Chapter 13
1206 Words
Dante’s POV
She stood beside me like light in a room full of vultures.
Sweet, soft Selene.
Clutching her wine glass with both hands, trying to steady the tremble I knew she hated anyone seeing. Her eyes scanned the crowd with that nervous smile that did nothing to hide her discomfort but everything to ignite something primal in me.
She didn’t know—not yet—that she had just been marked.
Not just by me.
But by them.
By the men who ruled beside me in shadows. By the wolves in tailored suits and the daughters their fathers had trained to seduce power. Eyes followed her, like a pack circling a doe in the forest, but none dared move closer.
They saw her beauty, but they also saw the warning in my stance. The steel in my jaw. The way I hovered near her like a f*****g animal daring anyone to take a step too close.
Still, that didn’t stop the interest. The curiosity.
She didn’t know what it meant to walk into a room like this with me. What it meant to stand at my side when I had deliberately defied every tradition, every alliance, every calculated move expected of a Salvatore.
Especially tonight.
Because tonight wasn’t just a party.
It was a declaration.
One that couldn’t be undone.
A low hush rolled through the room. I felt it before I saw the source. That shift in the air, the way attention snapped in one direction, reverence coated with dread.
I didn’t have to look to know who it was.
He always made a f*****g entrance.
My father.
Descending the staircase like he owned the air in our lungs.
Dressed in his signature black tailored suit, blood-red handkerchief tucked into his breast pocket like some perverse nod to the lives he’d taken. His expression was carved from stone—shallow lines cut deep by time and cruelty. Cold eyes that never missed anything, least of all weakness.
And he looked right at me.
I didn’t move. I just breathed through the quiet fire in my chest and felt Selene shift closer.
She hadn’t recognized him, not yet. But she felt it—the change in atmosphere, the way the room held its breath.
Her hand brushed against my side.
Good.
She didn’t need to know the truth. Not yet.
Not that this wasn’t just some gathering.
It was war.
War dressed in velvet and champagne, strung together with diamonds and sharpened smiles. It was a showcase. A warning. A claim.
That she was mine.
That I had chosen her—Selene Moretti—over Bianca Vescari, over the daughters of dons and the alliances their fathers begged me to forge in blood and name.
And they hated me for it.
But they feared me more.
My father approached slowly, deliberately. He didn’t look at Selene at first.
He looked at me.
And the silence between us grew teeth.
“Dante,” he said, voice sharp as glass.
“Father.” My tone was steady, but there was fire beneath it. Fire I didn’t care to hide anymore.
The tension between us was thick enough to choke the entire goddamn ballroom. Conversations slowed, glasses paused mid-air, eyes subtly turned our way, waiting. Watching.
Selene’s hand rested against my suit jacket now, small and trembling. But still warm.
Still here.
His eyes shifted. Finally.
To her.
And I saw it—the way his expression barely moved, but everything sharpened. Focused.
She gave him a polite nod. Sweet. Naïve.
She had no idea who he was.
No idea what her presence here meant.
What her existence meant.
“You brought her here,” he said flatly. “To this.”
“She belongs with me.”
His jaw tightened, a small flicker of rage passing through him like a crack in his marble mask. “That’s not what we agreed.”
“We never agreed,” I said, low and calm. “You ordered. I declined.”
He hated when I did this. When I stood my ground. When I reminded him I wasn’t his f*****g puppet.
His eyes flared. But his voice was steady. Too steady.
“You’ve made a mockery of everything we’ve built. Parading a girl—”
“Watch your mouth.” I stepped forward without thought, instinct taking over. My arm moved subtly, shifting Selene behind me, out of the direct line of fire.
“She’s not some girl. She’s mine. That makes her untouchable.”
The words hung in the air like a loaded gun.
The men nearby had gone quiet. I could feel their gazes like knives in my back. Measuring me. Measuring her.
My father didn’t blink.
“And what happens when your enemies use her against you?” he asked, eyes narrowing. “When her blood is on your hands?”
“I’ll drown this city in theirs.”
The room seemed to still at that. The music continued, but no one was really listening anymore.
Selene’s hand clutched tighter into my jacket. I could feel the confusion, the worry, the panic radiating off her—but she didn’t speak. Didn’t move.
She didn’t understand yet. Thought this was just a father-son argument. Thought I’d just lost my temper.
She didn’t know this was the beginning of something none of us could walk away from.
A war that had been waiting to erupt.
One I’d just declared in front of them all.
My father stared at me for a long, heavy moment, and then, slowly, his lips curled in something that wasn’t quite a smile.
“Fine,” he said, voice silk-wrapped steel. “Then introduce her. To all of them. Let them see who you’re willing to burn the world for.”
And with that, he turned.
Walked away.
Like it didn’t matter. Like the ground hadn’t just cracked beneath our feet.
But his words stayed behind like poison.
Introduce her.
Not just to the crowd.
To the wolves.
To the men who called me boss behind closed doors. To the families that still whispered about bloodlines and loyalty, about blood pacts and daughters raised to be mafia queens. To the ones who would either protect her because of me—or destroy her because they knew it would hurt.
I looked down at Selene.
Her lips were parted slightly, her brow furrowed. Confused. Concerned.
“Are you okay?” she asked softly, voice so gentle it almost broke something in me.
I wanted to take her away. Right then.
Steal her from the room and disappear into the night. Wrap her in my arms and erase the way those bastards looked at her. Hide her from this world of blood and ruin and men who would carve up their own daughters for power.
But I couldn’t.
Because I’d brought her here.
Because this was her world now too.
Instead, I leaned in, brushing a kiss across her forehead, breathing her in like she was the only clean thing left in this rotten place.
“Stay close to me, amore mio,” I whispered.
Because if tonight went the way I feared—
She would never be able to walk away again.
And neither would I.
- Writer
