Chapter 5
647 Words
The garden was quiet except for the soft rush of the fountain. Moonlight pooled in marble corners, and wind whispered through the roses. Isabella sat at the edge of the stone bench, laughing softly as she nudged Luca Romano's arm with her shoulder.
He smiled, rare and real. “You laugh like someone who’s never been afraid.”
“I’ve been afraid every day of my life,” she said, her voice lower. “I just learned how to wear it like perfume.”
Luca stared at her, his eyes unreadable. “Your father would kill me if he knew I was here.”
She smirked. “He probably already does.”
They leaned closer—fingertips brushing, silence humming between them. It wasn’t rushed. It wasn’t lust. It was something deeper, more dangerous. Love, not like fire, but like velvet and daggers.
A door creaked open in the distance.
“Isabella,” a cold voice called from the balcony. Jacob Moretti. Her father.
She straightened instantly, breath caught in her throat.
Luca stood, already slipping back into that composed, cocky mask. “That’s my cue.”
“You don’t have to go,” she said softly.
But he was already walking into the dark.
Jacob's private chamber was dimly lit, heavy with old smoke and older secrets. Her father stood by the window, glass of scotch in hand. Her twin brother, Isaac, leaned against the fireplace, arms crossed. The room felt like a courtroom. Her mother, Sarah, stood off to the side, tense.
Jacob finally turned. “Sit.”
She did.
“I saw you with him.”
“I wasn’t hiding it,” she said calmly.
He slammed the glass down. “You should have been.”
Sarah flinched. Isaac’s jaw tightened.
“Romano is not your friend, Isabella,” Jacob continued. “He is not your lover. He is a threat.”
“You don’t know him.”
“I know his bloodline. I know what he’s done. I know what you don’t.”
She stood. “Then tell me. Tell me what I don’t know.”
Jacob’s eyes turned to steel. “You are to stay away from him. From now on. Do not speak to him. Do not meet with him. If I find out you’ve disobeyed me…” He didn’t finish. He didn’t need to.
Sarah reached for her daughter’s hand. “Please, Isa. Listen to him.”
And with that, the judgment was sealed.
But Isabella was not a girl who listened easily.
Later that night, she walked back in quietly, heels in hand, heart soft from memory. As she passed near the study, voices stopped her.
“…you should have told her,” her brother was saying.
“She can’t know,” her father’s voice replied. “It’ll destroy her.”
“She’ll hate us,” Sarah whispered.
“She’ll survive,” Jacob said flatly. “Romano killed her uncle. My brother. That man shot Cain Moretti in the back, and now he wants my daughter’s heart?”
Isabella froze. Her breath shattered.
No one noticed her slip away.
Days passed. Then weeks. She didn’t answer Luca’s texts. Didn’t open his calls. She practiced the piano until her fingers bled. She avoided the garden, the music, the memories.
And she didn’t cry.
Not once.
When she finally saw him again, it was raining.
Luca was leaning against the back gate of the chapel her family owned, drenched but waiting. Like he knew she’d come.
She stepped into the rain, no coat, no words.
“You disappeared,” he said.
“You killed my uncle,” she replied.
He didn’t deny it.
The rain fell harder.
“I needed to see if you would lie to me,” she whispered.
Luca looked at her, eyes shadowed with pain. “Do you want the truth?”
“I want everything.”
- Writer
