Chapter One Hundred and Nineteen - Like Blade
(Luca's POV )
The morning sun broke over the coast like a blade through silk, clean, sharp, and merciless.
Luca hadn’t slept. Not really. He’d laid there for hours with her curled against his side, the soft rise and fall of her breathing mocking the chaos twisting inside his chest.
The world hadn’t paused just because he’d held her.
Now, as light spilled across the sheets, he eased away without waking her. The air was colder the moment her warmth left him. She murmured something in her sleep, a sound too soft to carry, and he hated how it almost made him stay.
Almost.
He moved like a man trained for war, because he was. A ghost in his own house.
Downstairs, the living room still smelled faintly of salt and smoke, reminders of the night before, when everything had cracked open.
Rico was already waiting at the kitchen island, a black mug in one hand, the other resting on the gun tucked casually against his hip. His jaw was clenched tight. Bad sign.
Jory leaned against the wall behind him, boots crossed at the ankles, a wicked grin ghosting the corner of his mouth. She was always like that, sharp edges hidden beneath sugar. But Luca trusted her as much as anyone. Maybe more.
“You’re up early,” Rico said.
“I didn’t sleep.”
“Yeah. Figured.”
Luca poured his own coffee, black and bitter. He didn’t need sugar to sweeten the taste of betrayal.
Jory tilted his head. “You look like shit, boss.”
“Good morning to you too,” Luca muttered.
He smirked. “You only look like that when something’s bleeding under the surface. So… who do we bury?”
Rico tossed a thin folder onto the marble countertop. “We got a name.”
Luca flipped it open.
A face stared back at him. Familiar. Too familiar.
“Marcus Hale?” His voice was low. Controlled. “He was supposed to be locked down.”
“Apparently not anymore,” Jory said, voice flat. “Two days ago, he met with someone at the docks. No cameras, no clean audio. But we’ve got enough to know he’s not playing nice.”
Rico’s mouth tightened. “And the shipment?”
“Delayed. Someone jammed our lines before it even hit open water. We’ve got a rat.”
His grip on the file tightened. The game wasn’t just starting. It had already been set in motion.
“Find him,” Luca said, the words coming out like steel. “Find everyone tied to Hale. And burn it clean.”
Jory’s grin faded. “You think he’s working alone?”
“No,” Luca said. “I think this is a message.”
Rico nodded, but he didn’t move. His eyes flicked upward, toward the ceiling. Toward the bedroom. “She doesn’t know, does she?”
Luca didn’t answer.
“She deserves to,” Rico pressed. “If this blows up....”
“She’s not part of this.”
“She’s part of you,” Rico shot back.
That landed like a punch. Luca met his gaze, and for a second, they were two wolves testing the line. Rico broke it first, exhaling through his teeth.
Jory was quiet, watching them both like a blade being sharpened. Then, softly, said, “If they’re coming for her, they’re not just trying to hurt you. They’re trying to end you.”
“I know,” Luca said.
When she woke, the space beside her was cold.
She blinked against the pale morning light, sheets tangled around her legs, hair mussed from where his fingers had been. For a moment, she let herself believe in the quiet, the illusion that last night wasn’t built on a foundation of blood and shadows.
But the ocean outside was still restless.
She found him in the kitchen, shoulders stiff, black shirt stretched across his back like armor. Jory leaned against the island, a blade twirling lazily between his fingers, while Rico scrolled through a burner phone.
The tension in the room was sharp enough to cut skin.
“You didn’t sleep,” she said.
Luca didn’t look at her. “Didn’t need to.”
“Liar.”
Jory snorted softly but didn’t say a word. She liked her, even if she’d never admit it out loud.
Luca finally looked up, and she hated how familiar that look had become. Cold. Controlled. As if every part of him was locked behind iron doors she wasn’t allowed to open.
“What happened?” she asked.
“Nothing you need to worry about.”
Her breath caught. “Luca...”
“Not now.”
It was soft but sharp, like the edge of a blade. She crossed her arms over her chest, grounding herself in the heat of her own pulse. “You don’t get to do that. Not after last night.”
Something flickered across his face, guilt, maybe. But it was gone too fast.
“You don’t understand what’s coming,” he said.
“Then make me understand.”
