CH- 33 

CH- 33 
Isabella POV

The air in Florence tasted different.

Lighter. Still sharp with autumn’s bite, but not choked with ash and gunpowder anymore.

The villa they were borrowing—a glass-walled haven perched on a cliff outside the city—was too beautiful to feel real. Like someone had plucked it from a dream I didn’t believe I deserved.

I pressed my hand to the balcony railing, watching the sea crash against the rocks below.

Behind me, the wind caught pale linen curtains, fluttering them like ghosts escaping a haunted past.

Dante was inside. Healing, slowly. His shoulder was still bandaged. I had to practically sedate him to keep him from rearming. Marco was quieter now, often seen talking to a local woman with too many tattoos and not enough patience.

Aria... Aria was asleep. Or pretending to be. We weren’t enemies anymore, but we weren’t quite sisters again either. The bruises from our shared history hadn't faded. Not yet.

But we were here. Alive. Breathing.

And in my belly, something new stirred.

I hadn’t told anyone yet. Not even Dante. Not until I was sure. But the doctor we met—Dr. Ana Moretti, sleek, sharp, and utterly unfazed by mafia bloodlines—had confirmed it this morning.

I was pregnant.

The thought didn’t terrify me like I expected. It anchored me. Grounded me in a way no crown, no syndicate, no blood oath ever could. This life inside me... was mine.

And maybe that was the beginning of everything.

Footsteps approached behind me. I didn’t turn. I didn’t have to.

“You’re quiet this morning,” Aria said.

Her voice had changed. Less steel, more soul.

“So are you,” I replied, glancing at her.

She wore one of my sweaters—oversized, draping off her shoulder—and sipped from a steaming mug.

Her dark hair was pulled into a loose knot. For a moment, she looked more like a sister than a shadow.

“I’m trying to be,” she admitted. “It’s easier here.”

I nodded, letting the silence stretch.

“I got a call this morning,” she said softly. “From Sabrina Leone.”

I blinked. “The lawyer?”

Aria nodded. “She’s arriving this afternoon. Said she represents one of our father’s assets.”

I turned fully now. “Asset?”

“She wouldn’t say much. Only that she’s tied to a trust, and it’s time we were ‘brought in.’ Her words.”

My stomach tightened—but not from the baby.

Sabrina Leone. I’d only heard her name whispered once before, in the depths of Syndicate records, filed under the same classification as ghosts and mistakes too dangerous to erase.

“She’s dangerous,” I said.

Aria raised a brow. “So are we.”

Fair point.

“And there’s more,” she continued, eyes narrowing. “She said the club—Club Inferna—is being watched.”

My heartbeat tripped.

“By who?”

“No idea. But I figured you’d want to get ahead of it.”

I did. That club wasn’t just my business. It was my legacy. My armor. And now... my child’s future.

I straightened. “Then we meet her. But on my terms.”

Aria smiled faintly. “Already done. She’s meeting us at the café near the Arno. Three p.m.”
“Is it a trap?”

“Probably.”

We shared a look.

“Let’s walk into it anyway,” I muttered.

Aria touched her cup to mine. “De Luca style.”

The café Aria picked was all glass and steel, modern in a way that didn’t try to belong to Florence.

Floor-to-ceiling windows reflected the Arno like shattered mirrors, and everything smelled like burnt espresso and lemons.
We arrived five minutes early.

I scanned the room automatically—old habits die hard. Two college students in the corner. A woman feeding pigeons outside.

The barista was too bored to be an assassin. Still, I kept my hand near the knife tucked beneath my coat.

Pregnant or not, I wasn’t stupid.

Aria ordered a single espresso, black. I didn’t order anything.

My stomach was a battlefield today—part morning sickness, part nerves, part what-the-hell-have-I-done.
She arrived at 3:07, late by design.

Sabrina Leone didn’t walk. She arrived.

A tall, elegant woman in a high-waisted black pantsuit with an open collar and a single blood-red silk scarf wrapped tight at her throat. Her heels clicked like loaded chambers. She wore no jewelry, no rings—but her nails were matte black, filed to precision.
I knew power when I saw it. And she wore hers like perfume.

She didn’t smile. “Isabella. Aria.”

Her voice was smoky, low—measured like a lawyer’s cross-examination. Every syllable carved.

“Sabrina,” I returned, motioning to the empty seat.

She sat without asking. Set her slim black briefcase on the table. The leather looked expensive. Older than me.
“No security?” Aria asked.

Sabrina lifted a brow. “You wouldn’t see them even if they were here.”
Charming.

“Why are we here?” I asked.

She clasped her hands, folding them on the table. “Your father left behind more than bloodlines. He left questions. Ownership. Legacies hidden in plain sight.”

My skin prickled. “We’re not here to play riddles.”

“Good,” she said flatly. “Because this isn’t a riddle. It’s a reckoning.”

She opened her briefcase with a soft click, pulling out a thick file. Pale cream paper, stamped in a strange, looping seal I didn’t recognize.

“Before he disappeared, your father created a trust. Under a private holding shell called Aquila Veneno—The Poisoned Eagle.”

I exchanged a glance with Aria.
Sabrina continued, calm as a glacier. “He designated two possible heirs. One born of legacy. One born of vengeance.

The trust now requires a meeting between the beneficiaries and all associated third parties. Which is where I come in.”

“And who are the third parties?” I asked.

“Two surviving members of the inner circle,” she said. “An offshore accountant named Theo Marinakis, and a hacker who used to work for the Volkovs.

Code name: Silvertongue.”

Aria narrowed her eyes. “We’ve heard of him. He tried to blackmail Cassian.”

“Yes. And failed. He’s... available now.”

I sat back, letting the pieces click.

Sabrina took a sip of the espresso Aria had pushed toward her. Didn’t flinch at the bitterness.

“There’s one more thing,” she added, lowering her voice.

My heart pounded. “What.”

She pulled out a final document. “You’ll both want to read this. It’s your mother’s last addendum to her will. Dated six months before her death.”
Aria paled.

I reached for it, hands slightly shaking.

Sabrina’s tone softened, almost imperceptibly. “Your family’s story isn’t finished, Isabella. It’s just been... interrupted.”

Her phone buzzed once. She silenced it without checking.

“I’ll be in touch. Your next meeting will be at the Inferna office. I suggest you get reacquainted with your staff. And that security gets updated.”

Without another word, she stood, smoothed her blazer, and walked out.

Just like that.

I stared after her.

Aria was already flipping through the addendum.

“She named us both,” she whispered.

I took it from her and flipped to the last page of the will’s addendum.

My mother’s signature was there—familiar, looping, sharp at the tail. But underneath it, in a different pen, was a note. Handwritten.
Faded ink.

Aria leaned in.

“Is that her handwriting?” she whispered.

I nodded slowly. My throat dried.

If something happens to me—don’t trust the one wearing my ring.

He knows where the child is. But she was never supposed to be born.

My fingers clenched the edge of the page.
She.
My pulse went ice cold.

Sabrina was already gone. The café had emptied.

Outside, the sky was breaking into late-afternoon light, but it felt like shadow had just slithered through the room.

Aria stared at me.

“She wasn’t talking about us, was she?”