Chapter 5 4. A Beautiful Problem

"𝔥𝔢 𝔱𝔞𝔰𝔱𝔢𝔰 𝔩𝔦𝔨𝔢 𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔯𝔶 𝔡𝔞𝔯𝔨 𝔱𝔥𝔬𝔲𝔤𝔥𝔱 ℑ 𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔯 𝔥𝔞𝔡."

- 𝔲𝔫𝔨𝔫𝔬𝔴𝔫.

[ZEKE]

The crying is starting to piss me off.

Elio's wife hasn't shut up since the bullet tore through her husband's skull. It wasn't even a messy shot-clean, precise, almost surgical. He didn't suffer. I could've made it worse, but I'm not feeling particularly cruel today.

I slide the gun back into my jacket, welcoming it back against my ribs like an old friend. My eyes trail lazily to the body on the floor. Elio's eyes are wide open, lips parted like he still thinks he can talk his way out of this. He can't. Not anymore.

Marco crouches down beside him, clicking his tongue. "Carpet cost too much," he mutters, poking at the blood pooling under Elio's head. "Stupid prick couldn't even bleed somewhere convenient." Milo joins him, and together they carry the body outside.

His wife in the corner is still sobbing-those dry, hiccuping cries that have lost their edge. That first wave of panic has passed. Now it's just grief clawing at what little's left. She's accepted it, whether she knows it or not.

I turn away from her and look at the girl she brought in earlier.

Her.

Vance's daughter.

The irony isn't lost on me. Of all the women in the world... it had to be her. The one person who ever touched me in anger and lived to tell the tale. A humiliating slap years ago-and I let her walk away. I don't even know why. Maybe it was the way her eyes burned like she wasn't afraid of the devil in front of her. Maybe because, back then, I wasn't quite the devil yet.

And now?

Now she looks like her world's been torn apart. Not crying. Not screaming. Just... frozen. Like her brain's still catching up. Like she still thinks this is a nightmare she'll wake up from. Her wrists are raw, her lower lip is split, and her eyes are wide with something between disbelief and horror.

I watch her. Beautiful but broken.

For a second, just a second, I feel it again-that itch of something I thought I buried. A part of me wonders if I should let her go. Because of that night. Because she reached into a part of me no one else ever touched, and didn't flinch.

But I don't do even.

I go too far. Always have. Always will.

She sways on her feet, and I know she's about to drop before she even moves. Then-thud-she hits the ground like a broken doll, limbs limp, pale hair splayed across the floor like a halo twisted out of place.

Marco steps back into the room, sees her collapsed there, and smirks. "She'll get used to it."

I glance at him. "Camilla, was it?"

He nods. "Yeah. Name fits the face?"

Camilla.

No.

Camilla sounds cunning. Calculated. She should be named something softer. Sweeter. Something I can whisper in the dark right before I ruin her.

Doesn't matter what the world calls her.

She's mine now.

My doll.

I tilt my head, smirk tugging at the corner of my mouth as I watch her lie there, unconscious and helpless. All that fire buried beneath fear and broken pride. It'll come back. I'll drag it out of her, piece by piece. And when she screams, it'll be my name in her throat.

"Looks like the wedding will have to wait," I murmur.

But not for long.

I crouch beside Elio's wife, fingers tangling in her hair. She flinches hard, like she expects the barrel of my gun again. She should. Her tears smear across her face, and her breath hitches as I lean in.

"You're still useful," I say, dragging her to her feet. She stumbles, trembling, trying not to meet my eyes. Good. Fear looks better on her than that fake grief she's hoping will save her.

"You'll make sure my bride looks perfect," I tell her, letting go only when I'm sure she won't fall.

Her lip trembles. I lean close, speaking slow enough even her shock-drowned brain can follow.

"If there's as much as a scratch on her when I come back... if she so much as chips a nail while under your watch-" I trail my finger along her jaw, then tap it lightly, right where her temple meets the bone. "The next bullet goes here. No warning. No monologue."

She nods so fast it looks like she's seizing. "Y-yes. Yes, I-"

"Don't speak unless she needs you to," I cut in, straightening. "And don't ever look at me again like you looked at him."

Her mouth clamps shut.

Marco watches from the doorway, arms folded, gaze bored. "Should I call the tailor?"

I glance once again at the unconscious mess on the floor.

"Yeah," I say. "She'll need something white."

Even if it's the last pure thing she ever wears.

***

The ember of my cigarette flares in the dark, a small, glowing defiance against the silence. I stand on the patio outside her room, watching the fountain water splash across the marble and onto my bare feet. It's cold. I don't move. Let the water touch me. Let it try to chill me. Nothing gets through the layers I've built.

This is the only moment I've had to myself all night. And like every other moment I try to claim, it doesn't last.

