Chapter 5

Aria Sterling POV

The dress was red. Not just red-it was the color of a fresh wound.

It had arrived in a sleek black box on my bed with a handwritten note from Dante: Wear this. Tonight, we go to war.

The "war" in question was the annual Vitiello Gala, a black-tie masquerade of power where the city's elite rubbed shoulders with the underworld's royalty.

I walked into the ballroom with my hand tucked into the crook of Dante's arm. The room was a vast, undulating sea of black tuxedos and glittering gowns. Crystal chandeliers cast fractured light over the crowd, and the air smelled of expensive perfume, old money, and hypocrisy.

Dante was tense. His arm was a coiled spring beneath my hand, hard and unyielding. He scanned the room with predatory precision, offering curt nods to judges and politicians, but his eyes remained glacial.

Then, the atmosphere shifted. The ambient chatter didn't just fade; it was severed.

The crowd parted near the grand entrance like the Red Sea. A woman walked in.

She wasn't just stunning; she was weaponized elegance. Tall, with raven hair cascading down her back and curves that looked lethal. She wore gold, shimmering like a deity who had descended to judge the mortals. She walked with the terrifying confidence of someone who didn't just own the floor, but the very ground the building stood on.

Beside me, Dante went rigid.

"Who is that?" I asked, my voice barely a whisper.

"Sofia Moretti," he said, the name grinding through his clenched teeth. "The daughter of the Chicago Outfit."

The woman spotted us immediately. A smile curled on her crimson lips-a sharp, surgical expression that didn't reach her eyes. She adjusted her path, cutting straight through the crowd toward us.

"Dante," she purred. Her voice carried a slight, smoky Italian accent. She looked through me as if I were made of glass.

"Sofia," Dante acknowledged, his tone flat. "I thought you were in Milan."

"I came back early." She placed a manicured hand on his chest, claiming the space right over his heart. "I heard rumors. I had to see for myself."

Finally, she turned her gaze to me. Her dark eyes raked over my red dress, my simple jewelry, and my face. She looked at me not with curiosity, but with the clinical disdain one reserves for a stain on a Persian rug.

"And who is this?" she asked, arching a sculpted brow. "The help?"

"This is Aria," Dante said, stepping slightly in front of me, shielding me from her glare. "My biographer."

"Biographer?" Sofia laughed. It was a cruel, brittle sound, like champagne flutes shattering. "Is that the polite term we are using now? In Chicago, we have a far more... archaic word for women who cling to powerful men."

I gasped, the air leaving my lungs.

Dante's hand tightened on my waist, his fingers digging into the silk. "Careful, Sofia."

"Don't be sensitive, Dante," she dismissed, leaning in close. She lowered her voice to a stage whisper, ensuring I caught every syllable. "You know the arrangement. The Vitiellos and the Morettis. You and me. That is the endgame. That has always been the endgame. Do not let a little stray dog ruin the alliance."

She flicked her gaze back to me, her eyes narrowing.

"Enjoy the party, little girl," she said. "Try not to spill anything."

With that, she turned and walked away, leaving a trail of heavy, cloying scent in her wake.

I felt sick, my stomach twisting into a knot. I looked up at Dante.

"Arrangement?" I asked, my voice trembling.

He wouldn't look at me. He was watching Sofia move through the crowd, his jaw clenched so hard a muscle feathered violently in his cheek. He looked like a man holding back a scream.

"It is just business, Aria," he said finally.

Just business. The words cut deeper than Sofia's insults ever could.

I pulled my arm away from his as if I'd been burned.

"I need air," I choked out.

I turned and walked blindly toward the balcony, fighting the hot tears that stung my eyes. I wasn't his biographer. I wasn't his mistress. I was a pawn in a game I didn't understand, a placeholder until the real queen arrived.

But as I stepped out into the biting cold of the night air, the silence of the terrace wrapping around me, I realized something else. Sofia Moretti hadn't just looked at me with disdain. She had looked at me with hatred. Pure, unadulterated, venomous hatred.

She didn't see a pawn. She saw a threat.

And that terrified me more than anything else. Because if the Mafia Princess saw me as a threat, it meant Dante Vitiello was looking at me with something more than just possession.

The heavy glass door to the balcony opened behind me. I didn't turn around.

"Go back inside, Dante," I said to the city skyline. "Your fiancée is waiting."

"I don't take orders, Aria," he said. His voice was right behind my ear, low and vibrating with suppressed rage. "And I don't want the fiancée."

I felt the solid wall of his chest press against my back. His hands slammed onto the railing on either side of me, trapping me in a cage of his own making.

"Then what do you want?" I whispered to the glittering city lights below.

He buried his face in the curve of my neck, inhaling sharply. I felt his lips brush my skin, hot branding iron against the cold, sending a violent shiver through my entire body.

"I want to burn the goddamn contract to ash," he growled against my pulse. "And I want to keep the writer."