Page 51 of Watch Me Burn

I stay in the shadows, watching. This isn’t my world, not yet. But I’m learning. I study Marco’s movements, the cadence of his threats, the way Frank’s knuckles whiten around the chair arms as dread seeps in.

“You know what we want.” Caterina steps closer, playing with her prey.

Frank spits blood onto the floor. His eyes sharpen with pride. “Fuck you. Giovanni will come for me.”

That’s all Frank gets out before Marco steps in front of him. The sound of bone snapping is sickening. Frank tries to hold in his screams but fails. Marco and Caterina don’t even flinch.

“Giovanni doesn’t even know you’re gone,” Marco murmurs, gently realigning his stance like he’s preparing for a dance. “And by the time he does...there won’t be enough left of you to save.”

“You’re going to wish you weren’t born.”

Caterina sighs, looking at Marco as if this conversation is boring her to tears. “Last chance, Frank. Marco is very impatient, as you know.”

“Go to hell.”

What follows is quiet horror. Marco moves as if he’s done this a thousand times, methodical and almost reverent.

He likely has, maybe this is the one part of the job he enjoys.

A scalpel in hand while he slices down Frank’s chest. Caterina picks up the pliers for his nails, cracked one by one until the chair is slick with blood and spit.

Frank howls, pleads, curses. Then howls again.

I can’t look away.

Marco and Cat don’t scream. They don’t threaten. They just talk, softly, the way a parent might to a disobedient child, warning of consequences long past negotiation. And Frank’s fight is starting to unravel at the seams.

I remain a step back, a shadow behind the light, my face unreadable.

This isn’t cruelty for cruelty’s sake.

It’s revenge. It’s legacy.

It’s a war they know how to navigate.

“Your turn,” Marco says suddenly, gesturing me to step forward.

I step into the light, Frank’s bloodshot eyes widen as I crouch in front of him, grabbing his broken wrist.

“The security codes for the west wing. Now.”

He screams instantly as I apply pressure to the shattered bone.

“Eight-six-four-three-two. Reset every forty-eight hours,” he gasps.

“The tunnel access under the estate?”

“I don’t—” His words dissolve into another scream as I twist. Hard. Sweat drips from his temple, mixing with blood.

“Alpha-nine-seven-delta,” he sobs. “Final door requires voice and retinal scan.”

“You’re a natural at this.” Caterina watches, her teeth sinking into her bottom lip, distracting me.

“I learned from the best.” I wink at her, turning to face Frank. “My wife taught me how to break men without ever losing composure.”

And with that I twist Frank’s wrist one last time…feeling the bone break further as his screams echo through the small room.

When I glance back at Cat, she’s got this dark, dangerous and thirsty look in her eyes.

She wants to fuck me. In the middle of all this.

And it should feel wrong. Twisted. Deranged.

But it only makes me want her more.

This is who I am now. Ruthless. Unyielding. Protecting her at all costs. It doesn’t bother me, if anything it grounds me. Because to beat monsters, you have to become something even darker.

She stands beside me, her mere presence electric in the gloom. “I’m impressed, Jackson.”

Tristan gives a sharp nod—he’s in. The system is ours, and from this moment on, time bends to our will. Every word that escapes Frank’s lips is being recorded. Tristan’s fingers fly across the keys as Marco works with practiced, intentional cruelty.

Eventually, the dam breaks.

Frank fractures in stuttering sobs, confessions spilling out between gasps of pain. Emergency routes. Blood-soaked accounts. Names we suspected, and others we didn’t dare hope for.

The kind of intel that doesn’t just wound.

It decimates, ending legacies.

And most importantly, the mention of an upcoming meeting. In the middle of the night, mere hours from now with Giovanni, Salvatore, and Doyle. Top secret and in the dead of the night so they can finalize their expansion overseas.

The perfect ending to our plan.

Tristan puts his laptop down and walks to us. “Isn’t it too soon?”

Marco shakes his head. “We won’t have another opportunity like this for a long time. Maybe never.”

“Then let’s do it. Get everything in order.”

Marco walks off, wiping off his bloody hands before retrieving a burner phone.

“When Mortelle falls, the city’s ours. We have everything we need to take everyone down, not just Giovanni and his men.” Tristan’s eyes are on me like a hawk, looking for a point of weakness or regret.

“You want to take over everything?”

“Wasn’t that always our plan?”

Franks head slouches over as I contemplate Tristan’s question.

“Is this what you want, Aaron? Fuck everyone else.” Caterina’s soft voice anchors me. But for the first time in forever, my thoughts aren’t a storm. Everything in me is sure about what needs to be done.

I keep my eyes on Frank, who minutes ago, thought he’d walk out of here alive. Funny how they always think they’re the exception.

“We have to see this through. Business was just the prelude. Now we play for keeps.”

The empire will be split. Construction, surveillance, and real estate under me. Intelligence, stocks, and international routes under him. Legitimate fronts for operations buried in shadow.

“We’re done here. I’ll take care of this and meet you all at the estate,” Marco says flatly, standing beside the broken shell of a man still twitching in the chair.

“Finish it. No loose ends,” Caterina mutters.

Marco doesn’t blink.

When it’s done, there’s no sound. No words. Just silence—clean, final.

He hands her the USB, blood still smeared across its edge. “This kills surveillance. Drops the alarms. Seven minutes to breach and plant charges.”

“We hit tonight,” she says. “Before the summit.”

Tristan’s already moving, packing gear. “I’ll scrub everything. Nothing traces back.”

He disappears into the dark.

I reach for Caterina’s hand, pulling her into the shadows with me…just for a moment. One breath. One heartbeat. Alone.

“Now it’s my turn to ask. Is this what you really want? To end everything?”

Her gaze doesn’t waver. “I crossed that line a long time ago.”

“I just need to know you won’t wake up tomorrow and hate me for dragging you into this. That you won’t regret what you did tonight.”

I show her I mean it the only way I know how—by tasting her.

My thumb brushes along her cheekbone as I tilt her face up, dragging her lip between my teeth and biting until she gasps.

Then I pull back, eyes fixed on her.

“You’re not my regret, Caterina,” I whisper. “You’re the reason I’d set the world on fire and never look back.”

She kisses me hard and claiming, like that was what she needed to hear to light the match and watch it all burn to the ground.

We separate, breathless, our foreheads pressed together as electricity still crackles beneath our skin.

“Ready?” she asks.

I nod.

Let them come. I’ll bleed entire kingdoms for her.