The machines keeping my grandfather alive beeped steadily, a relentless rhythm anchoring me to the reality I had been dragged back into, no matter how violently my insides rebelled against it. My hands curled into fists at my sides, caught between the urge to rip the tubes from his body and the discipline to remain still.
I hated him. For what he had done to me. To my family. To his own blood.
But I hated him most for what he had stolen from my future. The life I could've had with Alex.
He should've left me alone. Instead, he had violently torn me out of the world I had built for myself, taking my child with it. I wondered if he had known. Of course he had. The doctors would have told him. Or they wouldn't have been so tight-lipped about it.
I had been so naïve. Stupid. Reckless. I shouldn't have slipped into that life so easily. Shouldn't have let Alex get too close, too fast. I had believed faking my own death would be enough to escape this world.
It never is.
It was true what they say. That the evil ones live the longest, not because they are meant to enjoy it, but because they carry too many sins to answer for.
And my grandfather was the proof of that.
"Signorina Ricci," one of the guards' voice cutting through the steady beeping of the machines, knocking lightly on my grandfather's door.
I turned. "What is it, Sandro?"
He was Joshua's replacement. Joshua, who had died in his cell after the infection set in. His wounds from the torture left to fester until they finished the job for us. I hadn't seen him since he was dragged away. Hadn't even gone looking for his unmarked grave either. I couldn't. His betrayal still burned, even after all these years.
"They're ready for you," Sandro said in Italian.
He stood straight in his dark suit, an earpiece snug against his ear. His dark brown hair was cropped short, his expression carefully neutral. Professional. Nothing like my best friend.
"Good," I said, my voice steady. "Lead the way."
Sandro inclined his head, then turned on his heel, setting a brisk pace down the corridor. I followed without hesitation.
The estate was already awake. Voice murmuring behind closed doors, footsteps echoing against marble floors. Sunlight filtering through the tall arched windows on one side, catching on the gold trimmings and the oil paintings of my family. Ancestors who had built this empire with blood and believed it to be eternal.
I had passed through these halls for the most of my life, and yet, this morning, it felt more narrower. More purposeful. Watchful.
We passed the inner courtyard, guards rotating their shifts with mechanical precision, then cut through the side wing reserved for indoor training and operations. The air changed as we descended. It was cooler, sharper, tinged with oil, gunpowder and sweat.
The doors to the indoor training grounds stood open.
I stepped inside just as a body hit one of the sparring mats with a dull thud, followed by a chorus of grunts and labored breaths. Recruits filling the space, rotating through the drills under barked commands. Every muscle was taut, every gaze razor-focused. Fresh blood. All of them.
And there, standing just off to the side, separate from the chaos, was Sergio.
He wore black like the others, sleeves rolled to his forearms, his posture loose in a way that only came from experience earned the hard way. He wasn't fighting. He was watching. Standing among the new recruits but unmistakably apart from them, his eyes tracking their every movement on the mat, measuring weaknesses, noting their potential, weighing threats.
When his dark gaze lifted and locked onto mine, something shifted.
Recognition, sharp and immediate, passed between us.
Sandro nodded once to the man running the drills, soon as he noticed our presence. The effect was instant. The man's spine snapped straight as he turned.
"Hold," he barked.
The command cut through the room.
Movements stalled mid-strike. A punch halted inches from impact. Bodies peeled apart, recruits stepping back from the mat, sweat-slick and breathing hard, forming a loose perimeter. The space cleared out, not out of courtesy, but instinct.
"Thank you, Sandro," I murmured as I stepped forward.
My footsteps were measured, unhurried. Deliberate.
"I'll be taking over the training for today," I said calmly, my voice carrying without effort. "Until further notice."
A murmur rippled through the group, which was quickly silenced when the man running the drills nodded and stepped aside without protest. He was one of my grandfather's guards, one of the younger ones who looked somewhere about my age.
Camilla's absence hung unspoken in the air. Everyone felt it. But I chose to continue as if it were any other ordinary training day.
I let my gaze sweep over them. Still young. Dangerous in a way untested weapons always were.
"Drills teach technique," I continued. "They teach muscle memory. Control." I paused, letting that sink in. "But real fights don't follow rules, which I'm sure most of you know. They don't wait for form or structure, and they certainly don't care how well you perform in here."
I stepped closer to the mat, taking out the boxing tape in my pocket and wrapping it around both my wrists. Something tells me today's lesson was going to be bloody.
"When things go wrong, and they will, you use whatever arsenal you have. Your environment. Your opponent's mistake. Their hesitation. Their ego. Anything." A beat. "In this case, I'm going to teach you about the latter."
My eyes flicked, deliberately, to the side.
"Sergio."
He didn't hesitate.
He stepped forward without hesitation, boots thudding against the mat as the recruits subtly shifted, attention snapping fully into place.
"Take off your boots," I said, holding his gaze. "We're doing this barefoot."
I didn't know his full background, or where his training truly came from. But if he was one of Alex's spies, then I knew that he was better trained than every recruits here watching us. He wasn't even that good at hiding it, if I were to be honest.
The air tightened as he bent, untying his laces with unhurried precision. He set the boots neatly to the side, as if this were routine. As if he had done this a hundred times before.
I gestured toward the center of the mat.
He moved at once. His face gave nothing away, eyes empty of emotion, but the tension betrayed him. Veins stood out along his forearms, muscle coiled tight.
Alex was going to punish him for hurting me. Even when I made him do it. But frankly, I didn't fucking care.
I circled him slowly, letting the recruits feel the stretch of silence.
"You may begin," I said aloud, voice calm, measured. "Attack me."
He moved without hesitation.
Fast, but not fast enough.
I caught his wrist in a lock, twisting his arm behind his back just enough to hurt and leaned in as if correcting his stance.
"Where is Camilla?" I whispered.
His body went rigid.
He didn't answer.
I slammed him down onto mat.
The sound echoed. A collective intake of breath followed.
"This," I said, voice calm, almost instructional, "is where most of you fail."
A few recruits straightened instinctively.
He rolled, pushing himself back up, jaw clenched, eyes unreadable. He came at me again, harder this time but still restrained.
"You're taught to read posture. Balance. Footwork." I blocked his strike and redirected it with minimal effort. "Those matter. But they're not what ends a fight."
I turned, addressing them fully as he recalibrated behind me.
"Your watch the eyes. The breath. The moment their rhythm changes." I glanced back at Sergio, finally meeting the fucker's gaze. "Because everyone reacts when you touch the right nerve."
I moved before he could reset. The strike was brutal and precise. He hit the mat hard, the sound dull and final, a grunt tearing from his chest as the air left him. This time, he didn't roll fast enough. My knee pressed into his chest, pinning him there as I lowered my voice again, colder.
"Ask yourself how many times I'm willing to repeat the question, until I have my answer."
Silence.
Then, quietly, through clenched teeth, he bit out with his Russian accent, "You already know where my loyalties lie."
That did it.
Rage snapped tight and clean inside me.
I rose, seized him by the front of his shirt, and hauled him up only to slam him back down with enough force to make the mat shudder. He hit hard, a sharp grunt tearing from his chest as the air left him.
Instead of getting up and fighting back, he stayed down. Not because he couldn't. But because he knew he wasn't allowed to fight back.
"Your opponent will tell you everything," I finished coolly. "You just have to know where to look."
I stood over him, chest rising and falling, my fists clenched at my sides.
"Loyalty doesn't mean shit," I said flatly.
Then I turned to the recruits. My voice was steady again, controlled, impersonal.
"Training's over."