THE BILLIONAIRE'S KISS; HER CURSE

SIENNA’S POV Rome’s midnight sky dripped diamonds, casting silver across the velvet-lit ballroom of the Hotel Imperiale. Everything shimmered with too much silk, too many lies. Masks floated like whispers through the crowd, hiding faces but never intentions. Behind every smile was a strategy, behind every laugh, a plan. The scent of jasmine, cigars, and old money clung to the air like secrets too heavy to be spoken aloud. I stood alone, in a corner beneath a crimson chandelier, its rubies catching the light like spilled wine beautiful and brutal. I didn’t belong here. Not really. I was decorating tonight. A pawn draped in silk, painted in red, and offered like tribute to seal an alliance I never asked for. The music swelled around me, violins and piano crashing like waves. And still, I refused to drown in it. I stood tall in heels that hurt and a dress that glittered like a cage. My glass of champagne remained untouched in my hand. A shield. A statement. A warning. Eyes watched me, some with curiosity, others with calculation. Men who had killed for less than a name, women who would sell their souls for the power stitched into my last name. Moretti. A name that could silence a room or burn one down. I adjusted the edge of my mask, gold, sharp, ornate fitting for the daughter of a king who ruled in shadows. Fitting for a girl pretending she hadn’t already mapped her escape because that was the truth no one saw beneath the diamonds and silk. I wasn’t here to make peace. I was here to count my enemies. To find the cracks in the empire they wanted to bury me beneath. And maybe, just maybe to find one moment of freedom before they sealed my fate with a ring and a name that wasn’t mine. He saw me first or maybe I saw him. Either way, neither of us looked away. He made his way toward me slowly, like a storm that already knew how the night would end. Controlled. Certain. His presence pulled attention like gravity; people parted without knowing why, without realizing they'd stepped out of his way. He didn’t ask for space. He commanded it. He was the kind of man people feared without understanding why, the kind of man whose silence was louder than most men’s rage. His aura didn’t just command the room. It owned it. Like it had always belonged to him and we were merely borrowing the air he allowed us to breathe. When he reached me, his voice slid across my skin like silk soaked in ice. “You’ve been staring.” I didn’t flinch. I lifted my wine glass slowly, letting it catch the light like a shield I could pretend was armor. “So have you,” I replied. “I figured I’d return the favor.” His smile was small. Dangerous. It didn’t soften his features, it sharpened them. As if smiling was something his face wasn’t used to, and it had to be carved into place. Predator to predator. He offered his hand. That same energy rolled off him in waves dark, magnetic, addictive. His touch was a choice I shouldn’t have made. I took his hand anyway not because I trusted him, but because I didn’t trust myself. “I don’t dance with strangers,” I said, my voice quieter now. He leaned in slightly, not close enough to be improper, but close enough that I could feel the weight of him. “Then let’s not be strangers. Cassian Wolfe.” His name hit like thunder muffled in velvet. I hesitated, heartbeat stalling for a single breath. Then I lied. “Sienna.” A false name, my only shield. I saw the flicker in his eyes when I said it. He knew. Of course, he knew. But he let it slide tucked the lie away like a secret he’d enjoy uncovering later. Something in me shifted. Quietly. Dangerously. Because even then, I knew I wouldn’t walk away from this man unchanged. We didn’t speak after that. Not with words. *** The music faded into the background and the ballroom blurred. Somehow, I was in his orbit, and I didn’t want to escape. We danced slow, unchoreographed movements that felt like a conversation. My fingers on his shoulder. His hand was at my waist. His gaze locked with mine like he was memorizing me. Later, the hotel suite was too bright for the shadows we created inside it. He didn’t ask about my last name. I didn’t ask about the empire I suspected he ruled. That night, there was no Moretti, no mafia, no last names or bloodlines. Just heat and want. And the quiet ache of two broken people pretending we weren’t. He touched me like he wasn’t allowed to, and I let him like I hadn’t already sworn to never let anyone in. And when the night ended, I didn’t leave unchanged. His name slipped