Chapter 1 - The Drawer|
The sound of the heavy wooden drawer sliding open echoed through the quiet study like a knife scraping over stone.
Silas didn't look up from the folder lying between us. His hand moved inside the dark space beneath the desk, his knuckles turning white as his fingers brushed against cold steel.
"Say that again," he whispered. His voice had dropped into a terrifying, flat register—the sound of a man who had reached the absolute edge of his sanity.
I stood my ground, clutching my coat over my twenty-four-week belly. Every nerve in my body was screaming at me to step back, but I forced my eyes to stay locked onto his.
"Marry her, Silas," I repeated, each word burning my throat like acid. "Marry Elena Castiglione. Sign the treaty, let me go upstate to the house they chose, and secure our son's future before your own captains tear this tower apart."
Silas slowly pulled his hand out of the drawer. He wasn't holding a gun.
He was holding a heavy silver fountain pen—the one my father had given him five years ago when our marriage sealed the initial alliance between our families.
He slammed the pen onto the mahogany desk so hard the wood groaned beneath the impact.
"You think I fought for ten years in these streets just to trade you for a piece of paper?" Silas spat, rising from his chair. Standing at six-foot-two, his broad frame towered over the desk, his gray eyes flashing with an unhinged, predatory fury. "You think I'm going to let the Castigliones dictate who raises my child?"
"They have twelve captains, Silas!" I shouted, dropping my composure as tears finally broke past my lashes. "Matteo was just here! He told me the docks are completely choked! Your fuel is gone, your drivers are dead, and by dawn, your own security team will unlock the front doors for the hit squads!"
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Silas went entirely still. The fury in his eyes flickered, replaced by a cold, deadly calculation.
"Matteo was here?" Silas asked softly.
