Chapter Two: Isabella

The silk stuck to my skin like a lie.

Red—because someone once told me men in power respond to blood-colored things. I didn’t wear it for them. I wore it because it made me feel like I could cut someone without lifting a blade.

The Moretti penthouse was everything I expected: extravagant, cold, and humming with danger just beneath the polished surface. The kind of place where beauty masked brutality. Every smile held a secret, every glance held a weight I couldn’t afford to carry.

I had walked into a den of wolves wearing a lamb’s perfume.

And they believed it.

So far.

I kept my posture relaxed, fingers resting lightly around a glass of sparkling water—because champagne blurred the senses, and I needed all of mine sharpened tonight. Eyes scanned the room with precise calculation, but not too obviously. I couldn’t afford to look like I was watching. Couldn’t afford to look like I belonged, either. My entire game depended on the balance between too much and not enough.

Then I saw him.

Alessandro Moretti.

He wasn’t like the others. Not like the leering men in silk or the whispering women dripping diamonds. No, he stood alone on a high balcony like a statue carved out of shadow. Controlled. Silent. Regal in a way that felt… dangerous.

Every inch of him screamed power. The kind that didn’t need to be spoken out loud. The kind that had already buried men for less than a mistake.

He didn’t watch the party.

He watched the city like it was a chessboard.

I’d seen pictures of him, of course. Knew his file by heart. Oldest of six. Next in line. Cold as marble, smart as hell. Known to take care of problems with the precision of a surgeon and the soul of a ghost.

But pictures didn’t prepare you for presence.

He moved like a man who didn’t need to look over his shoulder because no one would dare approach it. He exhaled smoke like a promise. And when he finally stepped inside the room again, I felt the air tighten around my throat.

It was too early for him to notice me. I hadn’t made my move yet.

But he had seen me.

Worse—he had marked me.

I turned away before our eyes could lock again, pretending to listen to the man next to me, a slick-talking investor who thought I was someone’s cousin from Florence. I nodded when I had to, smiled when it felt appropriate, and gave just enough to keep suspicion away.

Inside, my heart beat like thunder.

I had prepared for this night for months. Every detail of my identity was crafted, forged, and polished. The dress. The accent. The false job history. The carefully placed connection that got me on the guest list.

But nothing prepared me for the moment he looked at me like he already knew I didn’t belong.

This was not part of the plan.

I was supposed to get in, stay quiet, and gather information. Not draw the eye of the most dangerous man in Milan.

And yet, when his footsteps crossed the marble, getting closer, something in me refused to run.

I wanted to meet him.

No. Needed to.

Because beneath the mission, beneath the lies and revenge and the weight of everything I came here to do… there was something else.

Curiosity. Heat. Something dark.

And that terrified me more than anything else in the room.

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