Chapter 89 The Dragon’s Promise
Nate’s POV
The boardroom at Salvatore Enterprises always felt like a tomb—expensive, silent, and smelling faintly of mahogany and cold ambition. For five grueling hours, I sat at the head of a table that sat twenty, listening to my mother and the directors drone on about logistics, port expansion, and a minor dip in the third-quarter projections. It was the kind of meeting that could have been summarized in a three-paragraph email, but my mother insisted on my presence. She knew I had been spending more time in the shadow of Brooklyn’s tenements than in the light of the Salvatore name, and this was her way of reminding me where I belonged.
Every time my phone buzzed in my pocket, I felt a jolt of restlessness. My mind wasn't on port expansion; it was on a drafty apartment and a girl with enough fire in her eyes to burn my world down. I had been skipping these sessions lately, prioritizing a pull-out sofa over a velvet executive chair, and the tension in the room was palpable. My mother’s gaze was a constant, icy weight, silently accusing me of dereliction of duty.
During a particularly dry lecture on maritime insurance, I felt a different kind of vibration—a long, steady pulse. I checked the screen under the table. It was a message from my private investigator.
Found them. They’re in a motel outside of Scranton, Pennsylvania. They fled. Your hunch about the docks was wrong, but the debt was real. They owe a local shark named "Vane" six figures. They took what they had and vanished. Problem is, Vane doesn't care who pays. He knows about the girls.
The words burned into my retinas, but the guilt that followed was sharper. A few weeks ago, I had handed Mila’s parents a staggering amount of cash. I’d known, deep down, they wouldn't spend it wisely. I’d known they were leeches. But I had been so desperate to prove a point to Mila—to show her that her "loyalty" to them was misplaced—that I’d essentially funded their escape. I’d handed them the keys to abandon her. If I’d known that my move to "enlighten" Mila would end with a loan shark named Vane looking for her sisters, I wouldn't have given them a single cent.
Now, I was staring at an impossible choice. If I told Mila the truth, I’d have to admit I was the one who gave them the money to leave. I’d have to break her heart by telling her they chose to save their own skins. But if I didn't tell her, if I just paid off Vane in secret, I was keeping her in a lie. I was becoming the very thing she hated: a man who thought he could buy his way out of messy human realities.
I pocketed the phone, my jaw tight. By the time the meeting adjourned, I was out of the building before the elevators had even finished their descent. I drove to Brooklyn like a man possessed, the city lights blurring into long streaks of neon. When I climbed the stairs to the apartment, I found Theodore sitting on the pull-out sofa, looking remarkably composed while Zoe used his expensive Italian leather loafers as a garage for her toy cars. Mila was in the kitchen, her back to me, the tension in her shoulders visible from across the room.
"He lives," Theodore said, standing up and gently reclaiming his shoes from Zoe. "I assume the board didn't execute you for your recent absences?"
"They tried," I muttered, my eyes finding Mila. She turned, a mixture of relief and that sharp, familiar defiance flickering in her gaze.
"You're late," she said, though she didn't sound truly angry. "Theodore and Gavin have been acting like a Secret Service detail all day. I think they’re ready for a break."
"Theodore, go," I said, nodding toward the door. "I’ve got it from here."
Theodore caught the look in my eyes—the lingering shadow of the news I was carrying—and gave a single, understanding nod before slipping out. Mila went back to the stove, and for a moment, the apartment felt like the sanctuary I had dreamed about in the boardroom. But the silence was broken by a small hand.
"Nate?"
I looked down to find Grace standing there. She wasn't smiling. Her small face was set in a mask of gravity that made her look decades older than nine. She jerked her head toward the hallway, a silent command for a private audience.
I followed her into the narrow hall, leaning against the wall so I was closer to her eye level. I didn't treat her like a child; I gave her the same focused attention I gave a partner during a high-stakes negotiation.
"You’re going to hurt her," Grace said, her voice a low, steady accusation. "People like you... you come here because it’s a story. You play at being the hero, but then the movie ends and you go back to your castle. If you break her heart, she won't just be sad, Nate. She’ll break. And I won’t let that happen."
The bluntness of it hit me harder than any board member’s critique. I looked at this little girl who had been forced to become a sentry for her sister’s soul. She didn't know about the loan sharks yet, but she knew about the predators in suits.
"I’m not playing, Grace," I said, my voice quiet and absolute. "I don't care about the castle. I care about her. I promise you, as long as I’m standing, she’s safe."
I reached into my pocket and pulled out a heavy, silver coin—a Salvatore signet piece, stamped with the dragon. It was a token that carried more weight in certain circles than a stack of hundreds. I pressed it into her small palm.
"This is a promise," I told her. "If Mila is ever in trouble—if I'm not here, or if you think I'm the one causing her pain—you call the number on the back. Someone will be here in minutes. It doesn't matter where I am or what I'm doing. Understood?"
Grace looked at the silver in her hand, her thumb tracing the dragon. She looked up at me, her dark eyes searching mine with a terrifyingly perceptive gaze.
"Okay," she whispered. Then, she leaned in closer, her voice dropping to a conspiratorial level. "You’re better than the other one. The one with the shiny shoes."
"Theodore?" I asked, a ghost of a smile appearing despite the weight in my chest.
"Yeah," Grace said, glancing back at the kitchen where Mila was laughing at something Zoe had said. "He looks at her like she’s a beautiful ghost he can't quite touch. Like he's waiting for her to notice him. But you? You look at her like you’re starving."
She turned and walked back into the living room without another word, leaving me standing in the dim hallway, the weight of the PI's text and my hunger for her sister resting heavy on my shoulders. I had to protect them from Vane, and I had to do it without Mila ever realizing how close the fire was getting.