Claire POV
Elena strutted into the Syndicate's training compound the next morning, a retinue of loyal Soldiers at her heels. Her laughter, sharp and triumphant, ricocheted off the bare concrete walls.
I leaned against the dented metal lockers, my stomach still churning with a chemical fire. Every breath felt like an inhalation of powdered glass.
"I won the bet," Elena announced, her voice pitched to carry to the far side of the gym.
The Soldiers chuckled, their eyes darting toward me with an open, insolent curiosity.
She turned to face me, a vicious gleam in her eyes. "Luca put something in your food last night. I told him you were too witless and trusting to notice. I told him you would eat from his hand like a stray."
As if summoned, Luca walked through the double doors. He wore black tactical gear, his sheer physical presence immediately commanding the room. The men straightened, their deference instinctual.
He stopped beside Elena. He did not grant me so much as a glance.
"She would swallow poison if I called it sugar," Luca sneered, his voice edged with contempt.
Disbelief buckled the last fragile support of my composure. A fresh spasm, sharper this time, twisted through my stomach. Cold sweat drenched my workout clothes.
The sharp blast of a whistle from one of the Capos cut the tension. The crucial endurance and medical assessment for the Syndicate was now underway.
I forced myself onto the track. My legs felt like lead weights. The toxin was still ravaging my system, each jarring step sending a fresh wave of nausea through my gut.
I had to rush to the restroom. Once. Twice. Ten times.
Every time I broke from the track, the Capos pointed and laughed. They called me weak. They mocked my lack of stamina, their cruel jokes echoing in the cavernous gym like the calls of carrion birds.
After dozens of trips to the bathroom, I was dehydrated to the point of collapse. My vision tunneled, the periphery dissolving into a dark, shimmering haze. The fluorescent lights overhead flickered and spun.
I stumbled out of the restroom and collapsed onto the cold tiles of the dimly lit corridor, my body having no more to give.
Footsteps approached. Slow, deliberate, heavy.
Luca leaned against the doorframe. He looked down at me, his expression a detached study in contempt.
"A little discomfort and you fall to pieces?" he mocked. "You aspire to be a Syndicate doctor, yet you cannot endure a minor stomach ailment. Pathetic."
I closed my eyes, and the darkness claimed me.
I woke in a sterile white room. The acrid smell of antiseptic stung my nose. I knew it at once—the mafia's private clinic.
A nurse adjusted my IV drip. She looked at me with a pity she did not try to hide.
"Your stomach ulcer has perforated," she informed me quietly. "A senior Family doctor brought you in. He covered the medical fees himself, off the books."
It was not Luca. It was the Consigliere's physician.
The image of the boy I grew up with dissolved, leaving only the hollow silhouette of a stranger.
I reached for my phone on the bedside table and opened the encrypted Family network.
The first post on the feed was from Elena. It was a photo of her hand intertwined with a man's.
I recognized the distinct, sprawling mafia tattoo on the back of that hand. Luca.
The caption read: Claiming my Don.
A cold pressure built behind my sternum, more acute than any chemical burn. I opened my contacts and tapped his name. The call dropped immediately. I tried the secure messaging channel.
Message failed to send.
He had severed every line of communication between us.
Without warning, my phone vibrated in my palm. It was the housekeeper from the Rossi estate. Her voice was frantic, breathless.
"Miss Claire, you must come home. Your father has brought his mistress here."
I ripped the IV from my arm, ignoring the sharp sting. Blood welled up, dripping onto the starched white sheets. I ignored the nurse's shouts and ran from the clinic.
I rushed through the heavy iron gates of the Rossi estate. The front doors stood agape, as if to welcome a conquering army.
I found them in the grand parlor. Elena and her mother, Rosa, were sitting on the expensive velvet sofas, as if they were born to them. Rosa was sipping tea from my mother's favorite porcelain cup, a casual act of desecration.
My father, Capo Vincenzo Rossi, stood by the fireplace. He looked at me with the cold indifference of a stranger.
"Claire, this is Rosa," he said, his voice flat. "They will be living here now. If you dare defy me or cause a scene, I will sever the black-market funding that keeps your mother breathing in that hospital."
I stared at him. The man who was the author of my life was threatening to murder my mother to appease his paramour.
Elena stood. She stepped close, her perfume cloyingly sweet. She wore a provocative smirk.
"I am five months your senior," she whispered, her voice for my ears alone. "You were the mistake, Claire. I will strip you of everything. Your status. Your dying mother. And Luca."
A wire, stretched taut for years within my mind, finally gave way.
I raised my hand and delivered a slap across her face that echoed in the high-ceilinged room.
Elena shrieked. She lunged, her nails digging into my shoulders like claws.
A brutal scuffle ensued. We crashed into a pedestal. A priceless Ming vase tipped and shattered. Shards of porcelain and droplets of blood scattered across the pristine marble floor.
Heavy footsteps thundered into the room.
Luca stormed in. He reached us in two strides, yanking me away by my hair with a vicious tug. He tossed me aside like a bundle of rags.
My back slammed against the wall. The breath rushed from my lungs.
Luca dropped to his knees, cradling Elena against his chest. He checked her face for injury, his touch a study in gentle concern.
He turned his head to look at me. His eyes were as cold and flat as a frozen lake.
"Have you lost your mind?" he roared, his voice rattling the crystal chandelier. "You attack your own sister out of a fit of jealousy?"
Vincenzo and Rosa rushed over, fussing over Elena, checking her arms, smoothing her hair.
I sat on the floor among the broken porcelain. My hands were bleeding. My head throbbed.
No one spared me a glance.
I looked at the four of them. A grotesque portrait of a family made whole by my exclusion.
A sound bubbled up in my throat. I laughed. It was a hollow, broken sound that quickly dissolved into a silent flood of tears that burned my cheeks.
I pulled my phone from my pocket with shaking, bloody fingers. I dialed the number I had saved months ago. It was a mentor of Professor Silas Vance, a renowned underground surgeon.
He answered on the first ring.
"I accept the offer to leave the country for your medical training," I said, my voice dead and flat. "But I have conditions—and you are not going to like them."
