The city was too bright, too alive, for Aria to ever feel entirely safe within it. She had begged Lorenzo to let her out of the mansion, to have one day that wasn't spent behind gilded bars, and to her surprise, he had agreed. Or rather, he had commanded. Because that was what it always felt like with him—every concession laced with control, every allowance shadowed by watchful eyes. And so she found herself walking through the narrow cobbled streets lined with boutiques and glittering windows, a pair of guards trailing behind them at a careful distance, Lorenzo himself beside her, a dark silhouette in a world of color. He didn't belong here, she thought. His presence was too sharp, too dangerous, as though the city bent around him, unwilling to touch him with its ordinary joys. And yet, she couldn't deny the quiet comfort that his nearness gave her, no matter how much she resented it.
The boutique they entered was elegant but quiet, designed for privacy. Rows of dresses shimmered under soft lights, perfumes lingered in the air, and the shop girls lowered their voices to whispers at the sight of Lorenzo De Luca himself. Aria tried to lose herself in the illusion of normalcy, running her hands over silks and velvets, pretending for a moment that she was only a woman shopping for gowns and not the unwilling wife of a mafia prince. She chose a few dresses, slipped into the fitting room, and for a handful of breaths, she almost felt human again.
But even inside that fragile bubble, unease gnawed at her. The memory of the note in her jewelry box haunted her every step. You're next. The words had carved themselves into her, so that even now, as she looked at her reflection in a gown of midnight blue, she couldn't help but scan the shadows in the corners of the shop. She stepped out into the open again, smoothing the fabric down her sides, and caught Lorenzo's eyes from across the room. He stood near the counter, tall and still, watching her with that unreadable intensity that never seemed to waver. For a moment, the world around them blurred, the air between them charged.
And then it shattered.
The first crack of glass came so suddenly she thought she had imagined it—a display window spiderwebbing before it exploded inward, showering the room with shards. Screams ripped through the boutique as chaos erupted. Men burst inside, masked, weapons raised, shouting words Aria couldn't even process through the pounding in her head. All she knew was that the world turned red, her body froze, and death was suddenly very close.
The shot came fast, aimed straight for her.
She didn't have time to move. Didn't even have time to scream.
But Lorenzo did.
One second he was across the room, the next he was slamming into her, shoving her back behind the nearest pillar as the bullet ripped past where her head had been. The force of his body against hers knocked the air from her lungs, her back hitting the wall as he pressed her down, his arm a steel bar across her chest. His other hand already drew his weapon with the precision of instinct, firing back at the intruders with cold, unerring accuracy.
"Stay down!" he growled, his breath hot against her ear, the command brooking no argument.
Aria's heart thundered, her body shaking as screams and gunfire filled the air. She crouched low, her hands trembling, but her eyes couldn't leave him. Lorenzo moved like fire unleashed, his face carved in fury, his body a weapon honed by years of violence. She watched him kill for her, watched the way he tore through the men who dared aim at her as though nothing else existed but his need to protect.
One of the masked attackers broke through the chaos, lunging toward her with a knife glinting in his hand. Aria gasped, scrambling back, but Lorenzo was faster. His arm shot out, catching the man by the throat, slamming him into the wall with such force the shelves rattled. The knife clattered uselessly to the ground before Lorenzo's gun ended him in a deafening crack. Blood sprayed across the marble floor, the body crumpling at his feet.
Aria's vision blurred, her stomach twisting violently, but she couldn't tear her eyes away. This was the world she had been forced into: a world where her survival meant his hands were stained red, where her breath came at the cost of another man's life. And yet—yet—what she felt in that moment wasn't just terror. It was something darker, sharper, more dangerous.
When the last of the attackers fell and silence settled in the ruined boutique, Lorenzo turned back to her. His chest heaved, sweat dampened his brow, but his eyes—those eyes burned with something that made her knees weak. He reached for her, his hands gripping her shoulders, dragging her close as though to make sure she was still real, still breathing.
"You're alive," he said, his voice rough, breaking on the edge of something he didn't want her to hear. "You're alive because of me."
Aria's breath came fast, her body trembling as she stared up at him. She wanted to push him away, to scream that she hadn't asked for this, hadn't asked for him to kill, hadn't asked for his protection. And yet, as his thumb brushed unconsciously against her collarbone, steadying her, she couldn't. Because beneath all the fury and violence, beneath the terror that still coursed through her, something softer had cracked open. He had saved her life. He had put himself between her and death without a second thought.
The distance between them disappeared, his forehead resting briefly against hers, the heat of his breath mingling with hers. For a heartbeat, the world outside didn't exist—the shattered glass, the blood, the guns. There was only the thrum of his pulse against her, the fire in his gaze, the way his grip trembled as if he were holding back everything he couldn't say.
And then his voice came again, low, dangerous, intimate enough to sear itself into her bones.
"If you die," he whispered, "I die too."