two things, keeping their power clean and bloodlines.

“But we’re also syndicate,” I butted the cigarette out. “Ports. Tunnels. Guns. Streets. The water. We control. Your fathers call us criminals when they want to feel civilized. But they all pay us. Every one of them.”

Bastion loosened his grip just enough for him to cough.

“So when you sit at my table, you’re not negotiating with merchants. You’re not trading with old men who still believe protocol keeps them safe. You’re looking at the only family in the empire who can’t be killed by ink or by steel.” I leanedcloser. “You’re looking at the Crows. And in Villain, that means you’re already out of moves.”

Heavy silence. The type that is final. Now they knew where they stood. Which was wherever we let them.

Bastion let him go, he staggered back into his chair, red-faced. His cousins didn’t move to help him. They never do, same pattern across all dynasties.

“This isn’t protocol,” I said evenly. “This is survival. You want Villain, you get it through us. Or you don’t get it at all.”

I lit another cigarette, staying calm and controlled, because I had to be for her.

The reason why I could sit here, patient, while foreign dynasty heirs learned that the Crow name was carved into skin of anyone who dared do business here.

Because these deals, every power move, was to secure our future with hers.

Chapter Five

LUCA

By the time I hit the penthouse, I didn’t want food or whiskey. I wanted silence and my girl.

I dropped down on the bed and reached for my phone. Because this part was ritual.

She was my ritual.

My day started with her face. And ended the same way. Every fucking day for the last three years.

Before I cleaned blood off money, shifted millions through accounts, signed off on executions and reminded the city why the Crow name was the blade they slept with at their throat…

Her.

My girl.

Even if she didn’t know it anymore and hadn’t said my name in three years. And I hadn’t called her baby in longer.

Some people built empires for power. We built ours for possession.

I opened the app with one swipe.