Vows of Blood and Velvet

The night smelled of gunpowder, leather, and rain.

Isandro Moretti adjusted the cuffs of his midnight black suit, his fingers moving with surgical precision as he stepped over the cooling body of a man he'd known since childhood. Blood pooled on the marble floor of the Moretti estate's grand hall, glistening beneath the soft glow of crystal chandeliers. Somewhere in the distance, sirens howled a pointless soundtrack to the chaos. Too late. Always too late.

"Get it cleaned up," Isandro murmured to his consigliere without so much as glancing back. His voice was smooth, cold, the voice of a man accustomed to death.

Beneath his skin, adrenaline still surged, sharp and electric. His heart pounded too fast. His father Don Moretti was alive, barely, after an assassination attempt that should never have breached the gates of their fortress.

Someone had sent killers into the heart of Moretti power. And that meant only one thing.

The Irish.

The Walsh Syndicate.

A muscle in Isandro's jaw twitched as he stepped outside into the frigid Milanese air. His breath frosted, his mind already moving at the speed of strategy. Blood called for blood. He could still smell the iron tang of it on his hands.

"Don Isandro," murmured Matteo, his right hand man. "The Walsh family claims no involvement. They sent word. They"

"They lie," Isandro said flatly.

The Walsh family was many things: cunning, violent, untouchable in their Dublin stronghold. But above all, they were opportunists. With his father now weak, with Moretti territory ripe for the taking, there was no doubt in Isandro's mind this was their play for dominance.

"Arrange a meeting," Isandro ordered, his dark eyes narrowing into slits. "With their heir."

Matteo hesitated. "Their heir is... volatile."

"Good," Isandro replied coldly. "So am I."

Across the city, in a cold alleyway slick with rain and blood, Kieran Walsh wiped his knife clean on the body of the man he'd just killed.

The corpse a hired gun, one of many testing the edges of the Walsh empire slumped to the cobblestones. The city smelled of damp concrete and gasoline. Kieran's heartbeat was still too fast, his breath sharp as he lit a cigarette with trembling fingers.

Another day, another death.

"Boss wants you," came a voice from the shadows.

Kieran didn't turn immediately. He exhaled smoke slowly, his green eyes sharp, restless fixed on the darkness ahead.

"What for?" he asked eventually.

"Meeting. With the Italians."

Kieran's lips twisted into a crooked smirk. "So the snakes finally come crawling."

He crushed the cigarette beneath his boot and wiped rainwater from his brow. The name Isandro Moretti was well known cold blooded, ruthless, untouchable. He and Kieran had never met, but their names had danced around each other in whispered rumors for years. Italian royalty. Irish rebellion. Oil and flame.

So be it.

Let the Italians think they could intimidate him. Let them think they still ruled the board. He would meet their heir face to face, and he would show them exactly who he was: Kieran Walsh, son of war, forged in fire.

No fear. No mercy.

And if blood had to spill so much the better.

The meeting was set for midnight neutral ground, a private estate on the outskirts of Milan where neither side held sway. Snow had begun to fall in thin, whispering flakes, dusting the black stretch of luxury cars parked beneath the iron gates.

Isandro Moretti arrived first.

He stood beneath the pale glow of lanterns, hands gloved in black leather, face carved from marble. He didn't shiver despite the cold. Power clung to him like an invisible crown. Beside him, Matteo scanned the area, one hand near the gun under his coat.

The air was sharp, expectant.

"Let them come," Isandro murmured, eyes fixed on the winding road.

And they did.

The Walsh motorcade slid through the gates, sleek black vehicles with tinted glass. The door of the lead car opened, and the Irish heir stepped out.

Kieran Walsh.

Isandro's first thought was: Beautiful. His second was: Dangerous.

Kieran wasn't what he'd expected. Broad shouldered but lean, with dark auburn hair falling in messy waves to his collar, he moved with a wolfish grace that spoke of violence barely restrained. Sharp cheekbones, a mouth made for sin or lies, and eyes a vivid, electric green that locked on Isandro's face with immediate hostility.

He wore black like armor: tailored suit, leather gloves, a silver ring glinting on one finger.

For a breathless second, neither man spoke.

Then Kieran's mouth curved into a slow, mocking smile. "Isandro Moretti. At last."

Isandro kept his expression unreadable. "Kieran Walsh. I was told you had manners."

Kieran's laugh was low, dangerous. "Not the kind you'd like, I imagine."

They moved closer, footsteps soft on the snow dusted gravel. Behind them, guards bristled, hands itching near weapons. One wrong word, one false move, and this fragile peace would shatter.

"Someone made a mistake," Isandro said coolly. "An attempt on my father's life. I'm not in the mood for games."

