Gianna POV

Just as the last syllable left my lips, a presence filled the corridor—a drop in temperature, a shift in the air itself.

Dante emerged from the elevator, his frame seeming to diminish the corridor's dimensions.

He was a study in contained violence—well over six feet of it, his shoulders straining the seams of his jacket.

His white dress shirt, unbuttoned at the collar, was immaculate save for the dark, rust-colored stains that coated the knuckles of his right hand.

He was the Don of the Syndicate, a man whose authority was not announced but felt, like a drop in barometric pressure before a storm.

The guards' chins dipped to their chests in unison; Manager Rossi seemed to flatten himself against the damask wallpaper.

His dark eyes swept the scene—the guards, Rossi, me—before coming to rest on Elena, on the glistening tracks of her tears and the way she shivered inside his jacket.

A muscle knotted in his jaw. The force of his attention, when it turned to me, was a physical weight.

"What is this disturbance, Gianna?" Dante demanded, his voice a low rumble that seemed to originate from the floorboards.

I held his gaze, refusing to grant him even the slightest concession of a flinch.

"I am not causing a disturbance," I said. "I am containing a breach of your security."

Dante closed the distance between us in three long strides.

He stood right in front of me, smelling of sharp, expensive cologne and the metallic tang of blood.

"She is crying," Dante said, jabbing a finger—the knuckles still stained—in Elena's direction. "And you are interrogating her like some rat in our ranks."

"Elena is wearing your clothes and implying the two of you were in that room together," I replied, my tone devoid of the tremor I felt deep in my bones.

Dante frowned, looking at his jacket draped over Elena's shoulders.

Consigliere Enzo stepped forward, his movement a quiet breach of the rigid etiquette that governed the men.

"Don Dante," Enzo said respectfully. "Miss Gianna's assessment was accurate. You were with me. Miss Elena entered the suite alone and orchestrated this display. And the logs are sealed—there is no possibility of tampering."

Dante looked at Enzo, then back at me.

The light in his eyes seemed to extinguish.

I watched the shutters come down in his mind, the refusal to process the calculated nature of the scene.

His loyalty to the idea of her—the fragile girl he'd known since childhood—was a fortress wall, impervious to fact.

"There is nothing between us," Dante warned, his voice dropping to the resonant octave that tolerated no argument. "You are becoming hysterical over a piece of clothing. Drop it."

An order from the Don was meant to be the final word on any matter.

It meant the conversation was over.

"Demanding obedience without explaining how she came to possess a master keycard is not authority," I replied. "It is an abdication of it."

Dante's eyes widened, not with anger, but with a flicker of pure astonishment.

No one had ever defied his command.

Elena let out a sharp gasp.

She swayed on her feet, her hand flying to her forehead in a gesture of contrived distress.

"Dante, I feel so dizzy," Elena whispered, her eyelids fluttering closed.

I instantly took three large steps backward.

I moved so fast that my shoulder collided hard with the wall.

"Stand back," I ordered the guards. "No one touch her."

Dante lunged forward, catching Elena before she could hit the carpet.

He scooped her into his massive arms, directing a look at me of such profound accusation I might as well have held a bloody knife.

"Are you satisfied?" Dante snarled, the fury in his eyes burning cold. "You've pushed her into a panic attack."

"I was five feet away from her," I pointed out, the words clipped and precise.

"Manager Rossi," I called out.

"Yes, Miss Gianna?" Rossi squeaked.

"Open a standard suite on the fourth floor under Miss Elena's own name," I ordered.

I looked down at Elena, who was burying her face into Dante's chest.

"Her access to the Don's name, his accounts, and the restricted floors of this building is hereby revoked," I declared.

Dante tightened his grip on Elena.

"Are you trying to back her into a corner?" Dante demanded, his voice dark and threaded with a quiet promise of violence.

"She said she was dizzy," I replied. "I am getting her a bed. Her departure from this floor is for her own health."

I turned my back on the Don of the Syndicate.

I walked toward the elevator, leaving Dante standing in the hallway with his weeping charge in his arms.