Chapter 8 

Later, in the main hall, Rupert was holding court. Laughing. Sipping his drink like he hadn’t sold his soul for power and perfume. And then his eyes landed on me. 

didn’t look away. 

He stared like he was trying to place me. Something about me tugging at the edge of memory. Maybe it was the way I stood. Maybe the way my chin lifted when I didn’t smile. 

But I held that gaze. Didn’t blink. Didn’t move. 

Just let the recognition simmer-not enough to boil. Just enough to itch. Then I smirked. 

And I turned and walked away. 

The last stop of the night was Marian’s dressing room. She wasn’t there yet. 

Soft lighting. Perfume still hanging in the air. Mirror framed in rose gold and vanity lights. 

pulled the black rose from my clutch. Velvet petals. No thorns. 

Deliberate. 

placed it on her vanity, right beside her lipstick. 

A small card beneath it read: 

For the Queen of Ashes.” 

.et her chew on that. 

Back in the car, Lothario was pacing before I even got in. 

What the hell was that?” he snapped, slamming the door shut behind me. 

pulled off the wig slowly. My scalp prickled. “I did what I came to do.” 

You brushed past your father. Rupert saw your eyes. Marian’s gonna lose her damn mind wher 

he sees that rose.” 

Good,” I said. Calm. Measured. 

He ran his hands through his hair like he wanted to scream. “You’re playing too close to the fire /anna.” 

turned to him and smiled, voice low, steady. 

‘Good. Let them smell the smoke.” 

He stopped moving. “This isn’t a game, Vanna.” 

‘I’m not playing.” 

Sam was sitting nearby, feet on the desk, typing something into a secondary server. He glanced at me, smirking. 

“She’s dangerous now,” he muttered, more to Lothario than to me. “You’re just scared because you’re in love with her. That, or you think she’s gonna vanish again and leave you with nothing but ashes.” 

Lothario didn’t answer. 

12:04 am PPPP. 

didn’t either. 

Because they were both right. 

had ashes. But I was building a blaze out of them. And next? Next I’d start peeling the empire, ayer by filthy layer. 

:** 

didn’t want to kill them. Not yet. Death was too merciful. So I chose something worse- embarrassment. Humiliation. Ruin. 

There was a wine shipment heading for a private tasting in Verona. Expensive bottles from a ‘ineyard Rupert’s crew laundered money through. The guest list? All high-tier allies of the Fiore amily. Men who shook hands with devils and smiled through blood. 

othario tried to talk me out of it. “It’s reckless,” he warned. “You spike one shipment and they’l tart tightening their circle.” 

That’s exactly what I want,” I told him. “Let them get paranoid. Let them start looking over thei houlders.” 

am helped me synthesize a little cocktail. Not fatal. Not even permanent. Just… unpleasant. A low-reacting gut disruptor, tailored to mimic food poisoning. The kind that hits ten hours later ke a curse, makes people question what they drank-or who served it. 

slipped it in at the bottling warehouse, disguised as a new hire from logistics. They had no 

dea. 

wo days later, the headlines started rolling in. 

Wine Tasting Scandal at Verona Estate-Over Twenty Guests Hospitalized.” 

Sabotage Rumored: Alliance Cracks Between Fiore and Rossi?” 

Is There a Mole Inside the Circle?” 

read every single article with my morning coffee and a quiet, satisfied smile. 

Chris? He spiraled. 

He fired half his staff. Called emergency meetings. Blamed the Vitellis, then the De Lucas, then even Rupert himself. 

Paranoia looked good on him. 

Sam handed me a news clipping with Chris’s photo on it, circled in red. “Your little prank turned nim into a lunatic.” 

just stared at the picture. At the tight set of his jaw, the wild in his eyes. That wasn’t the brother 

I used to know. 

Flashback hit me like ice water. 

We were young and free, running barefoot through Nonna’s vineyard, chasing each other with stolen cannoli, Chris had this ridiculous laugh-high-pitched and unfiltered. He used to grab my hand when I was too scared to jump fences. Used to cover for me when I’d sneak into the library at night. 

He was my best friend once. The only one who never judged me when I cried. The boy who held 

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me during thunder and pinky-promised me forever. 

I blinked the memory away and looked down at the photo again. 

Now? Now he’s the man who kicked my hospital bed across the room like I was garbage. The one who helped stage my public death so he could move on without shame. 

He’s no brother. 

He’s just another player on the board. 

Another piece I’ll knock down. Eventually. 

I whispered to myself, “He was my brother once. Now he’s just a target I’ll leave for last.” 

And I meant it. Not because he wasn’t important. 

But because he used to be everything. And I want him to feel it when I come back. 

Last. 

And loud. 

2:04 am PPPP.