CHAPTER Forty — Vows Written in Gunfire
Gold dripped from every corner of the Rossi cathedral.
Candles burned in tall iron stands like watchful sentinels. Velvet banners embroidered with the Rossi crest hung from stone pillars, their crimson folds rippling in the draft of whispered gossip. The pews were lined with men who killed for a living but wore suits like kings. Their wives glittered like diamonds—sharp, cold, ready to cut.
And at the center of it all stood Elena Moretti, draped in white like a sacrificial offering.
Her veil was sheer, but it felt like iron. Her heartbeat thrummed beneath the silk bodice as if it were trapped behind marble ribs. Every step she took down the aisle echoed like a countdown. Each eye upon her was not admiration—it was possession, judgment, curiosity. They were not guests. They were witnesses.
Witnesses to her coronation.
Or her execution.
Damian awaited her at the altar, a portrait of control carved in tailored black. Not a flicker of emotion cracked his expression. If Elena was burning alive, he was the frost descending to claim the ashes.
She reached him, forced by the guiding hand of her father—a hand that trembled.
Not with love.
With fear.
She felt it. Saw the sheen of sweat at his temple despite the chill. Even as he held his head high, his fingers dug into her wrist harder than necessary. As if letting go meant surrendering her not just to Damian…
…but to fate.
The priest spoke, voice echoing through the vaulted space.
“We are gathered today—”
Elena didn’t hear the rest.
She heard her pulse. Her breath. The soft rustle of satin as she clenched her hands together to stop them from shaking.
Damian’s gaze slid to her, slow and deliberate. For a moment—just one heartbeat—she wished he would blink. Show a crack. A sign. Anything.
But he did not.
He simply looked at her, like a man already reading the vows she had not spoken. Claiming her in silence.
Her throat constricted. Somewhere in the pews, a woman whispered, “She looks like she’ll faint.”
Elena lifted her chin.
She would not faint.
She would remember.
Every face. Every oath. Every sin.
The priest’s voice cut back into focus.
“Do you, Damian Luca Rossi, take—”
“I do.”
No hesitation. No breath between.
The words fell like a judge’s gavel.
The priest turned to her.
“And do you, Elena Maria Moretti—”
BANG.
The world split in half.
Glass exploded from the stained windows in a shower of rainbow shrapnel. Candles flickered out as a storm of gunfire shattered the air. Screams burst through the sanctuary like a choir of terror.
Elena’s ears rang.
Her body froze.
But Damian—
moved.
Like he had been waiting for this.
Damian didn’t flinch.
While guests ducked. While guards scrambled. While Elena’s father fell to his knees in panic—Damian stood tall, unshaken, like the bullets had been scripted into the ceremony.
His hand shot out—not in panic, but in possession.
He grabbed Elena’s wrist and yanked her behind him, shielding her with his body.
“Stay down,” he ordered, voice low. Calm. Infuriatingly calm.
She stared up at him, eyes wide, lungs refusing to breathe. “What’s happening? Who—”
“Not your concern.”
Not her concern?
Gunfire was shredding centuries-old stained glass. Guests were screaming. Her wedding had turned into a battlefield.
But Damian—
was smiling.
Just slightly. A dark curl at the corner of his mouth. As if someone had just delivered him the perfect wedding gift.
Armed men in black stormed through the shattered entrance. Elena recognized none of them. Not Rossi. Not Moretti. Outsiders.
A hit. An ambush.
Or—
A message.
“Get her out!” someone yelled.
“No one touches her,” Damian snapped without turning. His voice was soft. Deadly. Even in chaos, his word was law.
He reached into his suit jacket and withdrew a gun like it was part of him—an extension of bone, not steel.
The sight of it—the familiarity—hit her harder than the gunfire.
He was not a groom in that moment.
He was what he truly was.
A wolf dressed for a wedding.
And death had RSVP’d without invitation.
One of the intruders raised his weapon toward them.
Damian fired first.
No hesitation. No warning.
The man crumpled.
Elena’s gasp caught in her throat.
Not because she hadn’t seen death.
But because Damian had killed without blinking…
…and somehow she felt safer.
What is wrong with me?
Another burst of gunfire erupted from the choir balcony. Damian grabbed her shoulders, shoving her against the marble column for cover. He stood in front of her again, firing with terrifying precision.
A shell casing bounced off her ivory skirt, staining the silk with soot.
Her wedding dress.
Ruined.
Perfect.
Her father crawled toward them, face pale. “Damian—we’re surrounded—we have to—”
Damian didn’t lower his gun. “Get behind the pews. Take cover.”
Her father didn’t argue.
For the first time in her life—she saw it.
Her father obeyed.
Not out of respect.
Not out of pride.
Out of fear.
The weight of that realization crashed into her harder than the chaos around them.
Her father—the man who’d ruled her life with iron—was terrified of Damian.
And Damian knew it.
Elena pressed a hand to her chest, heart frantic. “Damian—who are these people?”
He finally looked at her then. Smoke curled in the air between them. His eyes—dark, alive—not with fear.
But thrill.
“Gatecrashers,” he said simply.
Then—he touched her cheek.
In the middle of carnage.
Like she was a bride again and not a hostage in hell.
His thumb brushed her skin with unnerving tenderness.
And he whispered—
“Don’t be afraid, Elena.”
Her breath trembled.
“I’m not.”
He smiled.
“Good. Because I’m far worse than whatever’s shooting at us.”