Seraphina POV

Twenty minutes later, the guttural roar of heavy engines rattled the foundations of the Rossi estate.

I had positioned myself at the edge of the second-floor landing, my shadow falling long across the grand foyer below.

The threadbare cotton dress I wore, the same one used for scrubbing laundry, was stiff and smelled of stale, dirty water. My face was bare, and I kept my burned right hand tucked behind my back.

Outside, a convoy of a dozen bulletproof SUVs with New York plates consumed the driveway, their tires churning the manicured gravel.

A volley of car doors slammed shut in unison, the sound cracking through the estate like a rifle shot.

Below, our estate guards fell back in a panic, lowering their weapons. No one in their right mind aimed a gun at the Falcone Family.

Marco and Elena rushed out of Marco's office. The color had drained from my father's face, leaving it ashen; his knees looked as though they might buckle.

With a shriek of rusted brass, the two walnut front doors were thrown open.

Dante Falcone stepped over the threshold. He wore a tailored black overcoat over a dark suit.

He was a man of immense stature, and as he entered, the motes of dust dancing in the foyer's light were thrown into a frantic swirl by his sudden shadow. Even standing still, an aura of suppressed violence emanated from him.

He was flanked by heavily armed soldiers and his Consigliere, a stern man carrying a polished mahogany briefcase.

Isabella stepped forward. Predatory ambition lit her eyes at the sight of the powerful Don.

She ran a hand through her styled hair and adjusted the plunging neckline of her dress. Elena hissed at her to show respect but shoved her forward like a prized show pony.

Marco began to grovel, bowing his head in a pathetic, trembling greeting.

Isabella flashed a seductive smile. "Welcome to our home, Don Falcone."

Dante's gaze passed over her as if she were no more than a piece of furniture. He walked past them all like ghosts.

His cold, lethal gaze swept past the Capo, his wife, and the nervous associates in the parlor. His dark eyes found me and locked on.

The air in the room thinned. He stared up at me, finding me where I stood half-hidden in the shadows of the second floor.

He moved toward the grand staircase. His footsteps were slow, measured, deliberate.

Marco opened his mouth to speak, but a massive Falcone soldier stepped into his path, silencing him with a single, warning glare.

Dante ascended the steps. He didn't stop until he was standing right in front of me.

Up close, the man was handsome in a terrifying way. A faint, pale scar cut through his left eyebrow, adding to his dangerous allure. His dark, fathomless eyes remained focused on my face.

His gaze flicked down, analyzing my defensive posture. He noticed the way my shoulder dipped forward in an attempt to hide my right arm.

He reached out.

I flinched, my body braced for a brutal strike.

He froze. A muscle feathered in his tightened jaw. When he moved again, it was with agonizing slowness.

His large hand gently wrapped around my wrist, pulling my hidden arm out from behind my back.

He turned my hand over, exposing the angry, blistered burn that marred my skin.

Dante's handsome face remained an unreadable mask of stone. But his gentle grip on my wrist tightened just a fraction.

The temperature in the hallway seemed to plummet, and the silence that followed became deafening.

"Does it hurt?" he asked, his voice a low, gravelly rumble.

I froze. The air in my lungs seemed to have been siphoned away, and in the sudden vacuum, I could hear the tick of the grandfather clock in the hall below. No one had bothered to ask me that all day. No one in this house had cared.

Sensing the shift, Elena rushed up the stairs, her designer heels clicking frantically against the hardwood. She tried to intervene, forcing a shrill, nervous laugh.

"Don Falcone," Marco called out from the bottom of the stairs. "You must have mistaken her identity. That is just Seraphina. She is a wild liability, unsuited for the mafia elite."

Elena chimed in, hovering a few feet away. "Isabella is our true pride. She has been meticulously groomed for the underworld. She knows how to represent a powerful family."

Down below, Isabella faked a few delicate tears and bit her glossy lip. "Please excuse my sister, Don Falcone. She severely lacks the class for someone of your immense stature. We were just discussing sending her away to learn some proper manners."

Dante listened to their pathetic chorus. He did not look at them.

He kept his dark eyes locked on my burn, the pad of his thumb beginning to lightly, soothingly brush against the uninjured skin of my inner wrist.

When their babbling ceased, Dante turned his head just a fraction. "Are you done?"

His icy gaze dismissed Isabella, reducing her to nothing. He looked back at me, and when he spoke, he used my name for the first time. "Seraphina."

The dark, velvety sound of my name slipping from his lips sent an involuntary shiver down my spine.

