The Moretti estate had gone quiet by the time Damian dismissed the last of his men. The gala’s echoes still clung to the marble halls—clinking glasses, hollow laughter, the careful choreography of alliances masquerading as friendship. But beneath it all, he heard something else: the silence between him and Adriana.
She hadn’t spoken much since the balcony. She carried herself with the same grace, the same defiance, but he had felt it—the wall, invisible yet impenetrable, rising between them.
Damian poured himself a drink in his study, the amber liquid burning as it slid down his throat. He wasn’t a man prone to doubt. Doubt got men killed. Doubt lost empires. But tonight, the poison of uncertainty gnawed at him, eating away at the core of his control.
He saw Adriana’s eyes in his mind—h
