The Rossi estate at night was a cathedral of silence. The gardens stood cloaked in mist, fountains frozen mid-song, and the statues of saints loomed like silent judges. But beneath the marble corridors and painted ceilings, the shadows whispered.
And in those shadows, blood waited to be spilled.
---
Adriana Rossi pressed her palm against the iron bars of her confinement, the chill biting into her skin. The cell was carved deep into the old wine cellars of the estate, where the walls wept moisture and the air stank of damp stone.
She’d been here three days. Three nights. Three lifetimes.
Her father’s men brought food but never words. They looked at her as though she were already dead — a traitor’s daughter, a bargaining chip.
But Adriana wasn’t broken. Not yet. Every scrape of her nai