"Was it necessary?" Dante's voice rasps behind me.

I exhale smoke, watching it curl like a ghost. I don't turn around. I don't need to. I can already see him-his graying hair slicked back, those lines etched deeper across his face. He's aging too fast-this life does that-but there's still steel in his spine. Sixty years old and still a lion in a cage of wolves. Good. I'd hate to bury him too soon.

"Elio was loyal," Dante adds. "Stupid, maybe. But loyal."

I shake my head slowly. "Loyalty means shit when it's misdirected. He would've had me marry a decoy. He was willing to gamble with my legacy. If Marco hadn't found out-"

"He brought the real girl in the end. He brought her to you," Dante cuts in, stepping closer.

I turn my head just enough to look at him. "After I had a gun to his head. After I threatened to cut him into pieces and feed them to my hounds."

Dante stares at me. His silence is more accusing than anything he could say out loud.

I flick ash into the fountain. "You taught me to send a message. I just made sure it echoed."

"You killed him in front of his wife," he says.

I finally face him fully. "And she screamed like a dying dog. You think anyone else in this house will make the same mistake now? No. She'll be the loudest warning I've ever left alive."

"You've gone too far."

"Too far?" I laugh dryly. "There's no such thing in this world. There's only who's still breathing and who isn't. And you're the one who taught me to be merciless, remember?"

He looks at me like he's seeing a monster he helped raise-and maybe he is. But I'm no Frankenstein's creation. I built myself. Bone by bone. Scar by scar.

"What are you getting me for the wedding, old man?" I ask, letting the sarcasm coat my voice.

"This wedding might blow up in your face."

"Then let it. We'll be armed and waiting this time."

I move to the edge of the patio lined by a continuous hedge, watching the ocean beyond. Endless, black, wild. Like the path I chose. Like the man I became.

"Vance would've pledged his loyalty to me no matter who I married-as long as I said it was his daughter. But this..." I tilt my head, feeling amused. "This is his real daughter. The one he hid. The one he protected. The one he didn't want me to find."

I smile to myself.

"That's real power, Dante. Not just forcing a man's hand... but taking what he loves most and making it mine."

He still doesn't respond.

I close my eyes for a second, listening to the crash of the waves, the hiss of the wind, the distant sound of someone sobbing inside.

"She's just a girl," he finally says.

"She's his girl." I tap ash again. "And now she's mine."

"I hope you know what you're doing," Dante mutters before leaving.

I don't respond. I never do when men like him start sounding like fathers. I wasn't made to hope. I was made to take.

I crush the cigarette between my fingers and flick the still-burning filter into the fountain. It sizzles, smoke curling up like a dying breath, then vanishes beneath the water.

Like Elio.

I head back inside, stop by her side and look down.

She's still unconscious, curled on the bed like something tender that's been dropped too many times. A ribbon of hair falls across her cheek, pale gold like sunlight on frost. And her lips...

I stare at them for too long.

Too soft. Too pink. They look like they'd bruise if I kissed them.

Unfortunate, really. That fate handed her to me.

She could've had a life. A boring, useless little life with some small-town boy who bought her flowers and took her to diners and asked her how her day was. Instead, she was born to him. Vance. And worse-she was born beautiful. That's two curses.

And now she's here, in my bed. My prisoner. My bride.

She stirs.

As if on cue, her lashes flutter open. Her body tenses instantly, like prey sensing the predator in the room. When her eyes land on me, she gasps and scrambles back, pressing herself to the headboard like it'll save her.

She trembles.

I smile, and crouch down.

Then I draw my gun.

She sees it and swallows hard, but to her credit, she doesn't cry. Not yet.

"What do you want from me?" she whispers, voice cracking.

I tilt my head, amused. "Are you asking because you think you have a choice?"

She freezes.

"You're not here to want anything," I murmur. "You're here because your blood makes you valuable. Because he kept you hidden. Because fate is cruel enough to hand you to me."

She breathes-barely.

"You remember me," she says suddenly. Quiet. A whisper trying not to die.

My eyes narrow.

She knows.

That one moment years ago-her hand across my face, fire in her eyes. She thought she could touch me and walk away.

And I let her.

I should've broken her back then.

I lean closer. "You don't know what you're talking about."

But I do.

That fire still flickers under her fear. I'll drown it.

"Eat." I nod toward the tray beside the bed. "You'll need your strength."

She doesn't move. Just stares at me with those wide and terrified, pretty blue eyes.

I let her look. Let her feel the weight of me.

Then I turn toward the door, fingers on the knob.

"Our wedding's in four hours," I say without looking back.

The door clicks shut behind me.

She can tremble all she wants. Fight it, fear it, beg for her old life back.

But it's too late.

She belongs to me now.

She just doesn't know what that means yet.