Chapter Seven: Blood in the Garden
742 Words
Palermo, 1983. Three weeks later.
The garden was silent, except for the rustle of lemon trees and the hum of dusk.
Dante stood by the marble fountain, hands clenched behind his back, staring down at water that mirrored nothing. The old sculpted angel had a chip in its wing. He hated it—had tried to replace it once. But his father had told him, “Imperfection belongs here. It reminds us where the cracks began.”
Cracks.
They were everywhere now.
Isabella’s true identity had not left his mind since she handed him the letter. Benedetta Vitale. Heiress to the family that once waged bloody war against his own. She had been raised in innocence, then weaponized by fate.
But it didn’t matter.
He didn’t care what blood ran through her veins.
What terrified him was how much he already needed her.
—
Isabella watched the security footage again and again. The camera outside the estate gates had captured a man in a dark coat, face blurred. He didn’t touch the intercom. Didn’t speak. Just stood there.
Watching.
Waiting.
It wasn’t the first time.
She slammed the laptop closed, heart hammering. She didn’t tell Dante. Not yet. Something inside her wanted to face this ghost herself. Maybe because she wanted answers. Or maybe because she knew—deep down—that someone wasn’t just following her.
They were coming to collect.
—
The attack came during a rare rainstorm. Thunder rolled over the villa as lightning illuminated the cliffs. Guards were distracted. Power flickered.
And then—shots. Shouts.
Dante moved like the wolf he was, gun drawn before his office door swung open. Blood on the rug. A guard down. Matteo shouting from below.
“Three men—North wing—searching for the girl!”
He didn’t hesitate.
“Find them,” Dante barked. “Bring one alive.”
He stormed toward her room, boots echoing down the marble hall.
But Isabella was already gone.
—
Outside, her gown clung to her in the rain as she crouched behind a stone column near the garden wall. She had seen the flash of a silenced muzzle through her window and slipped out just in time. The training Dante had insisted on—the knives, the signals, the exits—it pulsed through her now like instinct.
She was no longer prey. She was prepared.
One of the men spotted her—tall, scar across his brow.
“You’re coming with us, Benedetta.”
She threw the knife before he finished the sentence. It caught him in the thigh.
He howled.
Then came footsteps.
Not just his.
Dante.
Gunshots rang out. The man fell.
Dante reached her side in seconds, rain dripping from his hair, his shirt stained with blood that wasn’t his.
“You alright?” he demanded.
She nodded. Breathing hard.
He cupped her face, thumb brushing mud from her cheek.
Then his voice dropped. “They knew your name.”
She swallowed. “I didn’t tell anyone.”
“You didn’t have to.”
He looked past her toward the shadows beyond the wall.
“They were sent by him,” Dante muttered. “Don Carlo. He wants you back.”
“Why now?” she asked. “Why not fourteen years ago?”
“Because you’re no longer just his blood,” Dante said. “You’re a threat to his legacy. And maybe... something else he wants for himself.”
—
Later, after the bodies were taken and the storm cleared, they sat beneath the cracked-wing angel in the garden. Silent.
“I killed someone,” Isabella whispered.
“He would’ve killed you.”
“I know. It still matters.”
Dante lit a cigarette with shaking hands. Not from fear. From fury.
“You didn’t deserve any of this,” he said. “Not your past. Not tonight.”
She turned to him.
“What do I deserve, then?”
His voice was soft. Certain.
> “Freedom. Fire. And a chance not to be someone’s pawn.”
He looked at her then—not like a protector or a mafia boss.
But like a man seeing something sacred for the first time.
And she realized something terrifying and beautiful at once:
She trusted him.
Even now.
Especially now.
But trust didn’t erase what was coming.
And neither of them could pretend anymore—
The war had started.
And blood had already bloomed in the garden.
- Writer
