Elena Vitiello POV:
Morning light sliced through the dusty blinds, casting jagged shadows across the scratched wooden floor of the art studio. I sat on a stool in front of my easel, completely motionless.
My fingers were wrapped tightly around a palette knife. The tip of the blade hovered inches from a pristine white canvas. My wrist ached from holding the exact same position for hours, the joints stiff and unyielding.
Painting used to be my escape. It was the only place I didn't have to be the perfect Vitiello daughter or the obedient Moretti fiancée.
I suddenly drove the tip of the knife into a tube of black oil paint. The thick, dark pigment oozed onto the wooden palette, looking exactly like clotted blood.
I raised the knife and slashed it across the canvas. I scraped and smeared the black paint with violent, erratic motions. The metal blade caught on the fabric, tearing the surface with a harsh, grating rip.
In seconds, a massive, suffocating void of black swallowed the white space. It looked exactly how my chest felt—crushed, betrayed, and completely trapped.
The phone resting on the side table erupted into a piercing ringtone. It was the specific, customized alert for the head of the Vitiello family.
My hand jerked. The palette knife slipped from my grasp, clattering onto the floor and smearing thick black paint across the hem of my white shirt.
I took a sharp breath, pulled a paper towel from the roll, and wiped my hands aggressively. I picked up the phone and pressed answer.
The moment the line connected, my father's roar exploded through the speaker. I had to pull the phone a few inches away from my ear to stop the sound from physically hurting me.
He didn't ask how I was. He didn't ask if I was okay after being abandoned at the altar. Instead, he screamed that I was a useless, charm-less failure.
The vicious words hit me like physical punches. I clamped my jaw shut, the muscles along my jawline pulling so tight they began to ache.
"Why couldn't you keep a leash on one man?" he spat, his voice laced with pure disgust. "You have made the Vitiello family the laughingstock of the entire New York underworld!"
"Dante broke the treaty," I said, my voice tight. "He walked out."
"Excuses!" my father snapped, cutting me off completely.
I heard the sharp click of a lighter, followed by the deep inhale of a cigar. When my father spoke again, his voice had dropped an octave. The heat was gone, replaced by a chilling, calculated coldness.
"If the Moretti family tears up the alliance completely, you will serve your final purpose."
He said a name. A sixty-year-old Russian Bratva boss. A man notorious in our world for his sadistic methods. A man who left his women broken and bleeding.
The blood in my veins turned to ice. My stomach dropped out.
"No," I blurted out, my voice shaking with a mixture of pure terror and blinding rage.
My father let out a cruel, dry laugh. "The Vitiello family does not feed useless garbage, Elena."
He didn't give me time to process. "You have thirty days. You will crawl back into Dante's bed, by whatever means necessary, or you will pack your bags for Moscow."
The line went dead. The rhythmic beeping of the disconnected call pounded against my frayed nerves like a countdown clock.
My knees buckled. I slid down the leg of the easel and hit the floor, landing hard in a puddle of black paint. The phone slipped from my fingers.
Panic seized my chest, squeezing my lungs until I was gasping for short, desperate breaths. I pulled my knees to my chest and wrapped my arms around my legs, trying to physically hold my body together to stop the violent shaking.
I stared at the ruined, torn black canvas above me.
A sound clawed its way up my throat. A harsh, broken laugh that echoed off the empty walls of the studio. The laughter tore through my chest, and finally, the tears broke free. They streamed down my face, washing through the dust on my cheeks.
I hated my father for his cold-blooded cruelty. But more than that, I hated myself for being stupid enough to place my life in Dante's hands for five years.
I raised a hand and wiped the tears away. The black paint from my fingers smeared across my cheekbone, looking like war paint.
I forced myself up. My legs wobbled, but I locked my knees and walked to the bathroom. I turned on the cold water and splashed it onto my face repeatedly, the freezing temperature shocking my system. Water soaked the front of my shirt and dripped from my hair.
I grabbed the edges of the sink and leaned forward, staring at my reflection. I looked like a mess, but my eyes were terrifying.
My escape routes were gone. I would rather die than become a plaything for that Russian monster. And I would never, ever beg Dante Moretti.
A reckless, insane thought took root in my brain. If the Vitiellos needed an alliance with the Morettis, Dante wasn't the only man in that family.
"If you are going to sell me to a monster, I will pick the most terrifying one of all."
