The stench of gasoline seeping through the cracked floorstones decided it for her. "Enzo, step away from him," Fiorella said. Enzo looked up from the field compress pressed against Bastiano’s chest, fingers slick with crimson. "Donna, no. If you walk out there, we lose the pact. He will butcher you." "He won't butcher me yet. He wants an audience." Fiorella wiped her sticky hands on her trousers, leaning down until her cheek brushed Bastiano’s clammy forehead. His skin smelled of copper, gun grease, and the bitter bergamot soap he favored. His lashes fluttered, dark irises swimming in a fever haze, lips trying to shape her name. "You stay alive, you stubborn lunatic. You swore to keep Chiara safe, and you owe me five years of bakery back-pay." Enzo caught her wrist. Before she could jerk away, his palm opened. Pressed against his skin sat a disc the size of a plum pit—black, rubberized, with a microscopic pinprick toggle. "Half an hour," Enzo muttered, looking straight down. "The extraction team is four blocks out. If you buy thirty minutes, we pull him out." "Give me twenty. I'm charming, not a miracle worker." She palmed the plastic bead, slid it into her pocket, and walked toward the iron gates. She kicked the rusted bolt aside with a resounding clang. The night air hit her like a slab of wet meat. Floodlights mounted on three black SUVs blinded her instantly. Engines thrummed, churning exhaust into the damp churchyard. Behind the glare stood twenty men in heavy tactical parkas, submachine guns raised, their barrels tracking her torso. In the center stood Lev Oslavya. He wore a shearling-lined leather coat, his pale face carved with a grin that made the bile rise in her throat. "Well, well," Lev called out, spreading thick, ringed fingers. "The great Don sends his little baker to beg for mercy." Fiorella paused at the top of the stone steps, lifting a hand to shield her brow from the high beams. She let out a sharp, theatrical laugh that echoed off the gargoyles above. "Beg? Please. Have you seen the decor in there? It smells like dry rot and wet socks. Honestly, Lev, thank you for the eviction notice. Though I have to ask—do you always bring three trucks and an entire infantry division just to pick up one woman? It screams insecurity. What, was the tank in the shop?" Lev’s grin twitched. The men around him shifted, their knuckles whitening against their triggers. "You talk too much, little bird." "And you compensate too loudly. The coat is hideous, by the way. Did the sheep die of shame before or after you skinned it?" Lev stepped forward, snatching her by the collar of her jacket. He yanked her down the remaining three steps, tossing her toward the nearest car. "Search her. Strip the jewelry. Put her in the back." Two heavies shoved her against the bumper. Hands patted roughly over her ribcage, her thighs, emptying her pockets of her house keys and a pack of mints. They ignored her footwear entirely. As they pushed her onto the leather rear bench, Fiorella stumbled purposely, dropping to one knee in the footwell. Under cover of the motion, her fingernail clicked the disc’s toggle. A single green pulse blinked once. She jammed the plastic bead hard into the hollow groove beneath the stacked leather heel of her right boot, stomping her foot down until the tracker wedged firm. "Get in, bitch," the guard barked, slamming the door. The convoy tore through the neon-drenched avenues of San Piletto, rocketing upward toward the high-rise district that crowned the northern ridge. Through the tinted glass, the city was a blur of smeared amber and blue. Fiorella dug her nails into her palms until the skin split, holding her teeth together so they wouldn't chatter. *Keep him talking. Give them the window they need.* Not long after, the private lift doors slid back to reveal twenty-foot glass walls overlooking the black void of the bay. Persian carpets lay over polished white concrete. In the middle of the sprawling gallery stood a heavy wooden chair beside a steel brazier, coals already glowing an angry cherry red inside its mesh belly. Lev threw his coat onto a glass table, pouring himself a tumbler of amber liquid. "You think you bought his life, don't you?" "I think you spent half a million euros on ammunition just to get a date with me," Fiorella said, leaning against an ebony sideboard, feigning casual interest in an antique vase. Her stomach was doing backflips against her ribs. "A text message would have been cheaper, Lev." "The Corsini blood pact is voided the second you cross my threshold," Lev said, circling her slowly like an animal measuring its dinner. "The ancestral council only recognizes the bond if the Donna remains untouched and under her husband’s roof. Bastiano dies in that cellar, a disgraced dog stripped of his name. And you... you become a message to every family in the provinces." "Catchy slogan. Needs work, though. Maybe put it on a billboard?" Lev chuckled, a flat, dry noise, then checked his gold wristwatch. "You always make jokes when your world is burning? Let us see how funny you are when your family joins the party." Fiorella froze, her flippant mask cracking down the middle. "What?" Lev picked up a black remote, hitting a button. A mechanical chime echoed through the penthouse foyer. The display above the steel doors showed the car ascending: Floor 42... 43... 44. "Your husband thought Collegio di Solara was secure," Lev purred, stepping into her space, his breath smelling of neat scotch and cigarettes. "He thought my men retreated this afternoon. We didn't retreat, Fiorella. We merely waited until he left with his vanguard. My cleaners walked into the dormitory a short while ago. Little Chiara is on her way up right now." The world shrank to a pinpoint of deafening ringing. Chiara. Not Chiara. "You touch her," Fiorella breathed, every scrap of cheekiness burning away into raw, venomous fury, "and I swear to God, Lev, I will tear your throat out with my teeth." "You won't tear anything," he sneered. *** Deep in the cathedral crypt, the damp air went glacial. Enzo stood back, weapon drawn, as the sound of the Russian trucks faded into the distance. Behind him, on the stone slab, the ragged breathing stopped. Bastiano’s eyes opened. There was no grogginess, no confusion. The fever that had slackened his features had evaporated, leaving behind a terrifying, dead stillness. He stared up at the vaulted ceiling, his fingers brushing the torn fabric over his chest where Fiorella’s bloody handprints stained the white linen. "Don Bastiano," Enzo said cautiously, stepping forward. "The medics are—" "Where is she?" The voice did not sound human. It was low, scraped raw, carrying the finality of an iron gate swinging shut in an empty tomb. "She gave herself up to Lev," Enzo confessed, his own spine locking rigid. "To let us pull you out. She took the tracker, Don. She bought us time." Bastiano rose from the stone altar. The bullet had ripped through his pectoral muscle, grazing the ribs, but he moved as though the wound were merely paint on his skin. He tore the field bandage away with a wet rip, heedless of the fresh blood that welled over his silver locket. He looked down at the necklace, then up at the empty darkness where the crypt doors stood ajar. Something inside Bastiano Corsini snapped, breaking clean off from the world of mortal men. His eyes were totally black, devoid of light, reflecting only a bottomless, demonic hunger. "Bring the heavy armor," Bastiano whispered. "Every soldier. Every blade. No survivors. None." *** Across the polished suite, two guards slammed Fiorella down into the wooden chair, looping heavy nylon straps around her wrists and cinching them tight against the armrests. The arrival bell chimed—*ding*—announcing the car's arrival on the floor. Lev turned toward the glowing brazier. With bare, steady hands, he lifted an iron rod from the coals. The tip was forged in the shape of the double-headed Oslavya crest, glowing a brilliant, translucent orange, shedding sparks into the thick carpet. "Before your sister walks into this room to see what remains of her family," Lev murmured, stepping toward Fiorella, the heat radiating off the metal warping the air between them, "I will make sure everyone knows whose property you are." He raised the iron toward her bare collarbone, inches from her skin, the heat blistering her cheek as the brass doors began to slide open.

The Bride's Bargain