For a moment, neither of them moved. The world outside their walls hummed with the promise of something dangerous.
He stepped closer, close enough that she could smell the salt on his skin, the bitter coffee on his breath. “If I pull you into this, I can’t pull you back out.”
“I never asked you to protect me.”
“No,” he whispered. “But I will.”
Jory’s gaze softened almost imperceptibly. He only seen Luca like this only a handful of times. And each time ended in blood.
By the time the black SUV rolled up the driveway, the sun was high and the warmth of the morning had turned heavy.
Kade and Enzo got out first, both in black, eyes scanning the perimeter. Jory fell into step beside Luca as Rico handed him the burner phone.
“They’re moving faster than we thought,” Kade said. “Hale’s people have their claws in more than one port. If we don’t move today, we lose the east route.”
Luca scrolled through the text. A location. A time. A threat written between the lines.
“They’re forcing my hand.”
“Then force back,” Jory said, voice sharp as the knives he carried. “Hit them before they can blink.”
She hovered near the archway, listening even when she knew she shouldn’t.
Luca noticed. His eyes cut to her, not cruel, not kind, just the weight of a man who carried too many sins.
“You’re staying here,” he said.
She stepped forward. “No.”
“Yes.”
“This isn’t...”
“This isn’t up for debate.” His voice cracked like thunder. The room fell silent. Even Rico looked away.
Jory raised a brow but said nothing. He had learned to pick his moments.
Her hands curled at her sides. She could feel it, the widening gap between them. A fracture forming in the place they’d built something that almost felt real.
“Luca,” she said, quieter now. “Every time you shut me out, you make me wonder how long before you walk away for good.”
He flinched. Just slightly. Enough for her to see it mattered.
“I can’t let them touch you,” he said. “Not again.”
And then he was gone, storming out with Rico, Kade, and Enzo at his heels.
Jory lingered a second longer, looking at her.
“He’ll burn the world before he lets them touch you,” Jory said softly. “But you better be ready. Because war’s already here.”
The docks smelled of oil and salt and blood.
Luca’s boots hit the wet pavement with purpose. The world around him blurred into sharp lines, the dark water, the rusting shipping containers, the gulls overhead screaming like omens.
Hale’s men were sloppy. Confident. That was their mistake.
“Two on the south pier,” Jory whispered through the comm. “Three more by the crane. Hale’s inside.”
“Kill the lights,” Luca ordered.
The world snapped into darkness.
They moved like shadows. Jory’s blade slid through a throat before the man even gasped. Rico’s silencer spat twice. Two bodies down.
Inside, Hale stood at the center of the warehouse like a man who thought he’d already won. Cigarette smoke curled around him. His smile was all teeth.
“Luca Moretti,” Hale drawled. “Didn’t expect you to come down from your glass tower.”
Luca leveled his gun at him. “Then you’re dumber than I thought.”
“You can’t stop it,” Hale said, spreading his arms wide. “The tide’s already turning. You’ve built an empire on bones, Moretti. Empires like yours don’t last.”
Luca’s finger tightened on the trigger. “Mine does.”
Gunfire shattered the air.
Jory dropped two men before they touched their triggers. he was a ghost with steel.
She couldn’t sit still.
The house was too quiet. The sound of the ocean pressed against the windows like a heartbeat she couldn’t ignore.
Every part of her screamed to move, to do something.
But Luca had locked her in a world where the war was his, and she was supposed to stay safe.
Safe was a lie.
Her fingers trembled as she picked up his discarded burner from the counter. She shouldn’t look. But she did.
One message blinked across the screen:
“He’ll bleed for her. That’s the point.”
Her blood ran cold.
Luca stood over Hale’s body, chest heaving. Blood pooled beneath the man, seeping into the cracks of the concrete.
But victory didn’t taste like anything. Not when the message on Rico’s phone burned against his skin.
Jory stepped up beside him, wiping blood from his blade with a slow, deliberate motion. “Boss,” he said softly, “they’re not coming after the business.”
“I know,” Luca whispered. “They’re coming after her.”
Jory’s eyes flickered dark. “Then we make sure they never touch her.”
Whoever was pulling the strings had just moved their queen onto the board.
And Luca wasn’t ready to lose her.
Not again.