Chapter 1

Seraphina POV

The winter storm had turned the Moretti estate in the Hamptons into a frozen fortress. I walked down the cavernous marble hallway, the cold, abstract art on the walls mocking my isolation. My footsteps were silent, a habit ingrained in me since childhood, which was why the two Associates standing near the corner didn't hear me approaching.

"The Boss put her in the best suite in the East Wing," one muttered, his voice echoing faintly. "Linette Vance. She's the one who should be our Mafia Queen."

"Yeah," the other scoffed. "Instead, we're stuck with the Marino girl. The traitor's daughter is nothing but a ghost Julian keeps around to satisfy his sick possessiveness."

My blood ran cold, freezing faster than the ice on the windows. My father, Don Antonio Marino, was no rat. He died for his honor. But in this gilded cage, truth didn't matter. What mattered was the sickening realization that I was the last person in this house to know Julian had brought his childhood sweetheart-the former SEC Chairman's daughter-to live under the same roof.

I didn't retreat. I turned the corner and walked straight to the heavy mahogany doors of Julian's home office, pushing them open without knocking.

Julian sat behind his massive desk, the raging, gray Atlantic Ocean framed by the floor-to-ceiling windows behind him. His expensive Loro Piana cashmere coat was draped casually over a leather chair. He looked up, his dark eyes unreadable.

"How are you going to arrange Linette Vance?" I demanded, my voice cutting through the heavy silence of the room.

Julian didn't even blink. The polite, financial-elite mask he wore for the world vanished, replaced by the ruthless man who owned my life. "She will be staying here. Forever," he stated, his tone leaving no room for debate. "She needs a safe haven." He paused, his gaze pinning me down like a butterfly on a board. "This does not change your status as my property."

"I disagree," I said, my voice trembling but defiant.

For a fraction of a second, surprise flickered in his eyes. It was quickly swallowed by a cruel, absolute calm. "The Moretti family has no rules against hosting guests. You should learn to be grateful, Seraphina."

Grateful. I swallowed the bitter taste of ash in my mouth and turned away, leaving the office without another word. He didn't save me from the massacre of my family out of mercy. He wanted a broken trophy.

What Julian didn't know was that I had figured out his secret months ago. The constant lethargy, the heavy limbs, the mental fog-it wasn't trauma. It was the systematic micro-dosing of sedatives in my meals. He was trying to drug the Mafia Princess out of me, to erase the girl who was trained to survive. But I had been quietly resisting, eating only what I had to, fighting the chemical chains he placed on my mind.

I stepped out into the freezing courtyard, heading toward the secluded side house where I was practically kept under house arrest. The biting wind whipped my hair across my face. I closed my eyes, remembering the weight of a weapon in my hands. I used to be able to strip a Colt M1911 faster than any of my father's Soldiers. I could drop two grown men in close-quarters combat.

The last Marino. That's what they called me. The only one left.

Now, thanks to Julian's poison, just forcing my numb fingers into fists felt like moving mountains.

Footsteps crunched softly in the fresh snow.

I opened my eyes. Walking toward me was a vision in a pristine white cashmere coat. Linette Vance. She looked like an angel untouched by the brutal, blood-soaked world of our kind.

She stopped right in front of me, her maids hovering anxiously behind her. Her eyes swept over my pale, exhausted face. A sickeningly sweet, deeply pitying smile curved her flawless lips.

"Sister," she breathed, her voice like spun sugar.

I had never met her before, but the sheer condescension radiating from her delicate frame told me everything I needed to know about the woman standing in my path.