MARKED BY THE DEVIL'S SON

Chapter Three: Moving In

I didn't sleep that night.

I lay on my mattress in the dark electricity still off, city light bleeding through the thin curtains and stared at the ceiling with the black card balanced on my chest, rising and falling with every breath.

$20,000 a month.

Six months.

I turned the card over in my fingers until the edges felt warm.

By 3AM I had talked myself out of it four times. By 5AM I had talked myself back in three. By the time pale morning crept under my door I was still lying there, no closer to peace, but somehow already knowing what I was going to do.

I was going to say yes.

Not because of the money. Not entirely.

It was something he had said. You don't know anything about what I've survived. The way those words had come out of me quiet and certain like they had been waiting a long time to be said to someone who looked at me like I was breakable.

Luca Valentino didn't think I would last.

That alone was reason enough.

I packed in two hours.

It didn't take long. Two years in this apartment and I had almost nothing to show for it. A suitcase of clothes. A box of books. A small photograph of my mother tucked into the front pocket of my bag where I always kept it close enough to touch when things got hard.

I stood in the middle of the empty room and looked around one last time.

No. Not empty. It had never been full enough to be empty.

I picked up my suitcase and walked across the hall.

I raised my hand to knock.

The door opened before my knuckles touched it.

Not Luca. A woman. Tall, sharp-faced, somewhere in her fifties, with silver-streaked hair pulled back so severely it looked like a warning. She looked me up and down in one clean sweep and whatever she found did not impress her.

"You're the girl," she said.

"Aria," I said. "Aria Collins."

"I know your name." She stepped back to let me in. "I'm Elena. I run this household. Whatever you need, you ask me. Whatever Mr. Valentino needs, I handle. You stay out of the way and we'll get along fine."

"Understood," I said.

She looked at my suitcase. Then at my box of books. A single line appeared between her brows.

"That's everything?"

"Yes."

She pressed her lips together and said nothing. But something moved in her eyes that wasn't quite pity and wasn't quite respect. Something in between.

"Come," she said. "I'll show you your room."

My room was not a room.

It was larger than my entire apartment. A king bed with white linen so crisp it looked untouched by human hands. Floor to ceiling windows this side of the building facing a quieter street, softer light. A wardrobe that could have housed a family. A bathroom with a bathtub I could have slept in.

I stood in the doorway and didn't move for a full ten seconds.

"Mr. Valentino had it prepared this morning," Elena said from behind me. "Early."

I thought about him waking before dawn to arrange this. I pushed the thought away immediately.

"It's fine," I said. "Thank you."

"Dinner is at seven. He eats alone but expects you present at the table." She paused. "His rules, not mine."

I turned to look at her. "He eats alone but expects me present?"

"He didn't explain it to me and I didn't ask." She gave me a look that said clearly I shouldn't either. "Seven o'clock. Don't be late."

She left

I walked slowly to the window and looked out at the city below.

Somewhere behind me, through walls that probably cost more than my entire life, was Luca Valentino. Moving through his morning. Unbothered. Certain.

You are a solution to a problem. Nothing more.

I pressed my fingers against the cold glass.

"Okay," I said quietly, to myself, to the city, to no one. "Let's see who breaks first."

I didn't see him until seven.

I found the dining room by following the smell of food through a hallway lined with dark art that I didn't look at too closely. The table was long and dark and set at one end only two places, close together, which felt oddly intimate for a man who had said he ate alone.

He was already seated.

Dark shirt again. No jacket this time. Sleeves pushed up to his forearms, phone face down beside his plate, a glass of water untouched in front of him. He looked up when I walked in and said nothing.

I sat down across from him.

Elena appeared from nowhere and placed food in front of us both something warm and rich that smelled extraordinary

Silence.

I picked up my fork. He picked up his. We ate.

Two minutes passed. Maybe three.

"You actually came," he said, without looking up from his plate.

"I said I would."

"People say a lot of things."

I looked at him across the table. "Is that your experience? People don't follow through?"

He glanced up. Those black eyes finding mine with an ease that felt almost practiced.

"Always," he said simply.

I held that word quietly.

"I follow through," I said.

Something moved at the corner of his mouth. That almost smile.but it vanished.