past my lips once. Loud. Then again, softer. And once just once when I thought he wasn’t listening, I whispered the real one. Not Cassian. Softer. Older. Sacred. It ended before the sun climbed over the ruins of the Colosseum. I left before he could open his eyes. All I left behind was my scent on his pillow, a half-finished glass of wine on the balcony, and a man who had no idea that part of him had already taken root inside me. I told myself it was better this way. Cleaner and Safer. But as I walked away from the hotel in the early dawn, something inside me already knew…This night wouldn’t stay buried. Five Years Later… Rome, Italy The Moretti estate sat on its marble throne above the city, wrapped in vines, secrets, and blood. Guards patrolled with eyes that didn’t blink, trained to kill before asking questions. I sat on the balcony of my private wing, wine in hand, watching the lights of Rome shimmer like dying stars. Matteo and Luna were asleep. Finally, their soft breaths were the only thing anchoring me to sanity. And yet, my world tightened like a noose. Tomorrow? Next week? I’d be forced down an aisle. Not toward love. Not even survival. Toward a prison lined in silk and soaked in silence. Lorenzo D’Amato wasn’t just a monster. He was a legacy killer. He had already warned me that if I tried to run, there’d be consequences. For me. For my children. “Children of a bastard billionaire,” he sneered once. “Polluted but I’ll make them forget him.” I had to grip the marble railing that day to stop myself from lunging at him. A knock snapped me back to reality, sharp and deliberate. I didn’t need to ask who it was. My father. Don Emilio Moretti. Cold, sharp, and merciless. He never simply entered a room. He arrived like a thunderclap flanked by his ever-present guards, weapons visible, eyes trained on shadows no one else could see. Because men like him didn’t walk into rooms they invaded them, commanding silence, sowing dread. “Siena,” he said, his voice as smooth as silk stretched over a blade. “Time to talk about your future.” I didn’t turn. Just stared out the tall glass window, into the dusk bleeding into night. “I thought we already did,” I said quietly. “Marry the psychopath, secure the alliance, and pretend I’m not dying inside.” Behind me, I heard the tension in his pause. Then, the telltale sign was that my jaw was flexed. Barely noticeable, but I saw it in the reflection. That was always the only hint he gave when he was rattled. “Lorenzo is powerful,” he said tightly. “And loyal.” “He beat his last fiancée,” I said flatly. “Is that your definition of loyal?” He stepped forward, slow and deliberate, like a predator closing in. The guards remained by the door, silent, statues carved from intimidation. “You had your chance,” he said, his voice cooling to stone. “You chose betrayal, you chose Wolfe.” I finally turned to face him, fingers wrapped around the stem of the wine glass so tightly I thought it might shatter. “That man is dangerous, yes,” I said. “But at least he had the decency to let me walk away.” My voice cracked slightly at the end, not from fear but from memory. “I didn’t walk,” I whispered, my gaze locking with his. “I crawled, with his children growing inside me.” His eyes froze, not in shock he never showed weakness but in something colder. Calculation. As if he were recalibrating the equation now that the truth had shifted the balance. “They’re not Moretti,” he said after a beat, voice laced with disgust. “They’re mine,” I said, stepping closer. “And I will die before I let you or Lorenzo use them like bargaining chips.” The silence that followed was thick coated with years of pain, of submission, of rebellion barely contained. Then he leaned in, his face inches from mine. His breath smelled of cigars and iron. His next words dropped like a death sentence. “Then prepare yourself,” he said softly. “Because dying might be your only way out.” He turned and walked away, just like that. The guards followed, the heavy door clicking shut behind them. I stood there in silence, trembling but not from fear. Not anymore. I wasn’t afraid of death. Not after everything I’d lived through. What I feared was worse. That Cassian Wolfe would never find us. That he’d never know the truth. That my children… his children would grow up as pawns in a kingdom of blood and shadows. But even in that silence, something stirred deep in my soul. A whisper. Not mine…. His. He’ll come for them. He’ll come for me. And when he does, God helps anyone standing in his way.