Dante POV
The truth is a bullet. You don't hear it until it tears through you.
It was 3:00 AM. I was wandering the halls, a ghost in my own life. I ended up in the library.
My Consigliere, Leo, was waiting for me. He looked pale. He was holding a manila envelope.
"Boss," Leo said. "We need to talk."
"Not now, Leo. Unless you found Volkov."
"It's not Volkov. It's... it's a package. It was left at the gate. Anonymous."
He handed it to me.
There was no return address. Just a small, black USB drive inside.
I walked to my laptop and plugged it in.
A single audio file popped up.
I clicked play.
The sound of static filled the room. Then, a voice. A voice I knew.
"He's still obsessed with her, Nikolai. It's pathetic."
It was Sofia.
"Patience, little bird," Volkov's voice answered. "We stick to the plan. You get the Reaper to the docks. I take the Queen off the board. Then the grieving husband is all yours."
My blood turned to ice.
"Make sure she dies," Sofia said. Her voice was cold, calculating-stripped of the innocence she wore like a costume. "I don't want her wounded. I want her dead. She treats me like dirt. She thinks she owns him."
"Consider it done," Volkov said. "Just like with your brother."
I froze. My hand hovered over the laptop.
"Luca was necessary," Sofia said. "He was going to cut me off. He found out about the gambling debts. He was going to tell Dante. I had to give you his location."
The recording ended.
The silence that followed was heavier than the ocean that took my wife.
I stared at the screen.
Sofia.
Sofia, the innocent ward. Sofia, the fragile flower I burned down a city block to protect. Sofia, the reason I waterboarded my wife.
She sold Luca. She killed my best friend.
And then she colluded with the enemy to kill Elena.
I stood up. The chair toppled over behind me with a crash.
A sound tore out of me-a low, guttural growl that didn't sound human.
I walked to the window and looked out at the garden. I saw the guest house where Sofia was sleeping.
I remembered Elena's face in the dungeon. The water dripping from her hair.
I hate you, she had said.
She knew. She knew what Sofia was. She tried to warn me. She held a knife to Sofia's throat because she saw the monster beneath the skin.
And I shot her for it.
I tortured her for it.
And then I let her die for it.
"Leo," I said. My voice was dead calm.
"Yes, Boss."
"Wake the guards. Bring her to the cellar."
"Sofia?"
"No," I said, turning from the window. My eyes felt like they were burning in their sockets. "Not Sofia. Bring the rat."
I walked toward the door. I wasn't going to kill her. Death was too easy. Death was a mercy.
I was going to make her wish she had died in that ambush with her brother.
But as I walked down the hall, the rage was eclipsed by a crushing, suffocating weight.
I had sacrificed my Queen for a traitor.
I had broken my vows, my honor, and my heart for a lie.
And now, it was too late.
