Smashed to death against the ground.
I drove the silver needle into my chest without so much as a flicker of expression. Not a trace of pain crossed my face. Only the fury buried deep in my soul.
Perhaps it was this deathly, silent obedience that finally pricked at something guilty inside Dante. His brow furrowed. His expression softened. He was just about to speak.
Then Lucrezia Moreno appeared, dropping to her knees without preamble, her voice fragile and trembling:
"Don Griffin, this is all my fault. I failed to protect our sister's child."
"I've been plagued by nightmares, unable to sleep. This is the punishment I deserve..."
"I only beg that our sister show mercy and stop cursing this poor child's spirit. Let the little one rest in peace."
A few sentences, and she'd turned every drop of blame onto my sister.
My gaze went cold. Killing intent churned behind my eyes.
Dante, who had been on the verge of relenting, moved to her side almost instantly, pulling her up and gathering her into his arms.
"Lucrezia, why are you kneeling to her again?" His voice was thick with tenderness and edged with anger. "You are the First Lady now. She is nothing."
"She's the one steeped in malice. You have no reason to lower yourself. I will see justice done for you."
He bent down and brushed the dust from her knees, his touch gentle, as if handling something infinitely precious. Three of her fingertips rested against her collarbone the entire time, the portrait of wounded modesty.
Then he raised his head and looked at me.
"Soldiers! The Valente woman has forgotten her place. Hold her down and make her kneel before the First Lady. She will confess and beg forgiveness!"
I watched the two of them perform their little act, and a cold smile curved slowly across my lips.
"You both truly..."
"Deserve to die."
My sister Chiara and I were born as Twin Souls sharing one body. The old families whispered about it like a curse, a bloodline anomaly that hadn't surfaced in three generations. Two souls, one vessel.
Even in the womb, whenever our mother felt the slightest discomfort, Chiara would push me aside and take control.
As children, every time a dark thought stirred in me, she threw herself in the way to stop it.
When I was five, I grew so sick of my father's distant cousin that I spent three consecutive nights creeping toward her with a knife, intent on slitting her throat.
The first night, Chiara threw herself off a wall.
The second night, Chiara jumped into the well.
The third night, Chiara stabbed herself.
Arlena Moreno stared at the knife in my hand and collapsed weeping into my father's arms:
"How has your wife raised this child to be like this?"
My father was beside himself with rage. At Arlena's urging, he summoned a cleaner. An old-family specialist who dealt in things the Syndicate didn't talk about in daylight.
The man declared me a malevolent spirit. He drew up a ritual circle with great ceremony, intending to obliterate my soul entirely.
It was Chiara who shoved me aside, seized control of the body, and wrapped her own soul around mine so that not a shred of harm touched me.
When I was ten, I tried to have Arlena Moreno's daughter sold off. That daughter was none other than the oh-so-delicate First Lady Lucrezia Moreno standing before me now.
That time, even our mother was shaken. Terrified our enraged father would beat us to death, she rushed us to the Old Monastery Estate.
The sacred light there seared me, keeping me from taking control of the body. But Chiara would sneak down the hill to call me out, letting me taste the joys of the world beyond.
It was also at that estate that she met Dante, then still a sickly, overlooked heir the family had hidden away during a succession war.
A sudden fire engulfed the Old Monastery Estate, turning the sky black with smoke and flame. Chiara charged into the inferno and shoved Dante to safety, only to collapse herself, her strength spent, surrounded by fire.
I was pinned down by the sacred light, unable to move an inch. I endured the searing agony in my soul and dragged myself to the threshold.
In the end, it was the cold and ruthless ninth-born son, Romeo Griffin, who pulled me out at the last moment.
Chiara fell in love with the sickly heir. I fell in love with Romeo.
But the two of us could never go on living like that forever. Our parents made a pact with us. Whichever sister's beloved rose to become the Don would be the one to claim the body from that day forward.
Everyone poured everything they had into placing Dante on the throne. The family pulled strings, called in debts, eliminated rivals. Romeo was exiled to the Canadian border to run the family's northern operations, far from the seat of power.
Chiara married the man she loved, just as she'd always wished. I believed she would live happily ever after.
But now?
