At The Don’s Mercy

Measuring The Cage

ALICIA

My bedroom smelled like lavender and my mother's ghost.

That's dramatic. I don't care. She's been dead fourteen years and I still half-expect to see her sitting on the window seat, reading one of those romance novels she hid from my father. She'd roll her eyes at me now. Alicia, you're too morbid for your age. Probably. But she's not here, and I'm still here, and the morning sun is cutting through the windows like it has something to prove.

I sat at my vanity, pinning my dark curls into a bun so tight it made my scalp ache. That was the point. Pain keeps you present. Keeps you from floating off into the panic that's been living in my chest since last night.

Bastian Marcone. His voice. That stillness when he knew I was there and didn't care.

I kept seeing his eyes. Silver-gray. Cold. Like he'd already decided what to do with me and was just waiting for the right time.

A knock rattled my door. Frantic. Soft. The kind of knock that knows it's not supposed to be there.

Mia slipped in before I could answer. Locked the door behind her like that would stop anything. Her blonde hair was a disaster. It looked tangled, unwashed, the kind of mess that only happens when you've been crying all night. Her eyes were so red they looked raw.

She dropped to her knees in front of my chair. Grabbed my skirts. Buried her face in my lap.

"Alicia." Her voice cracked. "Please. The guards were talking. Father's giving me away tonight. Tonight."

I put my hand on her head. Felt her shaking. My jaw was so tight I thought my teeth might c***k.

"I know, sweet pea." My voice came out steadier than I felt. I've had a lot of practice with that. "I know."

"They say he's a monster. They say he killed his own uncle. Alicia, I can't...I can't breathe when I think about it. I'll die there. I'll just...I'll stop existing. You know I will."

She wasn't wrong. Mia's not weak, just she's tender. There's a difference. She feels everything too much, too deeply. She'd walk into that penthouse and crumple like paper in rain.

I lifted her chin. Forced her to look at me.

"You're not marrying him."

She blinked. Fresh tears spilled over.

"But Father said—"

"I don't give a s**t what Father said."

I didn't mean to snap. But the words came out sharp and mean and I didn't take them back. Mia flinched then nodded. She's used to me being the sharp one. The mean one. The one who steps in front of the blow.

She left without asking how. That's how naive she was.

I stood by the window, watching the driveway. A line of black SUVs rolled through the gates. Not Bastian's car I noticed. I memorized his last night, the way you memorize a snake's pattern in the grass. This was his vanguard. His security detail.

The lead door opened.

A woman stepped out. Tall. Sharp platinum bob. Trench coat that probably cost more than my father's car. Red heels that clicked on the gravel like gunshots. She looked at the estate like it was a moldy shoe she'd been forced to wear.

Barbara Viti.

I knew her the way you know the faces of people who'd kill you without blinking. Her father was Marcone's underboss. She was his money-launderer, his society face, the one who smiled at charity galas while counting bodies in her head. The whispers said she'd been groomed to be Bastian's wife. That she'd been waiting years for him to make it official with her.

She was here. Why?

I smoothed my emerald dress and walked downstairs. Slowly. Calmly. Like I had nothing to hide.

The foyer was a zoo. Cavallo soldiers with their hands twitching near their holsters. Marcone guards with rifles that made my father's men look like mall cops. Barbara stood in the middle of it all, holding a tablet, not looking at anyone.

"This perimeter is a joke," she said. Not loud. Just... cutting. Like she was stating a fact the air already knew. "The west wall has a blind spot the size of a truck. Fix it. If a single threat breaches tonight, Marcello, Bastian will have your head. And I'll hand him the hammer myself."

Marcello's face went red. "We've handled our security for twenty years—"

"Your territory is rotting from the inside. You lost a shipment yesterday. Don't lecture me about capability."

She didn't even look at him when she said it. Just kept tapping her screen.

I stepped off the bottom stair. My heels clicked. Barbara's head snapped toward me.

She looked me up and down. The dress, My mother's old jewels on me. My face. Something flickered in her eyes. Recognition. And then that small, cruel smile that rich women practice in mirrors.

"Ah. The eldest daughter." She walked toward me. Her perfume was expensive and sharp. "Alicia, correct?"

"Welcome to the Cavallo estate, Ms. Viti." I tilted my head. Not too much. Just enough to look submissive. "I trust your drive was comfortable."

She laughed. It wasn't a nice sound.

"I don't care about comfort, little girl. I care about efficiency." She stepped closer, close enough that I could see the tiny gold flecks in her eyes. Her voice dropped to a whisper.

"I've seen the bride's profile. Mia's fragile. Bastian will break her in a month. But a deal's a deal. Tell your sister to keep her tears out of sight tonight. Bastian despises weakness. He'll get bored of her eventually, tuck her away in some wing and I'll be the one running his house. Tell her to remember her place."

Something hot and sick rose in my throat. She was already measuring my sister's cage. Already planning how to slide into it after Mia was discarded.

"My sister knows her duty, Ms. Viti." I smiled. Wide. Sweet. Empty. "We all do."

She laughed again, turned her back, and started yelling at her guards.

I stood there, fingers curling into my skirts so hard the silk bit into my palms.

My phone buzzed.

Unknown number. I slid into the shadow of the corridor, heart hammering, and opened the text.

The docks are just the beginning. The contract is a trap. If the Don signs tonight, New York burns.

I stared at it for three seconds.

It vanished. Poof. Gone. Like it had never existed.

I looked back at the foyer. Barbara, still ordering people around. Marcello, seething silently. The clock on the wall ticked forward.

Six hours until Bastian Marcone walked through that door. Yet somebody was pulling strings. Someone wanted this deal to burn. I didn't know who and why.

But I knew one thing with absolute, gut-wrenching certainty:

I was walking into that lion's mouth anyway.