"I came here today for one reason," Dante stated, his voice ringing out as an undeniable command. "I am taking you."

Marco panicked. He rushed up a few steps, terrified of losing whatever deal he had brewing. "But Don Falcone, we already have an arrangement for her. It is a strict matter of family business."

Dante cut him off with a look. His tone was deathly quiet, but it carried the heavy, undeniable promise of a bloodbath. "I am here only for Seraphina. Isabella is irrelevant. The rest of you are irrelevant."

Desperate to salvage her plans, Elena forced a painfully tight smile. "But how could a girl who knows nothing of our world stand beside a Don? She cannot hold up the Falcone Family."

Dante turned his glare on her. His eyes were terrifyingly dead. "She doesn't need to hold up the Falcone Family. The Falcone Family will hold her up."

Without breaking eye contact with my stepmother, he snapped his fingers.

His Consigliere stepped forward, placing the mahogany briefcase on a hall table and clicking it open. He pulled out a thick stack of legal documents.

"This is the Blood Dowry," the Consigliere stated, his voice echoing in the foyer. "All assets listed are strictly in Seraphina's name. The Rossi Family has zero access and zero authority over them."

He began to read the staggering list. "A private fortress in New York. Five percent of the Falcone Family's legitimate port operations. Untraceable offshore accounts. Millions in loose diamonds and liquid cash."

Marco turned a sickly shade of pale. His deep-seated greed overpowered his fear of the Don. "By mafia tradition, the dowry belongs to the Capo. It legally belongs to the father!"

Dante stepped down the few remaining stairs into Marco's personal space. The violent energy rolling off the younger Don made my father stumble backward down to the foyer floor in terror.

"Tradition?" Dante sneered, his voice dripping with lethal disgust. "You treated her like a dog. You forfeit the right to her dowry."

Elena's strained smile twitched at the corners, the muscles in her jaw tightening as her smile lines deepened. Below them, Isabella gripped the expensive fabric of her dress until her knuckles turned white, her beautiful face twisting in ugly humiliation and raw fury.

Dismissing them, Dante turned his broad back on my family. He looked back up to where I stood on the landing, and slowly extended his large, scarred hand to me.

"Are you ready to leave this hell with me right now?" he asked softly, the question meant only for me.

I looked at his outstretched hand. Then, I let my gaze drop to the cruel, shocked faces of my father, my stepmother, and my sister.

They were staring up at me with pure, unadulterated hatred. But for the first time in my miserable life, their hatred did not scare me.

I slowly lifted my arm and placed my uninjured hand securely into his. "I am."

Dante's strong fingers interlocked with mine, his grip warm and possessive. He pulled me gently to his solid side, shielding me from their stares.

Together, he led me down the grand stairs and straight out the front doors of the estate. I walked out into the crisp, cold air by his side, and I never once looked back.

Behind me, I heard Isabella's muffled sob of rage, Elena's sharp intake of breath, and Marco's panicked whisper to his guards. But their voices faded with every step I took toward the convoy. The heavy doors of the bulletproof SUV opened for me, and as I slid into the leather seat, I caught one last glimpse of the Rossi estate in the side mirror.

It already looked smaller.

Seraphina POV

Barely fifteen minutes into the drive, Dante ordered his driver to divert the convoy. We did not go to his estate; instead, we went to a private, underground clinic controlled by the syndicate.

A trusted mob doctor was waiting for us. He led me to a sterile room and examined my hand. He cleaned the burn, applied a cooling medical-grade salve, and wrapped it in fresh white bandages.

The cleaning process stung terribly, but I sat perfectly still on the examination table. I stared at the wall and endured the pain in silence.

Dante sat in a leather chair beside the table. I watched him out of the corner of my eye. As the doctor worked, Dante's hand gripped the armrest of his chair so tightly his knuckles strained.

"You can cry," Dante murmured, his voice dropping low in the quiet room.

I shook my head. My throat felt dry and raspy. "I don't cry." I swallowed hard. "My mother said crying is just a manipulation tactic."

Dante went dead silent. He did not say another word, but I noticed his knuckles turning white against the dark leather armrest. A silent, terrifying rage rolled off his body, filling the small room until it was hard to breathe.

We left the clinic at two in the morning. The convoy drove back into the city, arriving at Dante's heavily guarded, ultra-luxurious penthouse.

The head housekeeper greeted us at the private elevator doors, bowing her head respectfully. Dante issued quiet orders to her before she led me upstairs to the second floor.

