The De Luca estate was a gilded prison.
Too beautiful to escape. Too dangerous to stay.
Every hallway was silent, every door watched. Guards didn’t wear uniforms—they wore Armani suits and icy stares. I wasn’t chained, but I wasn’t free either.
Still, I was restless.
I wandered past the piano room, through a vast corridor lined with oil paintings of people who looked half-alive and fully terrifying. There was one painting that stopped me cold: a boy—maybe thirteen—with the same storm-colored eyes as Luciano.
He looked too sad for a child. Too dangerous for a teenager.
No plaque. No name. Just… forgotten.
I turned to go, but the quiet voice behind me made me jump.
“You found my brother.”
Luciano.
I hadn’t heard him approach—how did he always do that?
I turned slowly. “He looks li