"I'm not in the habit of sending amateurs," Kieran replied. "If I wanted your father dead, I wouldn't have missed."

The words weren't bravado. They were terrifyingly honest.

For a heartbeat, the only sound was the soft sigh of falling snow.

Isandro studied him: the raw edges, the simmering fury, the way he held himself like a coiled spring. Kieran was reckless, yes but there was something sharp beneath the roughness. Intelligence. Calculation. Fire.

It unsettled him more than he cared to admit.

"You claim innocence," Isandro murmured. "But your name is written all over this."

Kieran tilted his head, voice softer now. "And yet here I stand. Unarmed. On your turf. Funny, isn't it? How easy it would've been to kill me right now. And yet you haven't."

A long silence stretched between them sharp, electric.

The truth neither said aloud was this: neither side could afford war. Not yet. Not with rival factions circling like vultures over every weakness.

"We can tear each other apart," Kieran added, voice dangerously quiet. "Or we can find out who actually tried to light this fuse."

Isandro's eyes narrowed. "And why would I trust you?"

Kieran smiled slow, wicked, impossibly magnetic. "Because you don't have a choice."

Isandro's gloved fingers twitched at his side.

He hated this. Hated the words, the compromise. He had built his life on control, and here standing inches from the Irish heir who radiated danger and dark charm in equal measure he could feel it slipping.

One thing was certain: this man would be his ruin.

Or his salvation.

Perhaps both.

"Temporary truce," Isandro said finally, his voice like cut glass. "Nothing more."

"Temporary," Kieran agreed with a flash of teeth. "For now."

They shook hands barely. A touch, brief and tense, electric with something neither could name.

And so it began.

The drive back to central Milan was silent.

Isandro sat in the backseat of his armored car, eyes fixed on the blurred glow of city lights as the snow thickened outside. The weight of the meeting settled heavily on his shoulders. Something about Kieran Walsh lodged itself under his skin unwelcome, sharp.

Dangerous, yes. But also something else.

Something he couldn't quite name.

"You think he's telling the truth?" Matteo asked quietly from the passenger seat, as if reading his mind.

Isandro's voice was low. "I think he's too reckless to bother lying."

He didn't add that Kieran's eyes those ice-bright shards of green hadn't flickered once when he spoke. No tremor of falsehood, no sign of fear. It was unsettling. Isandro knew liars. He had built an empire studying the small betrayals of the human face.

Kieran Walsh, somehow, had looked at him not with hatred, not with ambition

but with something that felt far more dangerous: curiosity.

Isandro exhaled sharply. "Keep eyes on him. I want to know every breath he takes."

Matteo nodded.

But no matter how carefully they watched, Isandro knew the truth in his bones:

This wasn't over.

Not by a long shot.

Kieran tossed his bloodied jacket onto the back of a chair as he stepped into his hotel suite. His fingers trembled slightly not from fear, but from the aftershocks of adrenaline. Meeting Isandro Moretti in the flesh had been like stepping into the eye of a hurricane.

The man was cold. Impossibly controlled. Dangerous in the quietest, deadliest way.

And beneath that polished facade, Kieran had seen it just for a second something raw. Something wounded.

He poured himself a whiskey with shaking hands.

"Temporary truce," he murmured to himself, his lips curling into a grim smile.

He knew how this would play out. His father had taught him well. There were only two endings in this world: blood or betrayal. No amount of handshakes would change that.

And yet...

Kieran's mind flashed back, unbidden, to the way Isandro had looked at him. The flicker of heat beneath the ice. The tension that wasn't just hatred it was something twisted, electric.

A laugh slipped from Kieran's throat, soft and breathless.

God help him, he was already looking forward to the next time they'd meet.

Three days later, everything unraveled.

A body was found in the canal one of the Moretti family's lieutenants, tortured, mutilated, throat slit ear to ear. The message was clear: the fragile truce was shattering.

And yet the Walsh family denied involvement. No calls, no warnings. Just a rising body count neither side could explain.

Isandro stood at the crime scene, the icy wind tugging at his coat. The corpse's face was barely recognizable.

"Not their work," Matteo murmured. "Too... theatrical."

Isandro's jaw clenched. He already knew.

Someone else was moving in the shadows. Someone who wanted this war. Who needed it.

And like it or not, he'd need Kieran Walsh to find out who.

He ground his teeth, rage simmering under his skin. The thought of working beside that arrogant Irish bastard set his nerves on fire.

But when his phone buzzed with a single name Kieran Walsh and an address for a second meeting, Isandro didn't hesitate.

He got in the car.

The war had begun.

And he would not lose.