My suite was massive, decorated in soft blues and creams. The bed was huge and plush, and a tray with warm water and fresh pastries waited on the nightstand.

The closet, lined with cedar, was filled with designer dresses on velvet hangers, their price tags still attached and glinting under the recessed lighting. I retreated to the marble bathroom, where a tube of premium burn ointment sat beside an array of expensive soaps, their presence a quiet accusation. I walked back into the center of the bedroom and stopped, a trespasser in a museum, my hands twisting the coarse fabric of my own dress.

Dante leaned against the doorframe. He had taken off his overcoat, and he watched me with intense, dark eyes.

I turned to him anxiously. "What are my duties?" I asked. "What do you need me to clean first?"

"Nothing," Dante replied.

I shook my head, stepping toward him. "I can scrub floors. I can do the laundry. I know how to cook for large groups. If I am taking up too much space in this room, I can sleep on the floor. I am used to it."

Dante pushed off the doorframe. He stepped into the room, closing the distance between us. He was so tall I had to tilt my head back to look at him, and he bent slightly to meet my eyes.

"Seraphina," he said, his voice dropping to a rough whisper. "You didn't marry me to be a maid in my house."

I stared at him, stunned. "Then what am I here for?"

Dante looked at me with a hidden devotion that made my chest ache. "To be worshipped."

The walls I had built for eighteen years cracked down the middle. My vision blurred, the edges of the ornate Persian rug beginning to bleed and swim in a wash of unshed tears.

"Why?" I asked, my voice breaking. "Why is the most dangerous man in the city being so good to me?"

Dante reached into his pocket and handed me a clean linen handkerchief. "Do you believe in fate?" he asked softly.

He didn't explain further, leaving me to sleep. But as I lay in the massive bed, staring at the soft glow of the nightlight I hadn't asked for yet somehow already had, his question echoed in my mind. Fate. Was that what this was? Or was there something more—something he wasn't telling me yet?

By morning, the news of the Don taking the Rossi outcast spread through the underworld like wildfire. Rumors and whispers flooded the syndicate network.

I woke up to the sound of the suite's cordless landline ringing. The digital display on the sleek device flashed a forwarded call from the syndicate's switchboard. The caller ID said Mother.

I answered it, my stomach tying in knots out of pure habit.

Elena screamed into the speaker. "Return to this house immediately! You will apologize to Isabella for stealing her spotlight. You have humiliated this family!"

I looked down at my freshly bandaged hand resting on the silk sheets. "What do I have to apologize for?" I asked softly.

Elena exploded. "You broke Omertà! You are a disgrace to our bloodline."

Marco took the phone from her. His tone was softer, dripping with manipulation. "Seraphina, listen to me. We will give you a bigger room. We will publicly acknowledge you as a Rossi. Just come home. And while you are at it, beg Dante to give us the shipping routes he controls."

A large hand reached over my shoulder, and Dante took the cordless receiver from my ear.

"She is never going back," Dante spoke into the receiver.

Elena shrieked in the background. "This is Family business!"

Dante's voice was lethal. "The moment you tried to sell her to Chicago, she ceased being your Family. She is Falcone now."

He hung up the phone and tossed the expensive device into the trash can. He looked down at me. "Are you hungry?"

I nodded slowly.

Dante took me out under heavy guard. After eating at a private restaurant, he brought me to a high-end boutique controlled by the Falcone Family. The staff scrambled to lock the doors and present their best collections.

I walked past the racks of clothing. I looked at the first price tag and immediately shook my head, pulling my hand back. I was conditioned to believe I was not worth the fabric.

"What do you actually like?" Dante asked, standing behind me.

I timidly touched the sleeve of a pale blue gown; the silk was incredibly soft.

"Box up the entire rack," Dante ordered the store manager without looking away from me.

The staff rushed to obey, and the manager urged me into the fitting room to try on the blue dress.

I stood in front of the full-length mirror. The dress fit perfectly. It swept the floor, making me look elegant, but I remembered Elena's voice in my head, telling me I was too common for fine clothes.

Dante stepped into the fitting area, standing behind my reflection. He placed his large hands near my waist—not quite touching me, but close enough that I felt his heat.

"You look perfect," he said to my reflection.

I smiled down at the floor, tears falling again, hot and fast. I realized, for the first time in my life, I was truly seen and protected, and no one was going to take it away.

But even as the tears fell, a question nagged at the back of my mind—the same question from last night. Why me? Why had the most powerful Don in New York been waiting for my call?