Page 110 of Crown of Blood

"Because Alexei loved her," Vito answers simply. "Because she carried his child. She carriedyou. She knew exactly what she was doing when she took Volkov secrets and disappeared with your father."

My mother. The translator between families. The woman who worked for both sides until she vanished, pregnant and afraid.

"I want to hear the choice you are offering me," I say, focusing on the immediate threat rather than the past I can't change.

Vito's smile chills me to the bone. "Fine."

He takes a long breath, each second that passes growing more tense.

"I will offer you the same choice I offered Marina Sutton twenty-five years ago." He leans forward and looks me dead in the eye. "Leave Luca. Disappear. Take his child and vanish into a new life. I will arrange everything for you."

"Or?"

"Or watch my boy suffer for choosing tainted blood." Vito's voice drops to a whisper. "For claiming a Volkov descendant as his queen."

The oxygen tank clicks, pushing another breath into Vito's failing lungs. In the silence that follows, I hear the truth beneath his offer.

This isn't about choice at all.

In this world, there is never a choice. I know that by now.

If I stay, Vito will destroy Luca - not with bullets or blades, but with the revelation that his chosen wife carries Volkov blood. He'll use me to break Luca's spirit, just as he used Elena's death to shape Luca into a weapon.

If I run, I'll wound Luca in a different way. I'll become another Marina. Another woman who disappeared with a fatherless child.

The betrayal I leave behind would hollow Luca out, leave him empty except for rage. Vito would mold that rage, turning Luca into something even darker than before.

Either path leads to Luca's destruction.

That's Vito's real game.

He doesn't want me to choose between freedom and captivity. He wants me to choose how I'll help him break his son.

I meet his cold eyes, seeing the calculation behind his fake mercy. This is the man who ordered his wife's murder to keep control of his son. Who watched me for years, waiting for the perfect moment to use me against Luca.

And now he wants me to help him finish what Elena's death started - turning Luca into a mirror of himself.

"You had my father killed, didn't you?" I ask, the realization settling like stone in my stomach. "Because he ran away with her."

"I'm offering you mercy," Vito corrects, voice rasping. "More than I offered her."

"Like the mercy you showed Elena?"

Vito's hand moves, faster than I would have thought possible for a dying man. From beneath his blanket emerges a pistol, its barrel aimed at my chest with unwavering precision.

"Careful, Bianca," he warns. "The child you carry may be my grandchild, but even that tainted,filthyconnection has its limits."

I stare at the weapon, at the finger poised on the trigger. The man who ordered his wife's execution would think nothing of eliminating me if I became an obstacle.

But I am not the same woman who trembled in a hotel hallway when Luca first claimed me.

I am a Ravelli now—in name, in blood, in the life growing inside me.

"You won't shoot me," I say with a calmness I don't entirely feel. "Not here. Not like this. It lacks... poetry."

Vito's eyebrows lift slightly. "Poetry?"

"Isn't that what this has all been about? The perfect narrative. The perfect manipulation." I rise slowly from my chair, keeping my movements deliberate. "A hotel maid who turns out to be connected to your greatest enemies. Placed in your son's path at precisely the right moment. The daughter of a traitor, carrying the next Ravelli heir."

---