Chapter 25: Chapter 25 – Split POV

POV: Matteo

The night tasted like metal.

Cold. Sharp.

Danger wrapped itself around the docks like fog, clinging to every rusted container and broken floodlight.

Pier 19 was a graveyard—quiet in the way only deadly places were.

I stepped out of the car alone.

Louis wanted to come.

Rocco wanted to come.

Hell, even Nico offered, which still felt like a slap across the face considering the way he’d been circling Lilianna these past days.

But no.

Petrov asked for me.

Only me.

And I wanted this meeting—I needed it—because something had snapped inside me after Lilianna said those words in the kitchen.

“You underestimated me.”

Maybe I had.

Or maybe I underestimated how far Petrov was willing to go.

My footsteps echoed on the concrete, slow and deliberate. I didn’t bring a gun in my hand. My men were hidden around the perimeter, snipers waiting for my signal, but this—this confrontation—had to start clean.

Petrov was already there.

Leaning against a stack of shipping crates, cigarette glowing like a small, hateful star.

He smiled when I approached.

“Costello,” he said, voice thick with vodka and venom. “You look tired.”

“I’m tired of your games,” I answered calmly. “You wanted to talk. So talk.”

Petrov inhaled deeply, the ember flaring. “I warned Alessio, but he didn’t listen. And now you walk the same road—blind, arrogant, thinking power makes you untouchable.”

“I’m not here for philosophy,” I snapped. “You touched my family. That’s the only mistake you’ll ever make.”

Petrov smirked.

“Family,” he repeated. “You should choose that word carefully.”

My jaw tightened.

He noticed.

Of course he did.

“You think you understand what’s yours, Matteo,” Petrov continued, throwing the cigarette to the ground. “But you don’t. You never have.”

I stepped closer.

“Get to your point.”

Petrov chuckled, low and poisonous.

“My point?” He tilted his head. “My point is that your biggest enemy… is loyalty. The wrong kind of loyalty. The kind that betrays you from the inside.”

I didn’t move.

Didn’t blink.

And that’s when he said it:

“Ask Nico who he really works for.”

The world didn’t go silent.

It detonated.

A bomb behind my ribs.

I felt the ground shift under my feet, the air thinning, the night twisting around me.

“Bullshit,” I growled. “You’re lying.”

But Petrov only smiled wider—because he knew he’d hit the vein.

“Nico came to me long before you ever realized you had something worth protecting. The boy was angry, desperate for power. And you? You were too busy trying to fix the family you broke.”

My fists clenched.

Everything in me burned.

“You’re trying to start something you can’t finish,” I spat.

Petrov lifted his hands innocently.

“I’m only giving you a gift. One truth. The kind that destroys a man in slow motion.”

I didn’t give him the satisfaction of reacting, but my pulse hammered. Hard.

Nico.

Betrayal.

The kitchen.

His eyes on Lilianna.

His defensiveness every time her name slipped between us.

Petrov’s grin sharpened.

“You think tonight is about guns and threats?” he said. “No. Tonight is about revelation. And by the time you figure out what truly belongs to you…”

He stepped forward, voice dropping.

“…it’ll already be too late.”

I lunged.

But the flashbang detonated before my hand touched him.

The world exploded in white fire.

The pier shook.

And Petrov vanished into smoke.

POV: Lilianna

Matteo’s absence was a weight pressing against my lungs.

Something was wrong.

Every cell in my body felt it.

Callum felt it too—he clung to my leg, his little fingers digging into me like he sensed the storm outside these walls.

“Momma,” he whispered. “Where’s Matteo?”

The truth hovered behind my teeth like broken glass.

I don’t know.

I don’t know if he’s alive.

I crouched and smoothed his curls back. “He’ll come home.”

Even if I said it softly… I wasn’t sure I believed it.

The brownstone was too quiet.

Too still.

Louis had gone silent on me.

Rocco avoided my eyes.

And Nico—

Nico kept watching me like he expected me to break.

“Hey,” he said now, leaning against the kitchen doorway. “You shouldn’t pace. You’re scaring the kid.”

“I’m scared,” I whispered. “I’m human.”

Nico hesitated, then walked closer.

“He’ll be fine,” he murmured. “Matteo always comes out on top.”

I laughed bitterly. “That’s not true. If it were, Silas would be alive.”

Something in Nico’s jaw tightened.

Good.

He deserved to feel it.

I grabbed the file Matteo had left on the table earlier—Petrov’s known associates, shipments, weaknesses. But there was another folder beneath it. One I hadn’t noticed.

A plain one.

No label.

Just sitting there, slightly out of place, like someone had put it down in a hurry.

“Nico,” I said slowly, “what’s this?”

His eyes darted.

Oh God.

“Nico.” My voice hollowed. “What is in this file?”

He swallowed.

Which told me everything.

I reached for it.

Nico moved faster.

He slammed his hand on the folder.

“Don’t,” he hissed.

My blood went ice-cold.

“Move your hand,” I whispered.

“No.”

“Move. Your. Hand.”

Nico’s gaze was wild—cornered animal wild.

Not fear.

Guilt.

And that terrified me more than anything.

“Lilianna… listen to me,” he began, voice cracking. “If you read what’s in there, you’ll never forgive him. Ever.”

My stomach dropped.

Matteo.

This was about Matteo.

Not Petrov.

Not the Russians.

Matteo.

I shoved Nico’s arm away and tore the folder open before he could stop me.

Several documents spilled out.

Hospital reports.

DNA correspondence.

Birth records.

My breath froze.

A picture slid out—

Callum.

An infant Callum.

With dark curls.

Brown eyes.

Matteo’s eyes.

And then—

A paternity test.

My hands shook violently.

Positive.

99.98%.

My knees buckled.

I gripped the table edge until my knuckles turned white.

He knew.

He KNEW.

All this time—

He knew Callum was his son.

And he didn’t say a word.

Didn’t confront me.

Didn’t ask.

Didn’t claim him.

I felt a scream claw up my throat, but nothing came out. Only shaking breaths.

Footsteps approached.

Nico.

“Lilianna—”

I spun on him.

“Get away from me.”

He flinched.

“I didn’t want you to find out like this,” he said quietly. “Matteo kept it quiet because he didn’t want you to run again. He was terrified.”

Terrified?

I was drenched in betrayal.

“You let me sleep under his roof,” I whispered. “You let me think—”

“I told him it was a mistake not to tell you,” Nico said, guilt raw in his eyes. “But Matteo… Matteo is afraid of losing people. He already lost Silas. He couldn’t lose you and Callum again.”

That broke something in me.

Something fragile.

Something I didn’t realize I’d been holding together.

But before I could speak, Louis burst through the door, breathless.

“Nico! Lilianna—Matteo’s been hit. Petrov ambushed him. We lost visual.”

The world stopped.

Callum’s small voice trembled behind me. “Momma? What’s wrong?”

I scooped him into my arms, clutching him so tightly he whimpered.

I whispered only one thing, because it was the only truth left:

“We’re going to get him back.”