Page 122 of The Underboss's Secret Twins

Mancini’s body jerks, then slumps forward, his head lolling to the side. Blood seeps into his already stained shirt, the scent of gunpowder mingling with the damp wood of the walls.

I watch him for a moment, waiting.

Waiting for him to spit out one last threat, one final taunt.

But there’s nothing.

Only silence.

31

SOFIA

The first thing I do once I get back home is take a shower.

Hot water cascades over my skin, washing away the grime of the forest, the sweat, the fear. I tilt my head back, eyes closed, letting the steam curl around me like a veil, loosening muscles that have been wound too tight for too long. The scent of Marco's soap lingers on my skin, rich and dark, a reminder of hands that held me just hours ago.

There is none of that searing anger that drove me to run in the first place.

Instead, all I feel is exhaustion.

I press my forehead against the cool tile, inhaling deeply, but even as the water soothes me, my mind refuses to quiet. I keep replaying the moment Marco found me in the forest—the way his voice cut through the chaos, the way his hands trembled ever so slightly as he untied my wrists. He was furious, yes, but beneath the rage, there was something else.

The jagged edges of whateverthisis between us—this tangled, thorny thing I hesitate to call a relationship—begin to blur. They soften, rounding into something unexpectedly, achingly tender. A fragile bloom pushing through the fracturesof something broken, like a single snowdrop defying the frost, reaching for the pale light of day.

It seeps into me, this quiet, unspoken thing. Not a rush, not a wildfire, but something deeper, something that takes root in the hollow spaces I once thought were barren. It echoes, like whispers in the vaulted stillness of an abandoned cathedral, resonating in places I had long since forgotten existed.

It feels…like love.

Not the kind that crashes in, reckless and all-consuming. Not the kind that drowns. No, this is something hesitant, something trembling, like the first stretch of wings before flight. A tentative thing, delicate yet undeniable. And the strangest part—the part that should send me reeling, clawing for distance—is that it doesn’t.

The fear I was bracing for, the familiar, ice-cold panic of losing myself, never comes. It lingers at the edges like a ghost, but it doesn’t take hold. In its place, there’s something else.

A flicker of quiet, fragile hope, its glow wavering but steady. Or maybe it’s just stillness—the rare, unfamiliar kind that follows a storm, when the world feels impossibly new, washed clean by chaos.

A knock at the door startles me.

"Sofia?"

It’s Valentina.

I turn off the water and grab a towel, wrapping it tightly around myself before cracking open the door. She’s standing there, arms crossed, her dark eyes searching mine.

"You’ve been in there forever," she says lightly. "Come to the kitchen."

"I’m not really hungry."

She arches a brow. "Liar."

And my stomach betrays me with a low, insistent growl.

A small smile tugs at the corner of her lips. "That’s what I thought."

I hesitate, but she doesn’t wait for me to decide. She just turns and walks down the hall, expecting me to follow.

And, for some reason, I do.

The kitchen is warm, filled with the rich scent of garlic and tomatoes simmering on the stove. Valentina moves, pulling out a bundle of fresh basil, slicing into a loaf of bread, tossing a pinch of salt into a pot like she’s done this a thousand times. Maybe she has.